Interview With Eric Stuart

Reprinted from an online Animerica article. This article appears for informational purposes only. The following interview is a look into the mind of the director of the "Yu-Gi-Oh!" dub Eric Stuart. It won't reveil the insane secrets of 4Kids Entertainment, but it WILL give you a whole new look of Saturday mornings "most commen voice."

Interview - Eric Stuart Voice Actor The voice of Pokémon's Brock and James talks about voicing cool characters and cute creatures, plus his musical career! Interview by Kit Fox. Animerica: I guess first things first, how did you get started in voice-acting? Stuart: I've always been doing commercial voice-overs, it's something that always paid the rent for me. And one of my clients mentioned to me that the guys who actually do the recording for all of these shows was auditioning for a series called The Slayers. I went in and got the role of Gourry who is the lead character of that series, and of course that was straight to video. I did that for a little while, and I still do it. I'm actually doing it in between all the Pokémon stuff. From that I established a relationship with those guys and when Pokémon came up they had me audition - and actually the first go around I didn't get any roles. I was kind of bummed out because I knew how much stuff was going to be going on, at least how many episodes I would have been working on. And then they called me back in, and I got Brock, and I also ended up replacing the original James after the first four episodes. But I've always done commercial stuff, that's been a side thing for me. Animerica: Well were you very active in acting and that sort of thing while you were in school? Stuart: I did some theater but I'm also a musician, that's sort of my main career. And I'm a singer/songwriter, so that tied into the whole being-a-performer. That's were that comes from. Animerica: So the energy is sort of the same thing? Stuart: Well, it's just being able to interpret something, whether it's a funny cartoon or a serious song. If you have that ability you should be able to bring it to anything. Animerica: Do you do anything special to prepare yourself for a role, such as research? Or do you normally find that when you get in the studio that you really don't know anything about the character? Stuart: Most of the time I don't. I sometimes get a chance to - if I'm auditioning for something, they let me see some video so at least I can see what the character looks like. Sometimes I''ll reference the Japanese track, especially when we're talking about dubbing stuff, to hear what type of voice quality the Japanese [version] uses to help me figure out what character I should try to go for. But in terms of the research behind it, there's always a paragraph that they that sort of describes what the guy is about and you can sort of use that as a general description. Animerica: So then you base your audition and performance off of that. Stuart: Right. They don't give you a lot really study up on. Animerica: As you said, do you like listening to Japanese to try and get the tone or inflection? Stuart: Well, not so much to get the inflection, because I don't speak Japanese and I really don't understand what they're doing. But what I can hear is if the guy has a gravely voice, or if it's a high-pitched voice, if the guy sounds like he's angry or if he's kind of lighthearted, I can get that from the sound of the voice. Animerica: Now you said that you played both James and Brock in Pokémon. What were your impressions of those characters? What was it like being them? Stuart: Brock is great because Brock kind of looks like me - he's got spiked brown hair and very squinty eyes which I have. I was kind of psyched that I got that role. And he's always chasing after women which, okay - I can connect with that - but he's kind of like Keanu Reeves to me. Animerica: You think so? Stuart: I think he's kind of like a combination between Shaggy and Keanu Reeves. Animerica: Which Keanu? Would you say the early Keanu? Stuart: Yeah like Bill and Ted. He's just got that kind of like, he has to constantly go through the description of what's going on and recap for everyone who's not following the plot. I think tha's funny. Animerica: Not too quick on the uptake? Stuart: Yeah, in the series he seems to be like he's a trainer - he's supposed to know about everything but yet things go on it seems that Ash know a lot more than he does. But he's cool and a lot of fun to do. I actually find him to be the easiest. James, because I had replaced the original one after the four episodes, I sort of took what that other actor did and did my take on it. He gradually became a more broad character. Animerica: Do you think that your impression changed? Stuart: Yeah, I felt like I was doing someone else's part for a little bit, then I finally sort of made him my own. And now of course his ridiculous laugh and all of that stuff - I mean, that's all mine. The guy who did it originally kind of was leaning towards Snagglepuss, but I took him all the way there. Animerica: Have you ever played characters like these before? Stuart: I think that Brock is very similar to Gourry. Gourry is a little stupider and he gets a little bit more angry and into the fighting scenes more than Brock does. Slayers is a little more violent than Pokémon is. But he's pretty similar. Animerica: How does it feel to be a part of the Pokémon phenomenon? You know that this is BIG! Stuart: Yeah, I can't believe the degree of how big it is. When you start something up and you hear who's behind it, who's working on it, how it's tying into the game, and all of that you think "Okay this could do very well." But kids on the street are talking about the cards they have and on the train and all around me. I always want to turn around and say "You know I'm Brock!" "I'm James!" Everywhere I go, there's this stuff going on. Animerica: Have you done that yet? Stuart: Actually the funniest thing happened where my Girlfriend was on the train and two kids were playing with the cards and one guy says "I have Pikachu" and the other guy says "I have Brock" and she said, "No, I have Brock." [LAUGHS] I thought was really funny. But it really is amazing. I think it's good, with all the things that could be in a popular show, it's pretty tame. There are somethings that bend the censors once in a while - James wears a dress too much, I think. There are a couple of episodes that we did skip - I think there is one where he is in a bikini and he has breasts in the original Japanese version. I think they cut that out of the American one. But I mean, everywhere you look this is going on. It's a lot of fun, it's definitely helped my music website because I get a lot of Pokémon fans visiting my site going "We didn't know that you were also a singer," which is kinda cool. Animerica: Have you gotten hooked on the Game Boy game or the cards, or do you abstain from those? Stuart: I do play a lot of video games when I can. I gotta say that I really haven't been hooked on the Pokémon video game phenomenon, but I do collect the figures - especially the ones that I play. I've got a Squirtle, I've got Brock, I've got James. I do a lot of Pokémon characters as well. Animerica: Oh, you do? Stuart: Oh yeah, I do Squirtle, Wartortle, Pterodactyl, Hypno, I think there might be ten to fifteen that I do. Animerica: Do most of the other voice actors do several Pokémon? Stuart: A couple of the people do maybe two or three each. I think that I do great deal of them for being one person. But I know that there's a couple of people that come in, I think that the woman who does Misty and Jesse also does about four or five different Pokémon. I think we have a cast of eight or nine people and everybody is doing a lot of things. Animerica: If you divide that it would be about seventeen Pokémon per person. Stuart: There you go. That's too quick math for me. So in terms of the games and dolls and the toys and stuff, I just try to find the stuff that I do. Animerica: Okay, well do you have a favorite Pokémon? Stuart: Do I have a favorite? I guess I kinda like Squirtle because he was the first one that they gave me and also the first toy. He's kind of funny and I like to do the water effect when I spit water out. Especially when he puts on his Ray Bans. Animerica: Now you said you were Gourry. Have you done any other anime work? Stuart: I think I've doe a couple of small things. I did a movie called Gall Force - in Gall Force I was two of the droids. I trying to remember - I think I was the ship's computer as well as Gail and Toil. And the ship's computer was named OX-11. I did the Art of Fighting...I was the stadium announcer in that one. And I think there might have been another...Here is Greenwood! Oh yeah, I did a lot of that. God, I can't even tell you who I was in that. I have the whole series that I did. I think there were eight or teb episodes that we did here. Animerica: Were you multiple characters on that? Stuart: I was multiple characters. I think there was a big macho guy who carries around his motorcycle and I was a bunch of side characters as well as the guy in the theater class. What's his name? Animerica: He was one of the cool guy's best friends. Stuart: Something like that, he helps put on the show. I think he was one of the bad guys. But I did a lot of side characters in that one. Animerica: Well there were a lot of side characters. Stuart: Oh yeah, that was like Melrose Place in anime. Or 90210. Animerica: Were you a big animation fan before you got into voice-acting? Stuart: Well, my favorite show growing up was Battle of the Planets. I played G-Force after school like everyday. Me and my buddies ran around and of course I was always Mark. Those kind of cartoons were my favorite. I also went to school for music and art and I used to draw that kind of stuff. That whole Heavy Metal magazine, that was always my favorite kind of art. So when I saw that there was all this Japanese stuff coming over here when I got a little bit older it was great and cool, to see that. But I'm not that much of a diehard fanatic as some of my fans are. And I think that they are some what disappointed that I don't know all the facts that they do. Animerica: You're the character, how can you not know everything about him! Stuart: There are a couple of people that have things like the Team Rocket official website or the Brock fan club and they keep challenging me like, "I bet we know more than you do," and I'm sure they do. I try to keep up on it because I do try to keep what I do with the character consistent and when we do get presented with something in a script that doesn't seem natural for someone to say I will speak up and say, "James will never say 'I'm gonna do something' he will always say 'I am going to do.'" We do pay attention to that. I think that all of us take a little pride in the people that we are but we still don't know every little detail about every little part of the show. Animerica: You don't know his blood type. Stuart: Exactly. Animerica: Well from the sound of it you seem to be a very versatile voice actor being all the different characters that you do, but is there a specific type that you find that you are cast for more often that not? Stuart: I'm usually the all-American sounding young guy. Brock is always young and cool and Gourry is up there too. They're all like if Kasey Kasem were about forty years younger. But that's kind of the role that I get. If it's not the main character, because that's usually played by women in both Japan and in America, it's usually the sidekick. In Slayers, Lina is the star and then Gourry is her sidekick. I do do some rough bad guys but those are usually side characters. The recurring ones that I tend to book are young all-American types. Animerica: Is there a type of character that you haven't played yet but would really like to? Stuart: I'd like to be a couple more bad guys because I definitely can do that. I don't always have to be so squeaky-clean. James is a bad guy but he's a goofball. I'd like to be a little eviler once in a while. Animerica: Do you find it's more fun to be evil? Stuart: Yeah, I think it could be. Although the fans seem to love the humor side when people fall and hurt themselves or get caught in strange traps, they seem to respond more than "Oh, that bad guy is so cool." Especially with the kind of stuff I'm doing. Animerica: Would you say you have a favorite character you've played? Stuart: I think that Brock would be my favorite character. I think he's just too close to home. [LAUGHS] Animerica: You can't help but identify. Stuart: Exactly, when I do him, I get through the fastest. There is usually no "Let's redo this line," it's usually "Okay, let's move on!"" Animerica: What would you say is the absolute weirdest role you've ever had?- Stuart: Hmmmm, in terms in weird, it's never been anything that's too out there. When I've played robots - Oh, I'm also the little computer on Pokémon; did mostly fill-in stuff last year and now I've taken over that role completely. Once again, one more character that they can give me. In terms of something strange I don't think I've been anything like a talking radish or anything like that. But a lot of the Pokémon that I do are weird-looking things. Animerica: You said you did some commercial work. you done any live-action work? Stuart: No, the only appearing-in-the-flesh I've done has been as me. In terms of an TV stuff I've done it's always been voice-over or anime stuff. Not that I'm an ugly guy, it's just that I really like to keep the things separate. I think if my face got recognized away from being the musician that I am, and was tied into something else, it would be a little bit of a conflict. I think it's cool that I do the cartoons but I think the people who take me seriously as a musician might think it were kind of goofy that I was doing Pokémon on Ice. Animerica: "He's on that Pokémon show, he's not hardcore." Stuart: Exactly. Animerica: Do you have any commercials that you've done recently that might be on the air right now? Stuart: I did some stuff for Polygram records that's a voice-over for Herbal Beats - which is a techno compilation CD that's out - where you'd never recognize me because I sound like some cool young kid. There's a chain of stores called Tom's Convenience Stores out in the northeast which is like the 7-11 chain, and Tom is a big blue cat who is a jazz guy that kinda sounds like Redd Foxx. I'm Tom, I'm the spokesperson for that. I mean most of the stuff that I do is a lot of radio stuff, a lot of regional stuff, and then of course the commercials for Pokémon, I've done those too. All the Game Boy stuff. Animerica: Well let's talk about your band. Stuart: Alright! Animerica: What's the name of your band? Stuart: It's Eric Stuart, that's the name of the act. And I have a band that backs me up. Animerica: What kind of music do you guys play? Stuart: It's Americana rock 'n' roll. Very sort of Bruce Springsteen meets Tom Petty meets maybe the Allman Brothers. Little southern influence in there too. Animerica: You said you were a songwriter too- Stuart: We play all original material. That's what I meant about the website, ericstuart.com. Animerica: How would you compare your singing to your voice acting? Are they very different? Stuart: They are completely different. I sing really strong and hard and my voice is a lot deeper when I sing. Brock is really a squeezed sort of voice to get to the higher register, because every character on that show can't be older than fifteen. So there is a difference, and a lot of the fans have commented on it because they can actually download one of the songs off my site. And they were like "At first we couldn't believe it was the same guy singing who does Brock, but after we listened to it enough times, we realized that there are some similarities there." Animerica: How long have you been doing the music thing? Stuart: I've been playing music since I was in the 9th grade in high school. But I'm almost semi-famous for that because I've toured with Ringo Starr and his All-Starr band in '97. I was the solo acoustic opening act as well as Lynyrd Skynyrd that same summer and Peter Frampton produced my album - who I'm touring with this summer. That's why I'm going to be out in San Francisco, because I'm Peter Frampton's opening act. Animerica: Wow, he was on The Simpsons. Stuart: There you go. It all comes together. Isn't it funny all these rock 'n' rollers are doing voice-over and animation stuff. Animerica: Six degrees of separation. Stuart: That's right. It's all pretty much the same things, and plus now people are doing better cartoons. The Simpsons has changed everything. Animerica: So as opposed to just doing voice work, you also sing. I imagine that must be quite a strain on your voice. Is there anything special you do to keep your voice healthy? Stuart: I don't drink, I try to stay away from too much beer and any sort of alcohol because that's the worst thing for your voice. I don't do any sort of vocal exercises. I've been told I don't sing properly, whatever...that's somebody's opinion. I don't do any sort of special warmups, but I will tell you that last night I did from 4:00 to 11:00 at night straight cartoons and that was something. I was definitely exhausted, and I felt it in my voice after that, and the night before, I had had a gig. So that was a little tough for me. The best thing to do is to really just rest. You can't just be yellin, and screamin, all day long, and go in and try to sing, and then go do cartoons. Animerica: And have a couple of cigars... Stuart: Exactly, I try to stay away from any of that. I never smoke. I've always been pretty healthy. Animerica: It must be hard to stay away from that what with the rock 'n' roll lifestyle. Stuart: It is, but you know anybody who is around me knows that I don't do that and they try to stay away, and like guys in my band who do smoke make sure they are not around me. It's not worth it. There's too much damage that can be done. Animerica: Pretty straight-edge. Stuart: Well, you know ya gotta be. That's it - you can take my foot or my hand, but if you took my voice from me that's really it. That's the way I communicate both with music and acting, that's how I make my money. If I couldn't do that I don't know what I would do. Animerica: Well on a completely different note, have you been to any anime convention recently. Stuart: I was invited to one that just happened in Chicago, but unfortunately I was too busy that weekend to go. Animerica: Rachael Lillis (the voice of Misty and Jesse) went there. Stuart: Yeah, Rachael went and I think one of the guys from Slayers - Crispin Freeman, who is Zelgadis, showed up there. He was sort of coordinating us to go down there. It sounded like it was a lot of fun. It's just that I wasn't quite ready for that at that weekend. I had to gear up for the summer tour. I am looking forward to doing one, it's one of those things - if you remember that scene from Saturday Night Live with William Shatner and they're like "In episode ten..." "Get a life!" I just feel like if these kids bombard me with questions and I don't know every little detail that they'll be totally bummed out. Animerica: Mr. Stuart, in episode 54 of Pokemon you refer to the 79th Pokemon as... Stuart: Exactly, I get than in e-mails all the time. I get kids asking me about specific episode numbers and I write back and say "you gotta give me more details, I don't know them by the number." Animerica: So you definitely get fan mail? Stuart: Are you kidding me? My website in the first month I had close to 60,000 hits. That's how active my site is and probably 20,000 of them are Pokémon fans. I do respond to every e-mail that people send me. If people go to my website they cab personally e-mail me, and what I do is, I respond to them if I have time. But if I had to sit down and write letters, I think that I wouldn't be able to do that. I'd feel bad if I didn't respond. Some of these kids are real little - they have a chance to write to what they consider is a celebrity, and if I don't respond to that, I feel like maybe I've let them down. I get people who send me auditions for the characters that I do, I've got audio files of "This is me doing James, do you think it's good? Do you think I have a future doing this stuff?" Animerica: "I think I'm better than you and I want your job." Stuart: I haven't gotten that yet, but I have gotten hardcore fans who say "Thank god you're doing James now because the guy before - he sucks." and I'm like, c'mon, give him a break, he was directed to be that way. He's really a nice guy. You know on the side we are doing a record don't 'cha? [2.B.A. Pokémon Master] I just did a song as James the other day. That's gonna be coming down the line and there's talk of other things coming down the line like that. We did one song as Team Rocket which is really almost a sort of Ghostbusters kind of thing. It's that kind of feel. Animerica: Who ya gonna call? Team Rocket! Stuart: Kinda like that. It's cool, it's a good little tune. It was fun to do it. When you do something like that we had a big debate about "well, should I sing?" and I said "If I sing I'm gonna sound like one of the singers. If I talk it in rhythm as James, it will be funnier." Animerica: A spoken word album. Stuart: Exactly, like William Shatner's version of Rocket Man which I have on video tape. Anytime you need to have a laugh, I'll play that for you. But it came out good and I think that it will be huge. Kids are trying to buy anything that has to do with Pokémon. Animerica: So what's next for you? More Pokémon? Staurt: Well, we started up the next batch of episodes. I think we have like fifty to do and we've finished five of them so far. So that's what we'll be doing all year long. We're doing the movie, that's coming down the line too, which I'm really looking forward to. I have a feeling we'll probably be doing it for Christmas. Animerica: "Pokémon premieres at the Venice film festival and wins the Palme D'or award." Stuart: That would be nice. If they really want me to make a live appearance take me some place nice, like Paris. I'll dress up like him too. I can really play Brock on ice. [LAUGHS] I would like to do these kind of shows. Animerica: Have you done any auditions for other anime recently? Stuart: I auditioned for Captain Tylor. And I didn't get anything in that series. What seems a little bit more closer to Battle of the Planets with all the military stuff going on. I kinda wanted to do something in there and I actually auditioned for that twice. They kept bringing me in for something but I never got a role on that. It's sort of produced by the same company and you'd think they'd throw me a bone. But it's okay. Animerica: Do you have any closing message, or words of advice for aspiring voice-actors? We get letters all the time about people who would really like to get involved in this field and would like to know how. Stuart: I know with the commercial side, demo reels are very important and there's a lot of places that want to teach you how to do voice-overs and want to teach you how to be a voice-actor. There are classes which teach the ABCs, which I think are helpful, but be very wary about all these people who want to take your money to make a reel and promise you work. There are so many people trying this business that you've got to really be so in tune with the craft, and it's an investment. You've got to go some place where you feel your gonna get a product that is going to be competitive with what everyone else has, so that they're not judging you on the production quality of your demo reel, but they're judging you on what you've done as an actor. I would say that there are people who do funny voices but you've gotta be able to bring it to the story. We all can imitate some characters, but if you can't interpret a script, or interpret "copy," as we call it, then what's the use of having a great-sounding voice if you can't do that? And you can just get lucky too. I mean, if you have a tape and you give it to the right person - y'know Slayers was going to be four or five episodes for me and that was going to be the end of it. And that led to Pokémon and now I get letters saying I'm their favorite anime voice-actor ever. And that's great, it's such a nice compliment because people are really paying attention to what you're doing. They should be careful before they spend their money. Animerica: So be skeptical, you're saying. Stuart: Yeah, everybody is going to promise: "Don't worry man, I'm gonna get you work. Pay me to help you out, and I'll take care of you. You'll be working in a week." It's not so easy for everybody who has a great voice there's like a 100 people who can do the same voice. I don't think I'd do anything different from a couple of guys I know, it's just that I happened to be in the right place at the right time. Okay, I do admitt that for the most part this interview is quite harmless, but there are still a couple of problems with some of the things Eric address's that I think I should. Animerica: I guess first things first, how did you get started in voice-acting? Stuart: I've always been doing commercial voice-overs, it's something that always paid the rent for me. And one of my clients mentioned to me that the guys who actually do the recording for all of these shows was auditioning for a series called The Slayers. I went in and got the role of Gourry who is the lead character of that series, and of course that was straight to video. I did that for a little while, and I still do it. I'm actually doing it in between all the Pokémon stuff. From that I established a relationship with those guys and when Pokémon came up they had me audition - and actually the first go around I didn't get any roles. I was kind of bummed out because I knew how much stuff was going to be going on, at least how many episodes I would have been working on. And then they called me back in, and I got Brock, and I also ended up replacing the original James after the first four episodes. But I've always done commercial stuff, that's been a side thing for me. Sounds to me like you didn’t get into voice acting because you liked anime or anything, sounds like you just wanted in for “how many episodes you would have been working on.” Don’t get me wrong, obviously you want to find lots of work so you can eat, but right off the bat it sounds like you only got into the dubbing business for money, and that’s not good. Animerica: So the energy is sort of the same thing? Stuart: Well, it's just being able to interpret something, whether it's a funny cartoon or a serious song. If you have that ability you should be able to bring it to anything. Yes, if you have the ability to do something good you should do it. Which is why it puzzles me that despite being a good voice actor, you can’t seem to be able to give Kaiba any other emotion aside from your “I’m super mad, and I’m super evil! I may care for some people, but I’ll care for them as long as I sound super evil!” emotion. Animerica: Do you do anything special to prepare yourself for a role, such as research? Or do you normally find that when you get in the studio that you really don't know anything about the character? Stuart: Most of the time I don't. I sometimes get a chance to - if I'm auditioning for something, they let me see some video so at least I can see what the character looks like. Sometimes I''ll reference the Japanese track, especially when we're talking about dubbing stuff, to hear what type of voice quality the Japanese [version] uses to help me figure out what character I should try to go for. But in terms of the research behind it, there's always a paragraph that they that sort of describes what the guy is about and you can sort of use that as a general description. A whole paragraph? That’s it? No wonder most of the cast for 4Kids dubs don’t sound right, they don’t have much to work with. I mean a paragraph may explain the characters at the beginning of the show, but this is a 100+ episode series where the characters change over time and grow up, and a paragraph not only won’t do in the long run, but it doesn’t do the characters justice. That doesn’t mean someone’s voice changes, in “Dragon Ball Z” Picallo may have the same voice the whole series, but the way he talks changes over time as his character grows and changes. At the beginning of the series he may sound strong, feirce, and evil, but at the end of the series he’s changed, and as a result sounds more kind and friendly. Kaiba’s character is the same. Yes he sounds like a really evil guy at first in the Japanese version, and that makes Eric Stuarts performance perfect in the first episodes, but what about later on in the show? Later on Kaiba goes from mean and evil, to confused, to the point where (At the moment) he’s earned some respect for Yugi, and is thus a much wiser person then when he started. The Japanese voice actor portrays Kaiba’s struggels and changes perfectly, while Eric Stuarts portrayal of Kaiba has, more or less, stayed exactly the same since the show first started. Also Eric I would like to ask you HOW much of the Japanese version did you watch!?! Did you watch a two minute clip? Did you watch a whole episode? Did you watch the whole series? The reason I ask is because a good writer and director does loads upon LOADS of research before they make something! Why? To inssure that they are well prepared to tackle the material at hand. Do you think Peter Benchley decided one day he wanted to write a book about sharks, and without a research came out with “JAWS!?!” Of course not, he most likely spent months researching about sharks, and the final product shows that he knew what he was talking about in the final product. YOUR final product on the other hand is filled with mistakes, contradictions, and re-writes that make the show look poorly done in every respectable way. Judging by the way the dub turns out you didn’t do much research at all, and as a director not only do you have a resonsability to do your homework, you have the responsabilty to educate the rest of the people who will be making the show. It helps for a better final product. Animerica: So then you base your audition and performance off of that. Stuart: Right. They don't give you a lot really study up on. Again, see above. Animerica: As you said, do you like listening to Japanese to try and get the tone or inflection? Stuart: Well, not so much to get the inflection, because I don't speak Japanese and I really don't understand what they're doing. But what I can hear is if the guy has a gravely voice, or if it's a high-pitched voice, if the guy sounds like he's angry or if he's kind of lighthearted, I can get that from the sound of the voice. Yes, you can get the tone of the voice just by listening, however judging that Kaiba’s tone is much different later on in the show as opposed to earlier on in the show I’m guessing you haven’t listened to the Japanese version much. Also I must point out that if you want translations you can not only get bootlegged “Yu-Gi-Oh!” DVD’s off eBay (Which have at least decent translations), but there are PLENTLY of YGO! fansites that carry translations of the Japanese episode, and if you can’t find them I’m sure fans would gladly give them to you. However you have opted for the easy was out by simply listening to a couple of minutes of the show and that’s it. Animerica: Not too quick on the uptake? Stuart: Yeah, in the series he seems to be like he's a trainer - he's supposed to know about everything but yet things go on it seems that Ash know a lot more than he does. But he's cool and a lot of fun to do. I actually find him to be the easiest. James, because I had replaced the original one after the four episodes, I sort of took what that other actor did and did my take on it. He gradually became a more broad character. Last I checked people were more happy with the old actor who played James as his voice sounded “more like the Japanese voice actor.” According to most Pokemon fans, your James voice is hated by many people because you make him sound gay. Animerica: Do you think that your impression changed? Stuart: Yeah, I felt like I was doing someone else's part for a little bit, then I finally sort of made him my own. And now of course his ridiculous laugh and all of that stuff - I mean, that's all mine. The guy who did it originally kind of was leaning towards Snagglepuss, but I took him all the way there. Yeah, you decided not to be faithful to the way the Japanese guy sounded and acted, and decided to make him completely different...and gay. Animerica: Have you done that yet? Stuart: Actually the funniest thing happened where my Girlfriend was on the train and two kids were playing with the cards and one guy says "I have Pikachu" and the other guy says "I have Brock" and she said, "No, I have Brock." [LAUGHS] I thought was really funny. But it really is amazing. I think it's good, with all the things that could be in a popular show, it's pretty tame. There are somethings that bend the censors once in a while - James wears a dress too much, I think. There are a couple of episodes that we did skip - I think there is one where he is in a bikini and he has breasts in the original Japanese version. I think they cut that out of the American one. But I mean, everywhere you look this is going on. It's a lot of fun, it's definitely helped my music website because I get a lot of Pokémon fans visiting my site going "We didn't know that you were also a singer," which is kinda cool. You know a lot of Pokemon fans want to have a talk with you about that “bikini” episode. Animerica: Have you gotten hooked on the Game Boy game or the cards, or do you abstain from those? Stuart: I do play a lot of video games when I can. I gotta say that I really haven't been hooked on the Pokémon video game phenomenon, but I do collect the figures - especially the ones that I play. I've got a Squirtle, I've got Brock, I've got James. I do a lot of Pokémon characters as well. Again, lack of research. Animerica: You're the character, how can you not know everything about him! Stuart: There are a couple of people that have things like the Team Rocket official website or the Brock fan club and they keep challenging me like, "I bet we know more than you do," and I'm sure they do. I try to keep up on it because I do try to keep what I do with the character consistent and when we do get presented with something in a script that doesn't seem natural for someone to say I will speak up and say, "James will never say 'I'm gonna do something' he will always say 'I am going to do.'" We do pay attention to that. I think that all of us take a little pride in the people that we are but we still don't know every little detail about every little part of the show. If you are the character I honestly can wonder how you can’t know everything about the character too. That’s got to be embaressing eh Eric? Animerica: Well from the sound of it you seem to be a very versatile voice actor being all the different characters that you do, but is there a specific type that you find that you are cast for more often that not? Stuart: I'm usually the all-American sounding young guy. Brock is always young and cool and Gourry is up there too. They're all like if Kasey Kasem were about forty years younger. But that's kind of the role that I get. If it's not the main character, because that's usually played by women in both Japan and in America, it's usually the sidekick. In Slayers, Lina is the star and then Gourry is her sidekick. I do do some rough bad guys but those are usually side characters. The recurring ones that I tend to book are young all-American types. The all-Americans huh? Too bad these shows are from Japan, and all these so-called “all-Americans” are technically all-Japanese! Congradulations, you’ve managed to insult the Japanese once again! Animerica: Well on a completely different note, have you been to any anime convention recently. Stuart: I was invited to one that just happened in Chicago, but unfortunately I was too busy that weekend to go. Better off you didn’t go, I’m sure there were TONS of YGO! fans who would have wanted to outright murder you for ruining a show they loved to death. Animerica: "I think I'm better than you and I want your job." Stuart: I haven't gotten that yet, but I have gotten hardcore fans who say "Thank god you're doing James now because the guy before - he sucks." and I'm like, c'mon, give him a break, he was directed to be that way. He's really a nice guy. You know on the side we are doing a record don't 'cha? [2.B.A. Pokémon Master] I just did a song as James the other day. That's gonna be coming down the line and there's talk of other things coming down the line like that. We did one song as Team Rocket which is really almost a sort of Ghostbusters kind of thing. It's that kind of feel. You mean to tell me you haven’t gotten one e-mail that tells you that they could do your job better then you? No person telling you they would dub YGO! better then you? Let me be the first: “I” could dub “Yu-Gi-Oh: Duel Monsters” better then you! Well I guess this brings this little "point out the obvious" session to an end. I seriously don't have too much of a problem with Eric himself, but the fact that he seems to care so little for what he actually does is scary. Not only does he sound like he really couldn't give a flying crap about his work (He seems more content to talk about the fact that he's somewhat a "celebrity" with kids), but he also bites fans hands off the minute they try to give him constructive critisim. Here's something you won't find in the above interview: At one point in the DBZOA's "4Kids Message Board" history someone claimed that he was Eric Stuart, and told everyone that since he was making money and they weren't that he was obviously doing something right. Obviously everyone was suspisious of this person, however a couple of members of the board actually got shocked when Eric Stuart e-mailed them from his own personal e-mail account about the message board (His real e-mail is ES101867@aol.com just to let you know) While it turned out the poster was in fact NOT Eric, the real Eric WAS reading the message board! His response to all the suggestions, constructive critisim, and so forth was "I read some of your comments on your message board. If you don't like what i do, don't write me." Excuse me? If you don't like what I'm doing don't write me? What kind of response is THAT!?! I'm sorry Eric, but you are the director, that means you absolutly MUST take all feedback the good and the bad, and use it to improve yourself at what you do! However from that comment and the interview above, something tells me that you don't want to face the reality that there are lots of people who are quite unhappy with the work you do, and instead of improving upon that critisim you decide that we are not importent since we don't like your work. Now I like some of your voices, your even one of my favorite voice actors, but I do NOT like the job you did on "Yu-Gi-Oh!" at ALL!!! Your response is inmature and rude. Many people who read your response were angered quite a bit, and I can't blame them. If there is a problem with a show, as the director YOU have a responsability to fix that problem! Don't give me this "it's my job" crap, YOUR the director, you have a certain amount of power that you can use to fix this! Once you show that you care about what your doing then, and only then will I remove you from the "YGO! Hall of Shame!" Goodnight everybody!