Ink Suit Actor: Difference between revisions

[[File:InksuitActor.jpg|link=Shrek|thumb|400px|The resemblance is [[Uncanny Valley|unc]][[Just for Pun|anny]], isn't it?]]

 

 

A famous actor whose animated counterpart is essentially the actor themselves. Actors playing themselves is an admittedly common occurrence, but one that makes less sense in animation.

Later, it became common to give voice acting jobs to actors who didn't traditionally perform voice acting, just to get their names on movie posters. One simple example is for the actors to play themselves, with the assumption that the audience will recognize them anyway. This can be taken to extremes when the animated character is modified to ''look'' like the actor, even if that requires a bizarre caricature that makes no sense in the story. This has a strange effect: the character feels less genuine, as if the writers just [[Hanna-Barbera|"stole" the actor to make into a character]]. This can also be used with non-white characters so those in production can easily shoot down any accusations the design is racist or offensive in some way by simply stating that's what the actor actually looks like.

 

 

The advantage to this is it can assist the animator in getting the details and mannerisms to look correct, since it is even easier to reproduce the mannerisms of an actor in three dimensions as in (the already commonly done) two dimensions. Also, there is more "acting" in voice acting than most people think; it is almost impossible to voice act properly without making facial expressions and gestures in front of the microphone.

 

 

Elements of actors' mannerisms and personality are often worked into their characters; while filming ''[[A Bug's Life]]'', for example, Pixar often films big-name voice actors and then adds a few of their gestures to their characters. This trope is for more severe cases, where the creators basically just took their voice actor and made him a bug/robot/genie/whatever.

 

See also [[Serkis Folk]], where a motion capture suit is used to model an actor's movements which is then overlaid with the CGI character. Compare "[[No Celebrities Were Harmed]]", where the celebrity caricature is voiced by an impersonator, and [[Comic Book Fantasy Casting]], which includes the modelling of a cartoon or computer character on an actor who does not voice them. Frequently [[Lost in Translation]] in dubs, since the animated character looks the same, but the voice actor is different. For bonus celebrity fanservice, see also [[Hey, It's That Voice!]].

 

* Emporio Ivankov from ''[[One Piece]]'' is based off an acquaintance of Oda's. Said acquaintance ends up voicing Ivankov in the anime, [[The Other Darrin|initially.]]

* The ''[[Cowboy Bebop]]'' movie has a minor character voiced by Renji Ishibashi who looks like Renji Ishibashi and is even ''[[The Danza|named]]'' Renji. However, this is a bit of a subversion - the writer was having trouble writing the scene, so they based one of the robbers off of Ishibashi. Shinichiro Watanabe later half-jokingly offered the part to Ishibashi, and he accepted.

* Tsukishima from ''[[Bleach]]'' looks a lot alike like his seiyuu [[Daisuke Ono]]

* Shinpachi from ''[[Gintama]]'' and Sugihara Teppei from ''[[Sket Dance]]'' looks like their seiyuu [[Daisuke Sakaguchi]].

 

* Ultimate Nick Fury of ''[[Ultimate Marvel]]'' is modeled after [[Samuel L. Jackson]] with his permission. Turns out Jackson allowed it so that ''he'' could play Nick Fury in live-action films, starting with the ''[[Iron Man (film)|Iron Man]]'' series.

 

 

* [[Coraline (animation)|Coraline]]'s [http://www.flickr.com/photos/w2b/3259104634/ other father] bears [http://tmbw.net/wiki/images/thumb/6/62/Linnell.jpg/180px-Linnell.jpg a striking resemblance] to his singing voice actor, [[They Might Be Giants|John Linnell]].

* Despite its fixation on maintaining its iconic characters, Disney also used obvious caricatures of its stock company voice actors in many films - thinly-disguised versions of Paul "Tigger" Winchell and Buddy Hackett show up a lot. During the golden age of Disney Animation basing characters on their voice actors was virtually company policy. Some examples include:

** The Genie from ''[[Aladdin (Disney film)|Aladdin]]'', possibly the textbook example of this trope, does bear some facial resemblance to [[Robin Williams]]. Except for the beard. And the muscles. And being blue, of course.

** According to the [[DVD Commentary]] for ''[[The Jungle Book (Disney film)|The Jungle Book]]'', the characters were designed to resemble their voice actors. This is most apparent in Shere Khan... look at a picture of him and then look at George Sanders and it's obvious.

*** King Louie ''is'' Louis Prima - to the point where it raised legal issues when ''[[The Jungle Book (Disney film)|The Jungle Book]]'''s cast was adapted to ''[[Tale Spin]]'' (and Louie remains conspicuously absent from Disney's sequel).

** Compare Baloo from that film and Little John from ''[[Robin Hood (Disney film)|Robin Hood]]'' and Thomas O'Malley in ''[[The Aristocats]]''. All are practically an [[Expy]] of the other and all were voiced by Phil Harris. Partly explained by the fact that the films were both made during [[The Dark Age of Animation]] and Disney was cutting corners all over the place.

*** There's also the 'Oh, that's just great' scowl of each... Especially the jaw movement.

** Hades, the [[Big Bad]] of the Disney version of ''[[Hercules (1997 film)||Hercules]]'', is voiced by James Woods, and was drawn with similar facial features and even most of the body language Woods was using when he was recording his lines. James Woods enjoyed the role so much that he agreed to play Hades again whenever needed - even in cameo parts. Phil in the same movie had his facial expressions modeled after his voice actor, Danny DeVito.

** Irene Bedard was the speaking voice and the physical model for ''[[Pocahontas]]''.

*** Likewise, [[Christian Bale]]'s character, Thomas, resembles the actor. Bale admitted as much in a 1995 interview for ''[[Disney Adventures]]'', adding that Disney had even sent in an artist to sketch the actor's movements during recording.

** Scar in ''[[The Lion King]]'' strongly resembles Jeremy Irons, who voices him. The hyena Shenzi also resembles Whoopi Goldberg, with many of her facial expressions used. And Zazu, voiced by [[Rowan Atkinson]], looks suspiciously [[Mr. Bean]]-esque. Adult Simba also looks somewhat like [[Matthew Broderick]].

*** ''Anything'' played by Whoopi Goldberg is going to look like Whoopi Goldberg.

** ''[[Pirates of the Caribbean]]'': Davy Jones' facial features, especially his eyes and cheekbones, were modeled directly from Bill Nighy's head using motion-capture dots on his face.

** Ed Wynn and Jerry Colonna as ''[[Alice in Wonderland (Disney film)|Alice in Wonderland]]'''s Mad Hatter and March Hare, respectively.

*** Nani from the same movie looks quite a bit like Tia Carrere.

** Of course, many of the 1950s examples are due largely to the animators' use of reference footage during this time.

** Before [[Eddie Murphy]] ''was'' Donkey, he ''was'' Mushu the Dragon in ''[[Mulan]]''.

** According to the DVD commentary for ''[[Beauty and the Beast]]'', the producers mentioned that Richard White and Jessi Courti were the physical doubles of Gaston and Lefou.

** One high point of ''[[Home on the Range]]'': Steve Buscemi as... well, Steve Buscemi.

** Tiana in ''[[The Princess and the Frog]]'' took a lot from Anika Noni Rose, even her left handed-ness.

** While [[The Great Mouse Detective|Ratigan]] is considerably burlier than [[Vincent Price]], Price's dramatic hand gestures were deliberately worked into the character animation.

** Jane Porter from ''[[Tarzan (Disney film)|Tarzan]]'' looks a great deal like her voice actress Minnie Driver.

** And from Tangled {{spoiler|after Rapunzel gets her hair cut she looks a lot like Mandy Moore.}}

*** If anything it's pretty much subverted with Flynn Rider, because when the artists designed him, they went through different styles to make Flynn as handsome as possible (Not to say that Zachary Levi isn't attractive, but the artists didn't try to make Flynn look like him.) (Although he does, actually. Zac is tall, lanky, with dark hair and eyes and a ready wit).

** Despite being an entire cast of obviously and adorably inhuman creatures almost ''every single character'' in ''[[Monsters, Inc.]]'' ends up looking like their voice actor in some way, especially for Sully and Mike, who could not be ''any more'' John Goodman and Billy Crystal (respectively).

*** [[Word of God]] stated on the [[DVD Commentary]] of that film notes that Dory from ''[[Finding Nemo]]'' looks an awful lot like Ellen Degeneres, despite being a fish. Once again, it was unintentional, it just a result of the artists watching the footage of the voice actors and inserting subtle facial expressions, etc. Willem Dafeo's character, Gill, has the same facial scar.

** The opening sentence of [[Roger Ebert]]'s ''[[Cars]]'' review:

{{quote|I wouldn't have thought that even in animation a 1951 Hudson Hornet could look simultaneously like itself '''and''' like Paul Newman, but you will witness that feat, and others, in "Cars."}}

* One look at the main character from ''[[Titan A.E.]]'' is enough to figure out who [[Matt Damon|voices him]].

* ''[[Avatar (film)|Avatar]]''. Which, to be sure, was kind of the point.

* In a non-animated example, the ''[[The Gingerdead Man]]'' looks exactly like Gary Busey.

* Most of the human characters in ''[[Curious George]]'' look startlingly like their voice actors (Maggie ''is'' [[Drew Barrymore]], Mr. Bloomsberry ''is'' Dick Van Dyke, Junior ''is'' David Cross etc). Notable exception: Ted, who looks nothing like [[Will Ferrell]] and more like... well... The Man In The Yellow Hat.

 

* Three Muppet folk singers who appeared in skits on talk shows and the first season of ''[[The Muppet Show]]'' were Foam Suit Actor versions of [[Jim Henson]], Frank Oz and Jerry Juhl. In one talk show appearance, the puppeteers wore identical outfits for the interview afterwards.

* Cantus the Minstrel in ''[[Fraggle Rock]]'' also looks like [[Jim Henson]].

* [http://images.wikia.com/muppet/images/f/f9/Stiller.jpg Stiller the Elf], voiced by Ben Stiller in ''[[Sesame Street|Elmo's Christmas Countdown]]''.

 

* Certain movie-based games have the likenesses and voices of the actors who played in the film version.

* BioWare has been doing this a lot in their games since they started using modern game engines:

* ''[[Modern Wafare|Call of Duty 4]]'' has Staff Sergeant Griggs, who was voiced by, named, and modeled after Infinity Ward's lead animator at the time, Mark Grigsby.

 

* [[Adam West]] on ''[[Family Guy]]''. In fact, there's [[Adam Westing|a whole trope]] for this particular arrangement.

* Dr. Blight from ''[[Captain Planet and the Planeteers]]'' happens to resemble her voice actress, Meg Ryan.

* The creators of ''[[Transformers Animated]]'' mentioned that their version of Wreck-Gar's facial features were partially modeled after those of his voice actor, [["Weird Al" Yankovic]]. Of course, Weird Al is pretty cartoony looking himself.

** And then there's the episode ''Human Error'', where the Autobots are briefly turned into Humans. Their appearances were apparently modeled upon the actual voice-actors who portrayed them.

** Also Ricky Gervais as Charles.

** This might be an inversion, but take a look at [http://i3.digiguide.com/p/0809/12148-DanCastellaneta-12210549310.jpg Dan Castellaneta] sometime. Even though he is much thinner than Homer, there's no denying the similarity in hairstyle (or lack thereof).

*** Homer's friends [[John Waters|John]] and Ray Magini were just as obvious.

** Marge's convict friend Dwight bears a close resemblance to [[Steve Buscemi]], who's a good sport about the other characters calling him "needy and bug-eyed."

* ''[[The Flintstones]]'' often had stars with slightly-altered names ("Ann Margarock", et al), though this shades over into Simpson-like Special Guest territory since the characters were so blatantly their actors.

** Cosgrove ''is'' Ed Asner.

*** Disturbingly enough, so does Granny Goodness, [[Larynx Dissonance|played by Asner]] in ''[[Superman: The Animated Series]]'' and ''[[Justice League]]''. Even more disturbingly, if you read the original [[Jack Kirby]] comics, you'll see that it's not that much of a stretch to make Granny look like Ed Asner.

* Many characters (usually the narrators and main characters) in the mostly stop-motion [[Rankin/Bass Productions|Rankin/Bass]] holiday specials of the '60s and '70s were modeled after their voice actors.

** Burl Ives as Sam the Snowman, in ''[[Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer]]'', is probably the definitive example, so much so that Ives is now more famous for that role than for his folksinging or his Oscar-winning turn in ''The Big Country'', even though he only provides a voice here. Look at a picture of the guy, and then at the snowman, and you'll see why people think of the snowman as ''being'' him rather than simply being played by him.

** Earlier in the same episode, a [[They Might Be Giants]] song is played by Plucky and Hamton—both redrawn to be caricatures of the two Johns.

* In the ''[[Doctor Who]]'' animated webcast "Scream of the Shalka", [[Richard E. Grant]] voiced a now non-canonical [[The Nth Doctor|ninth incarnation]] of the Doctor who [http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100206045424/tardis/images/thumb/6/67/ShalkaDoctor.jpg/566px-ShalkaDoctor.jpg looked almost exactly like him].

** In fact, all the major characters resembled their voice actors; the hope was that the webisode would get enough support to start up the TV show again with that cast, so making the characters look like the actors would make it possible to use the webisode as part of continuity for the new series. As it turns out, that plan fell over, as the renewal of the show had already been announced before it aired.

* ''[[Stripperella]]'' looks like her voice actress Pamela Anderson. Given that a major part of this series is about a well-endowed stripper turned crime-fighting [[Hot Amazon]]...

* The creators of ''[[Kim Possible]]'' admitted that they created the character of "Motor Ed" to look and act like John DiMaggio because they thought his off-mike personality had great comedy potential.

** And Ricardo Montalban gets his usual treatment as Senor Senior Sr.

* [["Weird Al" Yankovic]] also appeared in ''[[Lilo & Stitch: The Series]]'' as a minstrel at a medieval festival.

* There's a whole ''mess'' of this on ''[[The Venture Brothers]]'':

** Inverted with hetero (they maintain) life/business partners Pete White and Billy Quizboy look more than a little like creators Doc Hammer and Chris McCulloch (AKA Jackson Publick), with added physical deformities. An inverted example because each character is voiced by the OTHER voice actor.

* Bruce Timm's toy store owner in the Gray Ghost episode of ''[[Batman: The Animated Series|Batman the Animated Series]]''. This episode also featured [[Adam Westing|Adam West as an actor who can't get work because he was typecast by a costumed crime fighter show he did decades ago]].

** Let's not forget that David Xanatos was modeled after his voice master Jonathan Frakes.

** Hudson, for a gargoyle, loosely resembles his voice actor Ed Asner.

** In addition, the manager of the Hawaiian hotel is modeled after Phill Lewis, who voices him. (Also an [[Actor Allusion]], since the character is basically [[The Suite Life of Zack and Cody|Mr Moseby]].)

* [[Looney Tunes|Elmer Fudd]] briefly went through this in the early 1940s when the animators thought that maybe the girth of his voice actor, Arthur Q. Bryan, added to the humor of his [[Elmuh Fudd Syndwome|speech impediment]].

* The 1959 short "The Mouse That Jack Built" had the cast of ''[[The Jack Benny Program]]'' playing animated mouse versions of themselves.

** Just to tie it all together, his live-action performance as the Trickster played a big part in him getting the later role.

* Ricardio on ''[[Adventure Time]]'' is a rather creepy-looking example. Just takes [[George Takei]]'s face with extreme detail and put it onto a cartoon heart.

* ''[[King of the Hill]]'''s numerous celebrity guest stars occasionally played themselves, but whether or not they did, their characters looked like them the majority of the time.

** John Redcorn was also reportedly modeled on Victor Aaron, his original voice actor.

* In ''[[Hey Arnold!]]'', the gang's teacher, Mr. Simmons, is a dead ringer for his voice actor, [[Frasier|Dan Butler]]. This is especially noticeable because the show has an extremely idiosyncratic character design, to say the least.

* [[Jason Anthony Griffith]] of [[4Kids! Entertainment]] fame has joked that all of the voice cast for ''[[Chaotic]]'' look like their characters.

* Many of the ''[[Recess]]'' cast happen to look like the characters they played. They commented on this on a documentary they did for the Disney Channel.

* According to the Audio Commentary, Eunice from the ''[[Futurama]]'' episode "Proposition Infinity" is modelled after the episode's director Crystal Chesney-Thompson. The brief on the character apparently was that she should look "girly, but nerdy." Animator's response? "Oh, she should look like Crystal then!"

* [[Looney Tunes|Warners Bros. cartoons]] did this a lot, probably reaching its zenith in Tex Avery's 1941 short "Hollywood Steps Out."

* [[The Danza|Cree Lincoln]] from ''[[Codename: Kids Next Door]]'' bears some resemblance to her voice actress and namesake [[Cree Summer]], even with a similar hairstyle.

* The Autobots' human forms in the ''[[Transformers Animated]]'' episode "Human Error" all resemble their voice actors [[David Kaye]] (Optimus Prime), Bumper Robinson (Bumblebee), Bill Fagerbakke (Bulkhead), [[Corey Burton]] (Ratchet), and [[Jeff Bennett]] (Prowl), respectively.

 

== Coincidences ==

* [[David Kaye]] bears quite a resemblance to [[Gundam Wing|Treize Khushrenada]]. It's kind of scary.

 

 

* Anneliese van der Pol, the final Belle in the [[Screen to Stage Adaptation]] of ''[[Beauty and The Beast]]'', bears quite a resemblance to her animated counterpart. Her voice also sounds similar to Paige O'Hara, Belle's voice actress.

 

* The original concept images of Starkiller in ''[[The Force Unleashed]]'' ([http://yfrog.com/iycomparezj a capture of the graphic novel possibly using the old designs]) looked remarkably like [[Sam Witwer]] before he was ever part of the project. A friend of Sam's who was working on the game noticed the similarities and suggested Sam for the part. Once he got it, they redesigned Starkiller to look even more like him. Sam tells the story [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=36XhAAiTqWY here at 2:57].

* Roxas and Ventus have an uncanny resemblance to Jesse McCartney, their voice actor in the English dub of the ''[[Kingdom Hearts]]'' series.

* [[Metal Gear|Solid Snake]] actually looks kind of like his English voice actor, [[David Hayter]]. Heck, they even have the same first name.

* In ''[[Metroid: Other M]]'', Samus's face bears a resemblance to Jessica Martin, her American voice actress. She looks even more like Samus with her hair dyed blonde.

** Considering Jessica wasn't famous until she played Samus, this might be an inversion of the trope!

* [[Wet|Rubi Malone]] bears quite the resemblance to her voice actor, [[Eliza Dushku]]. Funnily enough, one of the characters she played, [[Buffy|Faith,]] refers to wet works and assassinations in the comic continuity, which is basically Rubi's gig.

* In ''[[Spy Hunter]] 2'', Vanessa Duvelle is modeled after [[The Danza|Vanessa Carlton]], the singer of the game's theme song, but voiced by someone else.

 

* The characters in ''[[Archer]]'' were based on local people that the creators knew, but some ended up looking like their voice actors anyway, like Malory and Lana.

** It's also hard to say how much of a coincidence it is that Len Trexler looks so much like [[Jeffrey Tambor]].

** Actually, Jonathan Frakes is a character played by meat suit actor David Xanatos.

* ''[[Batman: The Animated Series|Batman]]'' does not resemble [[Kevin Conroy]]. Kevin Conroy just happens to look like Batman.

** From the same show, Zhao looks quite a bit like his voice actor, [[Jason Isaacs]].

* The main six kids in ''[[Recess]]'' eerily resembled their voice actors (though it was coincidental). [[Ashley Johnson]] (Gretchen) lampshaded this in the DVD bonus features to ''[[Recess: School's Out]]''. For example, Gus was a dead ringer for his voice actor, Courtland Mead, with the sole exception that the latter didn't wear glasses. T.J. was this even moreso for his second voice actor, Andrew Lawrence.

 

{{reflist}}