Interview with Garry Chalk on Voice Acting Roles

Hi, this is Gary Chalk, and you're listening

to the GeekCast Radio Network. Welcome to Videoland.

Snuggle eyes! Wake up, Kid Icarus. Welcome to

Castle D! Yahoo! Yahoo! It's Clongoware! Sniper

Brains! Behold, the ultimate warp zone! Uh, tell

me what I'm ready for. Spring the trap! I knew

that! Hello and welcome to Pixels in the Animation.

I am one of your hosts, TFJ and Mike, and joining

me is TV's Mr. Deal. Leakin' lubricant. Oh lord,

you had to put an Ironhide reference in, didn't

you? Uh, in this first ever Pixels in the Animation

interview, we welcome the voice of Optimus Primal.

I believe he was Mayor Squaresley and Captain

N on the Tetris world, but I could be wrong about

that. Oh wow. Gutsman from the 94 Megaman series

and of course that ever -loving King Hippo along

with everything else he does, Mr. Gary Chalk

returns to the GeekCast radio network after five

years. Hello, sir. Hi, how are ya? Pretty good,

pretty good. How are you? Excellent. I'd forgotten

all about the mayor. Well, I, because we just,

um, within the... confines of the podcast we

just recorded and were about to release that

episode in a couple of weeks. And when we got

to it I was like, hey, Mayor Squersley sounds

awfully familiar. No, I patterned him after he

was a Disney character. He played the toy maker

in that Christmas story, the tin soldier. What

the hell was it called? The toy, it was about

the toy maker and the tin soldiers marching and

all the toys in the store become animated. And

he was the toy maker. He had a big nose and he

thought, whoa, I don't know what to do. Very

awesome. I can't remember the name of the actor,

but he was pretty famous. Famous comedic actor

in those days. And I listened to him one day

and I went, that'd be a great voice for the mayor.

It wasn't Ed Wynn by any chance, was it? Ed Wynn,

that's exactly who it was. Wow, yeah. And Neil's

up on his animation. He is pretty much an aficionado

when it comes to certain stuff in animation.

That, and I also love old comedic actors from

like the radio era. Oh man, I just watched on

television the... or onto my YouTube, Tim Conway's

dentist sketch. Oh, jeez. I never laughed so

hard in my life. Have you ever watched those

things that he does at the end of the show, the

Tim Conway on Carol Burnett Show? Yeah. The one

with the monkeys, you know, with the elephants

with their trunks glued together and... Yeah.

Yes. He just makes it up. It's all improv at

the end of the show. They're sitting around,

blah, blah, blah. And of course, Carol Burnett

and the rest of the gang, they have no idea what

he's going to say. So if you watch it, it's just

like, it's absolutely hysterical just watching

them. Yeah. One of my favorite sketches is a

Stooges sketch. Take off your hat. Raise your

right hand. Oh, I'm going to love that one. Alright,

so, what have you been up to? You've been doing

a lot of stuff recently. What's going on in the

world of Gary Chalk? Well, I've got a lot of

interesting projects coming up. That you can't

talk about. I can't talk about. One show about

pirates, which is quite funny, and that'll be

coming on soon. I don't know when, but it's kind

of a nifty show. But again, we're sworn to secrecy,

so we can't say anything. And then I've got Godzilla

coming out May the 16th. You're in the new Godzilla

movie? Yeah. Oh, wow. Yeah. I have a smallish

part in it, but I'm in it with Bryan Cranston.

And I have all my scenes with him, and it's quite

fun. So that's good. And then I got a leprechaun,

the origins coming out, where I'm an Irish guy.

And I speak with an Irish accent, like, you know,

through the whole second thing. And it's a lot

of fun. So I play the villain for a change, which

is nice. It's very rare that you play villains.

Is that the WWE thing? I know. But every once

in a while I get to be a villain and and Cedar

Cole got picked up for another season on Hallmark

So that's coming up to start shooting that next

week Then another series they're doing called

Blackstone got picked up this year. So I'm going

out to Edmonton on Sunday to start shooting that

And now doing a pilot with Jamie Lee Curtis Which

is kind of fun And I start that in a couple of

weeks and working on that for a few days. But

it's only the pilot, so we don't know if it's

going to get picked up or not. But lots of interesting

stuff coming up. Why don't you talk a little

bit about, really quickly, Mr. Somebody? I just

saw the trailer for that. Oh yeah, Mr. Somebody.

Now this is very cool. Because what it is, it's

about... It's it's kind of weird because the

they take this drug called punch and what it

does is it just sort of if you die you wake up

in another dimension in the same as the same

person in the same story, but things are things

are a bit different and I play the editor and

the owner of a newspaper and Dean Ellsworth plays

a reporter And we're after this new drug and

it's part of this conspiracy and they've got

these sort of men in black who come from other

dimensions. It looks kind of like, it's kind

of fringy looking. It's a very, very neat, neat

webisode. I just saw the first episode last week

and it won't be on air for about a month or so.

But the trailer is really quite good and it's

Trevor Mirage wrote it and created it. directed

it and we've got myself and Rob LaBelle and and

Mackenzie Gray I think is in it and Scott McNeil's

in it and I'm in it and and Dean of course and

it's looks like it's gonna be a whole heck of

a lot of fun awesome awesome and it's my first

web series yay yay first web series yeah moving

into the 21st century Yeah, yes Now you've really

liked I would say the last two or three or four

years you've really been popping up on TV What

are some of the some of your personal favorite

TV roles? You've done in the last couple of years

the last couple of years some of my favorites

have played an old Russian guy in The Haunting

Hour Going after a golem, which was quite interesting

And that was a two -parter that we shot last

summer, which was quite fun, directed by Neil

Fernley. And it's a kids' series. I think it's

on the kids' network somewhere. And then I did,

of course, Godzilla. Oh, what else? Lots of...

Made for TV movies One kind of a horror flick

called red snow, which was quite quite nifty

I wish Alcatraz went a little bit longer. Oh,

yeah Well, you know they canceled Alcatraz because

it was just too expensive to do but it was such

a great show Yeah, the cast were wonderful I

saw that and I was like... Hey, wait. Why is

Optimus Primal being evil? That's not good. That's

not good. It's just been a roller coaster ride.

You know, there's been a lot of stuff going on.

I'm very excited about Blackstone. It's a new

series. It's in the sports season. But it's a

new series. First Nations. It takes place on

a reserve. But it, um, it's called Black Sun

Reserve, and it does Eric Schwagen, it's from,

um, what's the movie with Daniel T. Lewis? Deer?

Deer? Lincoln? No, not Lincoln, the Indian one.

Oh, aha, like Hawkeye, but he... Um, I don't

know. Lots of the Lincoln's. Oh, yeah, yeah,

yeah. Indian guy in The Last of the Monkeykins,

and Michelle Fresh, and Carmen Moore. It's all

native cast. And except for some of us who are,

you know, cops and detectives who are off -reserves,

so we're not natives. But the great thing about

the show is that anybody who comes on the show

who's playing a native has to be a native, has

to be First Nations. So it's quite a thing for

a lot of First Nation actors here in Canada,

which we have quite a few. And some absolutely

stellar performances in it. And a very gripping

drama, but it's so funny because some friends

of ours from church were... were a bit, uh, uh,

you know, they were excited to watch the show.

And this is sort of, well, it's, it's a good

show, but the language is a little bit salty

for our case. I mean, it's really talky, but

it's, uh, it's very good. And there's why it

plays this, the change of this, of this, uh,

uh, of this Blackstone reserve and he's against

her illness. It's like, It's almost like a dated

version of the Sopranos. Oh, wow. Yeah, it's

pretty good. If you ever get a chance to have

a look at it, it's on APTN in Canada. I don't

know if it's sold and selling in the States yet,

but it's a really, really good show. So I'll

do that, and other than that, playing a lot of

music, been singing a lot, and playing around

in different places, and kicking with my friend

Don. It was what I used to do before I got into

acting, and then I got back into music about

four years ago, five years ago, and been getting

a lot of requests to play in different places.

It's kind of fun. I actually, I actually, I claimed

the fame. I actually got to do a duo, or duet,

with Carly Rae Jepsen three times. We did a song

called Georgia On My Mind. You know Carly Rae

Jepsen, that girl there? Yeah. And my only regret

is my wife didn't take the video of us performing

it, because Virgin Radio absolutely loved it.

But they didn't record it on video. I'm saying

to myself, you know, if I had recorded this on

video, I'd be rich now, because she got over

a billion hits on her star. And it's amazing

from this little girl a couple of years ago who

was working at Brown's restaurant up on Fourth

Avenue. She was working as a waitress there.

And then all of a sudden she was like this mega

superstar. It was like, it's amazing. But anyway,

so that's one little claim to fame. And other

than that, you know, doing the odd cartoon here

and there. I've got a cool one coming up. I don't

know. I don't think I can talk about it. I don't

think it's been on the air yet. So I have to

wait until it gets on the air before I can talk

about it. I have trouble with cartoons these

days. They're so secretive. Yeah, they are. Go

ahead. I was going to ask, what are some of your

favorite voiceover roles? Oh, my favorite, one

of my favorites, well, as you say, King Heppo

was one of my favorite voice roles. Optimus,

Dr. Robotnik, I really liked him. Grounder was

scratching Grounder on Sonic the Hedgehog was

hilarious. We had a lot of fun with that. Dogstar

from... that one. One of the dramatic ones was

the show called Petzl Squad, where I played a

character named Marcella, which was a stretch

because it was a drama, a drama cartoon series,

and it was very cool. Let's see, Hack and Slash.

I just love those two characters. Well, Slash,

anyway, you know, it's because we had to improvise

all our dialogue, and that was always a lot of

fun. because you never know what's gonna come

up. And there's so many, and some of them, they're

so obscure, but we're so much fun just to perform

them. Metalhead, you remember Metalhead from

G .I. Joe? Oh yeah, oh yeah. That was a crazy

character, because I gotta go out of my mind

during that show, doing that character, because

there was a... Nothing was big enough. Go bigger.

And we even did a heavy metal song called, in

Metalhead, a retrospective episode, I feel like

I will be having a shredder metalhead rock and

roll song called Metalhead. Metalhead, you find

out how to control. And it was pretty cool. So

I liked that. So I guess I could say that, you

know, most of the cartoon characters that I've

done, I've absolutely loved because I love creating

the characters and I love performing them and

people seem to like them a lot. I've forgotten.

I mean, there's so many that I did that I didn't

remember, like Mummies and I think Dracula was

another one that they did. I just can't remember

Double Dragon. All those cool shows, Scary Godmother,

that was fun. I got another one that was a bit

of a challenge, but it was quite interesting,

because if you know your cartoons, I played Bluto

in Popeye. Oh yeah. Remember that? It was a Bluto,

it was called Pappy's Christmas. Popeye, you

know, at Pappy's Christmas on this Popeye animated

special. And I played Bluto until I went and

listened to Bluto on the old Popeye cartoons,

and I went, but he's a black guy, and he has

an accent that black people don't use anymore.

It's more of a Northern Yankee accent. I listened

to it, and I listened to it, and then when I

came to the studio to record it, the producers,

I was talking to them, and I said, you know,

it's funny, he's a black guy, he was a contract

bass singer for Paramount, and they had him play

Bluetooth, and they improvised all their dialogue

pretty well as well. He goes, no way. About what?

So I said, so, so, Popeye, wanna make a monkey

out of me? Well, we'll see about that. We'll

see who gets olive oil. And the guy listened

to it, and then he listened to the original,

and he listened to me, and he listened to the

original, and he goes, holy shit, it isn't a

black guy. It's real, and it's for real. And

that was a challenge, and it was a real... Feather

in my cap. I really like doing that one You've

had so many roles over the over the years you

I Don't know if this would be an obscure role

because I don't think I've ever it's been a long

time since I've seen this but you were Santa

Claus in Island of the Misfit toys Melando Misfit

Toys, I remember that. Yeah, and I could sing

a song in that. My little boy or dear little

boy. And I played, I also played Blitzen and

sang a duet with Debbie Reynolds. Oh, sweet.

Oh, that's awesome. That was fun. So let's let's

talk about some video game cartoons with Captain

N Did you audition for any other roles other

than King Hippo or was King Hippo the one that

they wanted you for? I auditioned for King Hippo

and I also auditioned for an eggplant wizard

and They did you know all those but eggplant

hippo was the one that I ended up getting But

I just, I love the eggplant wizard. You know,

you know, King Hippo was the one I got, but I

loved eggplant wizard. I didn't do it, what's

going on? But I loved that character, but I also

loved King Hippo because he got to go. Hey, don't

come in, I'm not decent. Trying to do a, King

Hippo playing a woman is very funny. I just I

just looked at the character you because that's

what you do is you basically look at the Physicality

of the character and what kind of guy he is and

he has those great big lips Why so I kept on

well, he's got a he's got a be lippy and when

he when he gets really excited he Yeah, that's

him. And then you find out how he laughs, and

he's got this, like, wah, wah, wah, wah, wah.

Okay, Black Widow, let's go. My name is gonna

kill us, you know? And I thought, that's the

guy, because he looks like a big, you know, punch

-drunk Price fighter who's past his prime. So

I came up with that voice, and they absolutely

loved it, and I liked it too, and we had a lot

of fun with that character. And I got to do a

lot of other characters, like ancillary characters,

like the guest characters, like I played Spanley

the Vampire Pat. And they were like, good morning,

my name is Spanley, welcome to my home. and the

mayor, and there were a few other characters.

I just can't remember them at the moment. The

Captain and Voice sessions, were those ensemble

or individual recordings? They were all ensemble.

What was it like being in the booth for that

series? Was it all, you know, go to work, do

business, or did you guys have a lot of fun and

some outtakes? Well, you know, it's never...

It's never really serious, crazy serious. It

all depends on the director and the cast. But

for the most part, we used to have an absolute

riot. I remember the thing about Captain and

the Game Master was that for a lot of people

in there, it was their very first series, their

very first animated show. And so they were quite

nervous about what they were doing. all of a

sudden you know you've got here after a couple

of a couple of episodes people start to settle

into their roles and all of a sudden became a

lot easier and we're very conscious of keeping

the energy up and keeping the words clear and

uh... in some ways it was uh... it was uh...

a lot more fun then because everything was so

new right now i mean i think i think it's it's

been almost Well for me, I've been doing cartoons

for About 31 years Yeah, and I had done a few

series before Captain N like kissy fern GI Joe

things like that and It was it was just so much

fun because we were still in the process of learning

how to develop characters and how to hold on

to them and how not to wreck your voice and mic

technique, all the things about P -Pops and all

that. Working with a director and just determining

what the terminology means and things like, I'll

put a sprinkle of little pixie dust on that line.

Yeah, okay. Bigger, harder, faster. Make it,

could you make it what was the most interesting

Directors know to go, could you make that more

interesting? Okay, I'll do that. Did you bring

it off the page, please? I remember one direction

from a famous, a well -known producer when we

first did the very first Barbie. We did a Barbie

called Barbie and the Rockers way back when.

And the girl who was playing Barbie had never

done cartoons before. She's standing there and

the director, the producer goes, now we sold

119 million Barbies last year. We want to sell

200 million Barbies this year. And it all hinges

on how you say this line, go. Oh my God. That

sounds like a Wally Burr session. Oh, no, Wally

Burr. Oh, yeah. You know, Wally Burr, it's funny.

You know, some people had a hell of a time with

Wally Burr. And, you know, we're quite upset

and we're hurt. But I always got along with Wally.

I mean, he would ask me to do takes, you know,

over and over a few times, and I'd just do them.

do them exactly like you said it and thank God

I got a music background because I can hear the

tones and then then mimic exactly what he says.

So it was uh it was not that hard for me with

Wally but for some people it was just a nightmare.

I remember for me it was a bit of a nightmare

when we're on a particularly long session I remember

I said Wally If you make me do this again, I'm

going to crawl down the phone line and I'm going

to strangle the lights out of you. But, uh, oh

yeah, it was, uh, you know, those were some interesting

sessions. That's where we got that. You've got

to get out of here, get through this by the way,

you know, all the, uh, the, the Bershendos. And

it got to the point where he couldn't even hear

what he was saying himself, you know, and that

was. It said it so many times, it becomes a mantra.

We eventually got through the show and it was

great. The one thing about Wally was that he

really cared about the product and that it wouldn't

go out unless it was absolutely perfect and he

had all kinds of notes and little pictures and

stuff on the scripts to help us. Get exactly

what he wanted. So that was a that was an interesting

exercise And Sue blue was wonderful to work with

I'm sure she she seems like she she's a really

awesome lady Really So We're also and it's funny

in doing research for you I come because I was

by the time Sonic Adventures of Sonic came on

I was kind of getting out of the cartoon thing

wasn't really you know I liked it I thought it

was really awesome but I completely forgot that

you were grounder and the thing about the funny

thing about this podcast is we are going through

Neil and I are going through every single episode

nine different video game cartoons we're actually

we're in the middle of Captain right now after

that we're gonna do a couple more Mario cartoons

and then we're gonna get to Mega Man now for

Mega Man when you went into that audition Outside

of Gutsman, were there other roles that you had

to...? Oh, there were other roles, but for the

life of me, I could not remember what they are.

I know I did other roles on the show. Gutsman

was the main one, and it was a killer voice.

So it was a bit of a killer voice, but I am quite

sure I did more than just one voice on it. Oh,

yeah. What were those sessions like? Oh, those

were wild. They were great fun. Now we had a

lot of good times on that puppy. There was a

Dr. Wiley in that one as well. And there was

Mega Man and Gutsman and I can't remember the

girl's name. Roll. you know that was it was myself

and scotty and ian and jimmy burns and uh venus

was in it and uh kennel rothery i think was in

it and who else was in that show i cannot remember

duck parker shane myer yeah i i don't have all

the the cast with me at the moment but yeah No,

it seems like me going back now, because we've

already done the Beast Wars and Beast Machines

coverage on the network, and it's like I'm going

back to all these slightly older cartoons than

Beast Wars, and I'm like, hey, wait a second.

All of the Beast crew was together before they

actually did that show. Oh, yeah. Oh, you guys

did amazing, amazing work. And it's so interesting

for me to hear. It's interesting for me to hear

different takes on different characters from

what I know that actor to be. Like, they're not

very dissimilar, but Ian's Mega Man versus Cheetor,

they're a little bit, there's a slightly different

tone. And then, cause he also did Wily, he did

Wily on Captain N, didn't he? Yeah. I'm Dr. Miley!

And he would breathe in the middle of a sentence.

It was off breath. So you want to go out, eh?

It was quite funny. Alright, so let's combine

Captain Anne and Mega Man. Who would win in a

fight? Gutsman or King Hippo? Oh, King Hippo

without a doubt. He had fists the size of...

Georgia Hams or Virginia Hams, huge. And he was

a big blubbery guy. I mean, he would outweigh

Gutsman by about 300 pounds. Oh, wow. But Gutsman

was kind of a robot. Yeah. And Gutsman was pretty

tough, too. So I don't know. What Gutsman lacked

at Gertz, he made more than made up for in speed.

Yeah, yeah, King Hippo is not exactly fast on

his feet. He's got one major weakness, though.

It's not something that comes into my mind. What's

his weakness, Neil? If you punch him in the gut,

he pretty much goes down immediately. He's like

the break character in Punch Out. He's the easiest

character. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Anyway, I'll

tell you one of the most interesting experiences

I ever had. Did you ever watch when you were

a kid, baby Huey? A little bit. Yeah. Remember

baby Huey? Yeah. It was a giant duck. And he

used to say, he used to go, which way do you

go? Which way do you go? Remember that guy? He

was a giant duck. Well, they revived baby Huey.

And they brought the guy in, the original guy

who did the voice of Baby Huey. And I think he

was about 90, 85. But I went and did a couple

episodes. I played his dad. And he came in and

he started reading this cartoon. And I just died.

I dropped on the floor because he sounded exactly

like the Baby Huey I listened to when I was a

kid. I'm thinking to myself, man, I was seven

years old watching this cartoon. Here I am sitting

in a studio doing Baby Huey with the guy who

did Baby Huey when I was watching it when I was

seven years old. It was a bit of a mind blow,

I gotta say. That's awesome. Have you worked

with any other legends like that? Oh, I worked

with Maurice LaMarche on Captain... Was it Captain

In? No, it was Salty's Lighthouse. There was

something else I worked with him on. I can't

remember. That was great. Billy West. I worked

with Billy West on Popeye. He played Popeye.

Let me see. The guy from Spider -Man who played

Spider -Man. Dan Gilvezan? No, the other Spider

-Man. Christopher Daniel Barnes? Uh, no, he was

an actor on screen. Oh, the 67 series. Yeah.

Okay. What the hell is his name? God, I'm sorry,

I'm a senior and I'm having a senior moment.

Oh, you're not a senior. He played the Indian

runner. He was also in, um... Oh, God. Come on,

Gere. I can't remember. But, uh, remember that?

Spider -Man. Uh, Debbie Reynolds. Worked with.

Um... I haven't worked with Dan Gilbertson or

any of those, but I've been at conventions with

Dan. And with, uh, Peter Cullen. And... I was

with the guy who played Squiddy on Spongebob.

Squarepants. He was very funny. Have you ever

done dueling Optimus Primes with Peter? No, he

won't do it. Really? No, just won't do it. So

that's okay. Never mind. But we had some really

good panels because we had three Optimuses there.

We had David Kay. And we had Peter Collin and

myself. All that was missing was Neil Kaplan.

If we had all four of us, that would have been

a real hoot. Then we could have had an optimal

off. Or an oppy off. So, Eddie, what's the scoop

on the latest movie? It's coming out August 8th.

Or not August 8th, June 27th. June 27th. yeah

all i know is that he writes a dinosaur i'm just

waiting for the next transformers cartoon because

there was a huge huge deal uh... late last year

on imdb where they announced uh... transformers

prime powerful alliances and it was this giant

imdb article that had listed basically everybody

that you could think of that had ever had anything

to do with transformers that is still around

today everybody's name was listed as rumored

and then like two days later poof disappeared

from imdb so i don't think it's a true thing

at all i don't i i'm not believing it whatsoever

no but i'm going to make it up yeah i'm just

waiting to see what the next cartoon has in store

for that Well, I'd like to see that that would

be kind of fun. I would be kind of fun I mean

if Peter can Cullen can return after 20 years.

I think I can return after 10 Oh, yeah, most

definitely Cuz I'd love to be kind of homeless.

That was so much fun Now, how did you feel and

I know this is the video game video game cartoon

podcast But since we're just having a conversation

here, how did you feel about optimuses? characterization

change from Beast Wars to Beast Machines This

is a tricky one. Because there were certain aspects

of Beast Machines that I liked, but as the show

progressed, the operas became more and more internal

and more distant from the rest of the gang. It

was on this kind of a spiritual journey, and

I'm going, wait a minute, that's not what I want.

I don't want to be a naval gazer. I want to be

out there, wrestling and doing action stuff and

saving worlds. But that wasn't happening. We

were fighting against the planet, I guess. And

Megatron and... Well, who is bigger than Megatron?

There was some of the other ones. Nobody really.

There was Noble, but Noble was Megatron. That's

right So You know you've You were dr. Abotnik

on sonic and grounder. What's it like working

with Urkel? Steve Urkel, you know what we never

got to meet him Really? Never never recorded

with him at all him and tails were a separate

entity They the only people that recorded up

here was Phil Hayes who played Scratch and myself

who played Grounder and Dr. Robotnik at that

time was played by Long John Baldry and and then

in the first series and then in the second series

Baldry couldn't do it anymore so I I took over

for him because I could do I could do Long John

Baldry's voice pretty pretty well because he's

an old friend of mine I've known him for years

Wow, that's crazy. Do you remember him? I remember

a little bit about his voice Because I do remember

the Sonic cartoons but that's again one of the

purposes of the podcast is to For us to actually

go back and really remember them Remember his

signature line was I hate that hedgehog Simon

Perambulator. Awesome. Yeah, I remember them.

Yeah. Well, Long John Baldry was famous in its

own right since the 50s as a matinee crooner

in England in the 50s. And he discovered Elton

John and Rod Stewart. They both played in his

band. And he then went off to do his own thing

in the 1970s, 69. And he discovered Rod Stewart

as a drunken teenager singing in the subway in

London. And he said, sure, you'll be a really

good singer. You should come with our band. And

that's when they went with the Small Faces and

with Jeff Beck. It kind of gives a whole new

meaning to Rod's song, Downtown Train, doesn't

it? Oh, it really does. I mean, it's quite amazing

that John Baldry passed away several years ago.

We went to his memorial, to his funeral, and

we were sitting in the theater. It was just packed

with musicians. people from all over the place,

and we had the tributes from Elton John, from

Rod Stewart, from Paul McCartney, from Eric Clapton,

from Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page, all these people

that were like our icons, who were all good pals

of our dear, sweet John Baldry, who I thought

was the most adorable guy. He was like six foot

six. And I used to drive him downtown home after

sessions, right? We'd work every week. And if

I went one kilometer over 30 miles an hour, he'd

go, ooh, yeah, ooh, yeah. And I'd go, what's

the matter? He'd go, ooh, too fast, too fast.

And I'd be going like 30 miles an hour across

the bridge, and he's like, wah! He was such an

adorable guy. Anyway, interesting stories. Look,

I love all the, you know, I think in the last

35 years, I've had the most amazing time. I got

to work with some of the most wonderful people

you'd ever have the chance to work with, like,

you know, Ian and... Ian and Scott McNeil and

Venus Turrizo and Doug Parker and Maurice. It

was just like, you know, you couldn't ask for

a better life. For almost 20 years, we worked

together at least two, three times a week for

20 years. It was quite something. Yeah, very,

very awesome. All right. Was there ever anything

in a script that you refused to say? Nope, because

those scripts were so carefully vetted before

they came to us that we would never question

the lines we had. Sometimes I would say, could

I say it this way? I would never absolutely refuse

to do a line. There was one line that I hated

and that Optimus did in the third movie. I think

it was the third, no, the fourth. What was the

dark side of the moon? The third movie, yeah.

Yeah, the third movie where Optimus goes, kill

them all. Yeah. Yeah. And I went, no, no, Optimus

has never killed anybody ever in his entire life,

his entire career. The movies are... that's a

more violent Optimus Prime, I'll put it that

way. I know. I thought that was quite shocking

and I know a lot of people who were quite shocked

when he said that. He's always been such a gentle

character. That's right. He might be a kick -ass,

but he was, you know, he was not, you know, he

was not a killer. You know, and to hear that

was a bit of a shock for me, so. I was like,

oh man, why would you do that? What is the point?

There's no point. But there you go. That's just

my personal thing, you know. All right, cat,

I'm just letting the cat in. Come on, stupid.

Come on, let's go. The cat it goes in and out

in and out like like a yo -yo crazy character

Yeah, I'm just watching a video I was just watching

a video on YouTube where an elephant paints a

picture with his trunk Crazy stuff. Oh, man.

I was really quick something but there you go.

Yeah, there's some crazy stuff out there but

the cats My cats, they've got two cats here and

they drive me crazy because every time I sit

at the keyboard or try and read a book, there's

a cat jumps under your chest or jumps under your

lap and says, why don't you just sit here and

claw the shit out of your thighs? There you go.

So what else? Anything else that strikes your

fancy? Would you ever return to King Hippo and

would you change his voice at all? With King

Hippo? Yeah. No, I love that. I love that character.

I love that character. It's a great voice. And

the thing I loved about it was the chemistry

between King Hippo and Eggplant Wizard. They

were so opposite but so funny. I forget who was

that actor who played Eggplant Wizard. Mike Donovan.

Mike was great. Yeah, he was. His laugh just

killed it. It was so stupid. It was so funny.

I love working with Mike. He's a great guy. The

craziest thing about Eggplant Wizard is sometimes

you really... Depending on what is being done

to the character, if Mike is talking, at the

same time they do the vegetable sound effects

and it's like, oh wow, vegetables always pop

out. Yep. Oh, yeah. Oh, oh, oh, I don't want

to do it. And he did a voice very similar to

that. Oh, wow. Yeah, that's what if you listen

to groupie and then listen to eggplant, which

listen to groupie on steroids or groupie on speed.

That's eggplant wizard. Would you like to inform

the people where they can interact with you online?

If you want to interact with me online you can

go to the Gary Chuck fan page which is administered

by Candice Santora or you can get me on my Facebook

page which is just me just Gary Chuck I'm there

and I try and chat with as many people as I can.

If they come on to Facebook and talk to me, I

talk to them a lot, I guess about 4 ,000 people

or so on there. And a lot of times, we'll have

group chats and stuff on the Skype I have about,

let me just see, I'm just looking here at my...

at my Skype list. Where are you, baby? Ah, here

we are. I have this one... On Skype, I have one

group. There's probably... Let's see. Well, probably

about 800 people on there. Wow. Oh, God, there's

so many. So many, so many. all right well we

would like to thank Mr. Chalk for taking the

time to chat with us here in this first ever

pixels in the animation interview we will ask

you to hold the line and Neil and I will be back

after this so there you go folks I know there

weren't a lot of questions that we asked Mr.

Chalk this time around but he told some pretty

interesting stories and really really enjoyed

it and absolutely amazing There are some other

voices from the game cartoons that I do want

to get on here. I would love for us to talk with

Ian James Corlett again. I'll probably save that

for once we get to Mega Man, since he was Mega

Man. But no, it's always a pleasure to talk to

Gary. He's an awesome guy. And he had a ton of

stories. Reason why I was kind of so quiet is

because I would come up with questions But that

he would like answer it like while he was talking

and I'm like, oh, I can't ask that now Yeah But

he filled he pretty much filled the podcast so

I didn't really have to say much So I'm kind

of quiet, but you know, that's just the way I

am sometimes Yes, Neil is the fourth cousin to

Kevin Smith Join us next time. What are we doing

next? Oh, man, I get to eat I get a Figure out

what the what the heck is is coming out next

actually 26 No, it's well, yeah people would

have heard episode 26 before this interview coming

up after this is episode 27 Where there are some

really? middle -of -the -road episodes, I would

say. Oh, I know what those are, yeah. So, for

now, I am TF2 and Mike with TV's Mr. Neil. Come

back and help us find the pixels in the animation

next time in episode 27. We'll see you later,

folks.