Interviews – Neil Ross

Hi, this is Neil Ross, voice of many of your

favorite cartoon characters, and you're listening

to the Geekcast Radio Network. Springer here,

and you are listening to all things Transformers.

Hello and welcome to the latest crossover interview

with all things Transformers in the TFG1 podcast

from the Geekcast Radio Network. I am one of

your hosts, TFG1 Mike. Joining me is Optimus

Solo. Hello. How's it going, Mike? It's going.

It's been a while since you've been on one of

these shows. Actually, you've never, well, you've

been on a few of the interviews, but you've never

actually been on the TFG1 podcast. But it's been

a while since you've been on all things Transformers.

Anyway, today we would like to welcome the voice

of Hook, Springer, Commander Keith from Voltron,

Shipwreck from G .I. Joe. Howard Sands from Jim

and the Holograms and everything else he's done.

Mr. Neil Ross. Yay. Hooray. I don't remember

any of those characters. Well, then, ladies and

gentlemen, this is going to be the shortest interview

ever because it just nullified all of our questions

that we're going to ask Mr. Ross. I'm being silly.

I seem to recall two of those characters. So

how are you, first of all? Not too bad. I came

down earlier in the month with this terrible

virus, and that's all gone, but it's left me

utterly exhausted. But today I feel pretty good.

Excellent. Sorry to hear that, but I'm glad you're

feeling better now. Yeah, I mean, this thing

hit me like a ton of bricks, I'll tell you. Well,

not, I mean, we're not here, this isn't a medical

show. Let's dwell on it, but I'm glad we waited

until this week to do it last week. Before we

get started, can you give us the scoop on what

is going on in the world of Neil Ross? Any upcoming

projects that you're allowed to talk about? Well,

that is the... conundrum because i'm sure you

guys know by now that in a lot of cases they

ask us to sign non -disclosure agreements and

if i reveal anything involving their precious

little concept my first born child is taken away

and god knows what else so i'm very i don't talk

about a lot i about all i can tell you for sure

is uh I was the announcer on the AFI Life Achievement

Award telecast, this year saluting Steve Martin.

The show already aired on TBS, but there's a

rerun on TCM, Turner Classic Movies. And that'll

be this Thursday, the 30th. It's going to run

at 8 p .m. and 11 .30 p .m. East Coast time.

If you're interested, insult your local listings.

You mean consult, not insult. Oh. The virus must

be coming back. Yeah, it must be. When all else

fails, blame Megatron. All right. Where did you

grow up, for those that don't know? Well, I grew

up in a lot of different places. I was born in

London, England, but left when I was two. years

old. I almost stole a Steve Martin line. I was

going to say, I abandoned a wife and two children,

but that's his line. Anyway, we moved to Canada

and I spent the next 10 years in Montreal. And

then, and in those days, this is, we're now talking

1957. We hopped on a plane and went to California,

which in those days was like going to Mars. I

believe it's still that way today. Maybe. Anyway,

I spent the rest of my youth in places like Long

Beach and San Diego, California. And then when

I matriculated, I don't know if I'm allowed to

say that on the Internet. The great adventure

began. Basically, Montreal, Canada, and a couple

of cities in California would be the short answer.

Did you always want to be an actor, or did you

have any inclination of being a voice actor at

all when you were in your youth? Well, it's funny.

I'm in the process of writing a book about my

life. You can sort of see where things fell into

place, but did I have some sort of master plan?

No. I found myself fascinated by voices and accents

at a very early age, mostly listening to the

radio or a few records that I had. I would sit

around and try to imitate things I heard. Not

with any thought of making a career out of it.

It was just something that was fun to do. You

know, some kids build model airplanes. I sat

in my room and talked to myself. And then when

I got into my teens, I was sucked into the devil's

vortex, rock and roll music. And the only way

to hear that in those days was to find the few

radio stations that would play it. And I spent

a lot of time listening to rock and roll radio

stations. And gradually I began to pay attention

to what happened in between the records. And

I began to be fascinated by these disc jockeys.

And suddenly at the age of 16, I thought, God,

that's something I could do. I seemed to have

no aptitude for anything except, you know, being

an idiot in the back of the classroom and cracking

up my friends with armpit farts. And I thought,

you know, that's not, maybe I could be a disc

jockey. So that's what I did. And once you get

in a radio station, you realize there's more

to it than you thought when you were on the outside.

And every radio station has two studios. One

is the air studio, and that's where the disc

jockey does his or her thing. But then the other

is the production studio, and that's where they

pre -record commercials and promotional announcements

and all of these various gizmos. And I found

that I had sort of an aptitude for the production

room. I actually did my best work in there. I

was not that great of a disc jockey, ever, really.

And, you know, my ability to do character voices

and this sort of thing. I was much prized by

the sales department because I could create these

really interesting commercials that they could

go out and sell. But I began to think that my

full potential was not being realized. And all

along, I'm paying attention to these people that

I hear voicing national television commercials,

national radio commercials. People who are voicing

cartoon shows, people who are narrating documentaries.

And I'm thinking, I'm turning into Seinfeld.

I'm thinking, who are these people that do this

work? And I sort of had this, I mean, you know,

everybody knows about voiceovers now. It's common

knowledge. But back then, no, you never heard

about it. And I had this sort of working theory

that, well, maybe they're on camera people who

do this stuff on the side to make a couple of

extra bucks. And then one day I vividly remember

in the parking lot of KCBQ radio in San Diego

where I was working, I was talking to a record

promoter and he suddenly blurted out the phrase

voiceovers. And scarcely daring to hope, I said,

what the hell's voiceovers? He said, oh, you

know, commercials, promos, cartoons. And I said,

you mean... There's just a business that just

does that. You can make a living. He said, make

a living. And he threw out the name of a particularly

successful guy. He said, he's a multimillionaire.

And all he does is voice work. And I said, well,

that's for me. I had no thought of becoming a

multimillionaire. But I thought, if I can make

a living doing that kind of work, it's just about

the perfect fit for somebody with my weird little

bag of tricks. And it took me another 10 years

to do anything about it. But I segued out of

radio and into voiceovers. And that happened

in the early 80s. Did you have any favorite disc

jockeys, radio shows, television shows, cartoons

that you had growing up? You mentioned listening

to some of those. Did you have some favorite

people or shows that you listened to? Yeah. We

didn't have a television set. for a long, long

time. My parents resisted it. And you couldn't

go to the movies in Montreal back then. I don't

know if it's changed. They had had a terrible

fire in a theater in the 40s and a lot of children

died. So they essentially said no one under 18

can go to the movies unless they put on 50 extra

ushers and the fire department is standing by.

So very seldom could you get into the movies

in Montreal when I was a kid. So I saw very,

very few cartoons. But I listened to a ton of

radio. Radio comedy, radio drama. It was really,

you could hear stuff from the States. You could

hear stuff from the BBC that was extremely well

done. And you could hear Canadian -produced stuff.

Drama, cop shows, just kind of like primetime

television, only it was all on radio. And I had

a number of favorites. We listened to the Jack

Benny show a lot, which I still hear on the satellite

radio. And it's funny, it holds up. It's, you

know, a different era, but the comedy still works.

But in the middle of all of this, I discovered,

and I don't know if you guys have ever heard

of this, it was called The Goon Show. I heard

of the gong show, but not the goon show. Well,

goon in England doesn't mean, it means more like,

if you did it in the States, you'd call it the

idiot show. It means more like an idiot. In this

country, it means somebody who breaks your legs

for not paying your gambit. Right. Anyway, it

was this bizarre radio comedy show that hugely

influenced. I mean, all the Monty Python guys

said they grew up listening to the Goons, and

that was their inspiration. People from the Fireside

Theater referenced the Goons. It was three guys,

Spike Milligan, Harry Seacombe, and a very young

Peter Sellers, who would later go on to become

a huge star. And Milligan wrote most of the scripts.

And they were like audio sight gags. You'd have

to hear the show. You either got it or you didn't.

My father and I thought it was wonderful. My

mother couldn't stand it. But I began to focus

on, in particular, Peter Sellers. You know, he's

been gone a long time. Are you guys even aware

of him? Yeah. Yes. Okay. He did about, God, I

don't know, 12 or 15 different characters. You

could sort of figure out it was him, but he did

them in such a way that they became absolutely

real. You could see them in your mind's eye.

It wasn't a guy doing a funny voice. He created

characters, and I was fascinated by this. One

guy can crank out 12 or 15 really believable,

interesting, funny people, and they're all coming

out of the same voice box. And he was a huge

influence on me. And that show was a huge influence

on me. And listening to Jonathan Winters, because

a lot of his act involved character voices. I

mean, everybody, everybody has stolen Maude Frickert.

I mean, Johnny Carson stole her and turned her

into an Aunt Blabby. Again, you guys may not

be old enough to remember that. Oh, no, I remember.

Yeah, I remember that. It's the same thing. It's

an old woman that talks that. But Winters was

the first person to do that. And, you know, I

used to listen to his albums just compulsively

to the point where I almost had them memorized.

Another huge influence was a guy named, again,

you may not have heard of him, Peter Ustinov,

who was a fascinating writer, director, actor.

And he did this album that a relative gave me.

And this one I really did listen to thousands

of times. It was called the Grand Prix du Rock.

It was a satire of radio coverage of sports car

racing. And Ustinov did everything on the record.

Sound effects. He played all the characters.

He did Russians. He did Germans. A wonderful

American announcer who was sort of, you know

that clueless guy Fred Willard does? It was almost

like his grandfather. Wow. And I listened to

that thing literally thousands of times. And

suddenly whenever I needed a German accent, suddenly

I had the German accent. But I wasn't really

doing a German accent. I was doing Peter Ustinov

doing a German accent. But that's how you learn.

You start out just. imitating people you like

and hopefully eventually develop your own your

own style so that's a very long -winded answer

but those were some of the influences as i was

growing up do you remember the first um the first

actual cartoon voiceover role that you landed

and at what point did you know that you were

there to stay oh i still sometimes question if

i'm there now the first one Well, they all sort

of happened around the same time. Wally Burr

was working on a version of Spider -Man in the

early 80s, and he called me in a couple of times

just to do incidental voices, just a couple of

lines as a cop or a construction worker or something.

But the session I remember is I got called in

to Hanna -Barbera. And I did a guest shot on

a in an episode of Richie Rich. And I walked

in there and there they all were like Mount Rushmore,

you know, to me, Joni Gerber, Lenny Weinrib,

Michael Bell, you know, names that were even

then legends in the voiceover business. And there

was renowned director Gordon Hunt. And I'm in

the middle of all of this. And I thought. You

know, I'm waiting to get kicked out. Like, who

hired this guy? He's nothing but a disc jockey

faking it. But somehow I got through that session,

and everything went pretty good. And I don't

know, maybe a year or two later, I breezed in

to do something somewhere, and it suddenly occurred

to me, I guess I'm making a go of this. I mean,

if they were going to throw me out, they'd have

done it by now. I guess I'm okay. Yeah, you know,

you talk about you're listening to all these

old albums and everything else. And the funny

thing is, for me as a kid, I'm 35 now. So when

I was a kid at six years old, when Transformers

the movie came out, granted, we didn't really

have the technology to do this properly back

then. I always wanted an audio version of the

entire movie. Because I am to the point now in

my life where I prefer listening. put something

on to watch it, but I'll end up just listening

to it and doing other things. Not even like housework.

I'll just sit here at my computer and just be

writing something or doing something else. Yeah,

I am such an audiophile. It's just crazy. Voice

actors have a lot of characters that they cover.

What is your easiest character to perform and

what is the hardest one on your voice? Well,

a lot of the Transformers stuff tended to head

in the direction of what we call throat rippers.

You know, if I'm asked to give a talk to aspiring

voiceover people, one of my rules is never, ever

do anything in an audition that you are not prepared

to do over and over and over again for 65 episodes.

You know, I don't care how wonderful the voice

is, if it starts to hurt after about 30, 40 seconds,

just tell them, guys, I'm sorry, I can't, wipe

that one, because I cannot, you know, do it without

causing myself damage. You say 30 or 40 seconds,

and the first thing I think of is, oh my God,

12 -hour Wally Burr sessions. That's the point.

If it's hurting you after 30 seconds, how's it

going to feel when you're... doing take 25 and

you've already done you know god knows how many

lines you know that that was one of the remarkable

things about the late uh lamented chris lotta

we used to joke that he had barbed wire for vocal

cords yeah because he could just do the most

amazing howling and screaming and it never seemed

to affect him in the slightest he didn't lose

his voice he didn't seem to be in any discomfort

And that was not true of quite a few of us in

that show. I know I've been podcasting for seven

years now. And for me, I've never in seven years

lost my voice. But I'll sit here and I'll record

two or three different podcasts over a six -hour

time period in a day. and even after talking

all six hours, I remember a couple years ago

we were doing a San Diego Comic -Con audio play

-by -play as the news came out, and I was there

for all six and a half hours of that show, and

my voice still didn't crack, so I don't know.

I must have some barbed wire in my cords, too.

Well, you know, if you find a good placement,

theoretically you should be able to go indefinitely.

Where you get into trouble is when you, you know,

create a voice like this, and, oh, boy, I'll

get this job. And then while he's going, all

right, take 35, you know. Neil, what type of

characters do you like playing the best? Do you

like playing good guys, bad guys, serious characters,

funny characters? What appeals to you the most?

Well, the most fun, and I think probably every

actor would tell you this, is a character that's

conflicted. That was what I particularly liked

about Shipwreck and G .I. Joe. Everybody else

in that show was either super, super good or

super, super bad. Right. And Shipwreck was kind

of on the fence. You know, he wanted to be a

good guy, but he didn't like following orders,

so he would decide to do it his way. somehow

muddle through, and that's what made him a really

great character to play. Much more fun than just

some square -jawed hero type who keeps saying,

here I am to save the day, over and over again.

When coming in with a voice for a brand new character

in an audition, a character that's not established

or anything like that, what process do you go

through in finding what you believe to be the

right voice for that? Well, I don't think I'm

that much different from the rest of the folks

in the business. You show up, if you're smart,

you show up half hour early. And they've got

a couple of pictures of the character and maybe

a paragraph or two description. Some descriptions

are helpful. Some are laughably silly. You know,

I've read for some characters where they say,

he led the revolt on the planet Baldestar, and

then he joined this, and then he went over there,

and I'm going, this is fascinating, Skippy. What

the hell does he sound like? Do you want a high

voice, low voice? Do you want an accent? That

they won't tell you, but they'll tell you reams

about, you know, that he led the slave revolt

on the planet Krelman. which is not that helpful,

frankly. But anyway, if it's a good paragraph,

sometimes they'll say, listen, we don't know

what we want, we're open to anything you've got,

or they'll say, we think we want a gruff voice

for this guy, whatever. And then some of the

characters that you read for are so outlandish

that it's... anybody's guess what they should

sound like so you absorb all of this and then

if all goes well you begin to hear a voice in

your head that you think would fit this character

and then the trick is to try to reproduce it

once you get up to the microphone and that's

kind of the process I know you've done a lot

of voiceover but is there one particular line

that you absolutely believe is your favorite

line that you've ever said? Well, I've got better

things to do tonight than die has been quoted

to me so often that I've decided that's probably

the one that if anything ends up being remembered,

that'll be the line. I can't, I'm going to have

to rewatch it, but I remember in the episode,

and I know you guys don't really remember episode

by episode, but in the episode, The Burden Hardest

to Bear, I remember Springer was like, that idiot,

I'm going to punch him. He knocked, he went unconscious.

It was something about Springer getting mad at

Rodimus for something, and I was like, oh man,

that would have been a fun voice session to be

a fly on the wall for. Well, sadly, that one's

not coming back. Yeah, yeah. Have you ever had

an interaction or a moment where a fan did not

believe you did a particular voice? Hmm. Not

that I can recall. No. They're remarkably trusting.

I've had many drinks bought for me when I tell

them, but I'm actually the voice of Optimus Prime.

I feel bad about it, but, you know. No, don't

feel bad. Getting into some of the series that

you worked on, just a couple of them that we

wanted to touch on just briefly, starting with

the Transformers series, obviously. I know you've

been asked about that a million times over your

career, but just... In brief, tell us a little

bit about your experience with that series and

what you took away from it. Well, my agent at

the time had made this contact with Wally Burr.

Her name was Donna Lee Davies. She passed away

some time ago. She had a small agency, and most

of us were beginners. up -and -comers and Wally

was very kind he said Donna I'll you know see

any of your people that you care to send over

you know for auditions and so the first show

I landed was G .I. Joe and I actually was doing

a couple of characters in G .I. Joe and I gradually

became aware that Wally was working on this other

show called Transformers about which I knew nothing

and then eventually he called me in to read for

that show And over a fairly short space of time,

I booked Hook, Slag and Bone Crusher. And I started

working Transformers. And it was a lot of the

same people that were in G .I. Joe were in Transformers.

So, you know, when I talk to other actors who

were involved in this stuff, once in a while,

someone will say, no, no, I only did G .I. Joe.

I never did Transformers. But most of the time,

everybody, you know, the people you run into

did both shows. And in our minds, it's all sort

of mashed up into one giant session, and everybody's

there. We don't know if we're remembering doing

a G .I. Joe or a Transformers, because they were

all done in the same studio, and in a lot of

cases were the same cast members. I do recall

that Wally, at a certain point, had a hell of

a time explaining a lot of the visuals. That's

a big part of what an animation director does,

because he or she has what's called a storyboard.

I assume you know what that is. But the actors

do not have access to that. And so if my character

says, oof, did I stub my toe or did I get hit

by a two -ton mallet? I need to know this stuff.

Or if I fell, did I fall two feet or a thousand

feet? And only the director can give you that.

And Wally was very good at describing all the

physical action. But at a certain point, the

Transformers stuff got so convoluted that he

would throw up his hands and say, do you mind

if I give you line readings? Because this stuff

is just too... complicated to explain. And we

said, no. I mean, most of the time actors resent

line readings, but at that stage of the game,

we didn't mind. It made things move more smoothly.

Tell us a little bit about your time on Voltron

as Commander Keith. Now, I do know that Jack

Angel and Peter Cullen were on that series as

well, but that cast was pretty much all different

from the Transformers and G .I. Joe stuff, right?

No, because Jack, I think, did Transformers.

I'm not sure if he did G .I. Joe. Yeah, Lenny

Weinrib was in Voltron, and I don't think he

did any G .I. Joe or Transformers work. Peter

Cullen, I don't even need to... Yeah. And then,

of course, Michael Bell was in Voltron, and he...

He also was involved in G .I. Joe, well, more

than involved. He played many roles. And then

B .J. Ward, and I'm pretty sure she did some

Transformers as well. Was there a difference

between the Transformers and G .I. Joe sessions

and the Voltron sessions? Because I don't think

Wally was doing the Voltron stuff. Wally was

a completely different organization. Voltron

was interesting. I really only found out lately

because I did a little research for this book

that I've mentioned. And Voltron was an already

existing Japanese series. And actually what they

did was they bought the rights to three different

series. And the idea was to somehow mash them

up into one show. Right. And then they took a

look at what they had, and because of cultural

differences and language differences, they realized

they couldn't just sort of translate these Japanese

shows into English and re -voice them. Essentially,

they wrote stuff from scratch and then found

footage that worked for it. It had to be like

putting a damn, what do you call it, those puzzles.

Oh, yeah. I can't think of... Not crossover.

You know what I mean. Yeah. Going behind... So,

we would show up. We did not work as a full cast,

which we did in Transformers and Voltron. Each

actor worked separately. Because the lines had

to be timed. uh some poor devil at the office

would time flip movements and then every line

you had would have a number next to it like 6

.5 and that meant you got to do this line in

6 .5 seconds and they would allow you a tenth

either way you could do six four six six but

anything else you had to do it over again and

man he's the time it's a wonderful line reading

but you're two seconds long oh god and um So,

yeah, a lot of it had to do with hitting timings,

which, of course, was not a consideration when

we did G .I. Joe and Transformers, because the

picture hadn't been done yet. They would animate

what we did. So with Voltron, we were sort of

working backwards, trying to fit the picture.

So they were very different sessions. And a lot

of the time, I didn't have a clue what the hell

the plot was or the storyline. Because you weren't

doing it in context. It was kind of like what

it's like to do these games now. Yeah, except

with the games, it's you in a booth alone for

12 hours a day or four hours a day or whatever

it is. Well, that's the way it was with Voltron.

We went in one at a time. I would come out, and

Peter Cullen would be coming in. Hey, Peter,

how are you doing? Good to see you. And that

was it. I would leave, and he would do his thing.

All right, going behind the scenes a bit, do

you ever go back and watch any of the shows you

worked on after they've been completed to hear

what you sounded like or to see how it all came

together, either right away or years later? Well,

it's usually a tremendous lag time between the

time you do the thing and the time it gets on

the air. But I always tried to watch at least

a couple just to get a feel for what the whole

thing looked like when it came together. in case

I needed to know how it all looked put together.

I don't sit around watching a lot of stuff that

I've done. To me, the fun is doing it, not watching

it later. Do you have any bizarre or humorous

audition stories? Bizarre or humorous audition

stories? I don't know if you're interested in

the shipwreck. Yeah, sure. It's kind of a long,

involved story. But before I even got into voiceovers,

one of the things that gave me some hope that

I might be able to do animation was I was working

for a radio station in San Diego. And working

with another fellow, we started doing this comedy

show that ran on the weekends called The Adventures

of the O .B. Ranger. And this was a satirical,

lighthearted look at the marijuana scene in San

Diego in the early 70s when it was just a quaint

little cottage industry. The O .B. Ranger was

sort of a takeoff on the Lone Ranger, but he

was a bumbling... He was a narc, but he was a

bumbling idiot, and he kept screwing everything

up. Anyway, I played a bunch of characters in

this thing, and one of them was the leader of

the gang that the OB Ranger was trying to bust.

He was a guy named Panama Red, and he was loaded

out of his mind, and he kind of sounded like

this. And periodically people would say, you

know, that kind of sounds like Jack Nicholson.

I would say, really? Could have fooled me. Okay.

So that shows over and done with. It's in the

past. I'm now in voiceovers. I'm in L .A. I show

up to read for Shipwreck. And I do a couple of

different voices, and there's various people

there, and I'm looking in the booth, which is

what you do. You kind of look to see if anybody's

jumping in the air and high -fiving. And I could

tell that no one was particularly thrilled with

what I had done. And there was a guy at the audition.

I never saw him again. I don't know who he was,

but he looked at me and he said, did you ever

see a movie called The Last Detail? And the last

detail is a movie that Jack Nicholson did. And

it's sort of he got nominated for an Academy

Award. He didn't win. And then he had a huge

win a couple of years later with Chinatown, I

think. And people sort of forgot about the last

detail. But basically, he he plays a sailor named

Badass Badusky. And there's. particular scene

in there you can find it on youtube look up jack

nicholson the last detail bar scene and the minute

he said have you seen the movie the last detail

i thought that's what they want they want nicholson

as badass badusky or some variation on that and

i thought i've got this stoner voice that people

say sounds like him what if i took the weed away

from him and got and filled him full of coffee

And made him kind of hyper. And, you know, I

started doing that. And boy, suddenly everybody's

jumping in the air and high -fiving. And the

guy who mentioned the last detail points a finger

at me and says, you got it. Which is usually

the kiss of death. But about a week later, Donna

called and said, you got that sailor part in

G .I. Joe. So it all sort of flowed together

over a long period of time. Awesome. Are there

any crazy off -the -wall, behind -the -scenes

moments you can tell us about from Transformers

or any of your other voiceover sessions? Any

Frank Welker stories that we haven't heard yet?

Boy, well, Frank Welker stories. You know, for

a guy who has... as much talent and success as

Frank, you couldn't meet a nicer, more humble

human being. I think of some of the people I've

known over the years who were so full of themselves

and didn't have a tenth of Frank's talent. And

he's just the nicest guy and no ego at all. It's

astonishing. But the story I always tell about

Frank is he... I forget if it was G .I. Joe or

Transformers, but he had a scene where he was

playing both characters, and they were having

an argument. Now, normally, when you get in a

situation where two of your characters are interacting,

the director will say, well, how do you want

to do this? Do you want to do one voice all the

way through, and I'll feed you the lines, or

do you want to try to do both at the same time?

Depending on how long the scene is, sometimes

I'll try to do both. And sometimes I'll say,

well, let's do each one separately. Frank just

rolled into it. And you guys know what overlapping?

Oh, yeah. We've heard this one. I know this story.

No, go ahead, tell it. I know it, but go ahead.

So Frank rolls into this thing, and of course

Wally never looked at us. There was no reason

to. He had his face down. He's looking at the

storyboard to make sure everything fit. And Frank

is blazing through this scene. It's astonishing.

And suddenly Wally gets on the button. He goes,

no, we've got to go back. We had an overlap.

And we're all screaming at him, how can there

be an overlap? Frank is doing both voices. You

can't overlap yourself. And, of course, Wally

was terribly embarrassed and apologized profusely.

But, I mean, that's how good Frank is. He got

in and out of these two voices so fast. Wally,

who's listened to a million hours of this stuff,

thought he heard an overlap. And that's astonishing.

Were you ever present when he would also? play

tricks on the other side of the glass with the

sound effects? Yeah, if he gets bored, he makes

this sound. He's not moving a muscle in his face

that you can see, but it sounds exactly like

a piece of electronic gear starting to burn up.

And I've seen more than one engineer dive under

the console looking around for smoke, and you

look over at Frank and he's got this little smile.

Awesome. He doesn't do it often, just every now

and then when he gets bored, I guess. Has there

ever been a role or a show that you've taken

a part in that later on you wish you wouldn't

have or vice versa, something you turned down

that you wish you wouldn't have in retrospect?

I've never turned anything down. I'm not at a

level where you can. I mean, I turned down non

-union work and stuff like that. Anything legit?

No. I mean, if they want me, I'm there. Something

I regretted? Regrets, I have a few, but hardly

a few to mention. No, I don't really think there's

anything I could cite that I wish I hadn't done.

Sometimes I think back to stupid crap I did on

the radio, and I wish I could take that back.

But as far as the voiceovers, no, I don't have

anything I regret. What have been some of the

favorite or most enjoyable shows that you've

worked on or some of the ones that were a little

bit more maybe tedious or not as fun to work

on? Oh, well, I did a show called Kissy Fur,

which mercifully has been forgotten. until now

and I played a pig named Dwayne and at the audition

just to crack everybody up I thought here's again

my rule don't do anything in an audition you're

not prepared to do for 65 episodes I just made

this I did this voice that was just very very

Flamboyant, shall we say. And instead of laughing,

they said, oh, that's perfect. And I ended up

doing that for 65 episodes. Lenny Weinrib played

my father in the show. And every time I would

go into this voice, he would fall off his chair

laughing. I'd say, Lenny, please. This is tough

enough without you. You know. Going into hysterics

every time I do this. So I don't regret doing

that show, but let me put it this way. I didn't

drive into work whistling zippity -doo -dah.

I can't believe that was an NBC show. Well, there

is one funny story connected with that, although

you guys probably don't remember Lenny Bruce

at all. I've heard the name. Yeah, he was a brilliant

comedian ahead of his time. I don't know. You

know, this is a long, involved story, and I don't

know that it's going to pay off that well. All

right. Let me put it this way. I just remember

that one of the first, it may have been the first

Kissy First session, in addition to the director,

And his assistant and the engineer, there were

five, count them, five suits from the network

in there. Oh, no. And we would every time we

would do a line and they would sit in there and

argue with themselves for like five minutes about

what we never knew. And then they'd get on the

button and go, OK, do it again with no direction.

And this is the first episode. And, you know,

when you're about 10 shows in. They think twice

before they fire you because they've got to replace

all the lines you've done. But if they don't

like you on the pilot episode, they can just

replace you in two seconds. So we're all sweating

bullets. And I just remember that as the session

from hell. And there's a funny story connected

with it, but it's just too involved. If you could

still be working on any one show that you've

worked on in the past, which show would it be

and why? Hmm. Well, I would be open to either

G .I. Joe or Transformers again in some fashion.

That was a lot of fun. I'm surprised they didn't

put Shipwreck in the Renegades cartoon that was

out a few years ago. Or maybe they... I don't

remember. I didn't watch that show that much.

Has there ever been a show that you were involved

with that either you were very surprised became

successful or that you were very sure was going

to be a big hit that didn't end up lasting very

long? Yeah, we just, it's really hard. I mean,

people say, boy, did you back in the day, did

you ever think that G .I. Joe and Transformers

would be remembered? And the answer is no. The

climate back when we did those shows, the prevailing

wisdom was they're aimed at 12 to 14 -year -old

boys or girls, and they will outgrow this stuff,

and the show will end because there'll be a new

crop of kids, and they don't want the show their

older brother watched. They want their own show.

So none of these things were expected to last

more than a few years. Thankfully, I was an only

child and I got attached to everything. But I

do remember one show that you probably have never

heard of. What the hell was the title? I can't

even remember the title. They didn't even run

all 13 episodes. They cut it off after the 11th

episode. It was about a... a school and we had

so damn much fun doing it we were just laughing

our asses off we thought it was the greatest

thing since sliced bread and it just died we

couldn't believe it now i'm spacing the title

but it probably wouldn't mean anything to you

anyway because they just ran 11 episodes and

dumped it and it was never heard from again but

we were all very disappointed because we were

having so much fun doing it see that's the thing

you They say happy set, crappy picture. Which

voice actors did you most look up to when you

were making the transition from radio into the

voiceover world? Which ones did you look up to

most then? And which ones do you look up to still

today that are still around? Well, I mentioned

the Richie Rich thing. There was a cadre of people

who'd been doing it for a while at Hanna -Barbera,

folks like Dawes Butler, and I mentioned, of

course, June Foray, Joni Gerber, Lenny Weinrib,

Michael Bell. I'm maybe forgetting a few folks,

but they were kind of the stars back then. And

the rest of us were all up -and -comers. Peter

Cullen sort of came out of the world of on camera

and sort of, I'm not quite sure how he got into

voiceovers, but now looking back, and again,

I'm going to slight some people, but just popping

into my head are, you say, who do you look up

to? Of course, it's Frank. We've already mentioned

him. Rob Paulson, Jim Cummings, Peter, of course,

Peter Cullen, Chris Latta, rest his soul. God,

just about everybody I worked with. I mean, there

were just no slouches in those shows. Everybody

was wonderful. And I just felt very lucky to

have snuck in there somehow. Well, we're glad

you did. Well, me too. Are there any voice actors

that you stay close with or that you're close

friends outside of the booth to in your real

life comings and goings? Well, unfortunately,

you know, geography kind of gets in the way.

It's tough to... And I'm down here in Rancho

Palos Verdes overlooking the Blue Pacific, and

a lot of these folks are in the extreme West

Valley, and it's two days to get there, and you

have to fight off road agents and all of that.

So we don't, unfortunately, get to see each other

that often, but when we do, there's great affection.

I saw Peter maybe a year or so ago, and it was

delightful to run into him. And chat a bit. And

I did. Rob Paulson has a sort of a continuing

thing that he does at the improv where he does

this show called Talking Tunes. And I did that

a while back. And again, it was a lot of fun

to work with Rob and see him again. But unfortunately,

I don't see these folks that often these days,

which is unfortunate. I'd say the coolest thing

I've seen you in in the past, I don't know, five

or six years or so, is when you did the special

feature for the Shout Factory Transformers set

when you guys did that roundtable. That was awesome.

You and Frank and, man, that was great. Yeah,

I was glad we got to do that. I thought if I

was a fan, I would want to see something like

this. Right, right. So, yeah, it was very, very

good of them to put that together and include

that in the package. Neil, I also work on a website

called BehindTheVoiceActors .com, kind of like

an IMDb database of voice actor roles, and we'll

be promoting this interview a little bit over

there as well. I just wanted to... A lot of people

there are interested in the business, etc., and

we get the same question a lot, which we can't

really answer as well since we're not in the

business. How hard would you say is it for those

folks to make it into the voice acting business,

and what advice, just brief advice, would you

have for anybody that's trying to start out?

Well, it's gotten a lot tougher. The field is

much more crowded. The odds are against you,

but then the odds are always against you if it's

something that's really worthwhile. A lot of

people are going to want to get in there. Advice?

Well, I would say take advantage of any opportunity

to perform in any way, shape, or form. Go down

to the bus station and announce incoming buses

if that's all you can do. community theater,

just anything. Because a big hurdle is just getting

comfortable enough to walk into an audition.

and be able to focus on really nailing a character

as opposed to, I don't know if they like me or

not. That guy's looking at me funny. Maybe I

should have worn the other shirt. People say,

geez, maybe I should do this stuff. At Thanksgiving,

I crack my relatives up around the table. Maybe

I don't say this, but there's a huge difference

between making your Aunt Minnie laugh, who loves

you anyway. As opposed to showing up on a Monday

morning in Burbank for a bunch of strangers who

aren't that thrilled to be there. And say, all

right, what do you got, kid? But I would say

persistence and work ethic. It's so simple now.

There are all kinds of little recording devices.

When the Sunday paper comes. Pull the funnies

out and just try to do every character in the

funny papers and record it and see what it sounds

like. That's great advice. Yeah. Just a few fun

questions. We're almost done here. A couple of

ones I'm curious about here. How fun was it getting

to do voice work in some of the live action films

that you've done that have become cult favorites

like Back to the Future 2, Dick Tracy, Gremlins

2? You did various voices in some of those. How

fun was that? Well, it's always fun to even be

a tiny little part of a major motion picture.

I mean, it's exciting. And, you know, to get

to work. Meet and work with people like Robert

Redford and Warren Beatty is, you know, it's

incredibly exciting. And yeah, those are some

of my fonder memories. And give me an honest

answer. Is there anyone that does a better announcer

voice than you? Oh, yeah. Hundreds, hundreds

of people. Obviously, you mentioned the ones

you're starting out with, with G .I. Joe and

Transformers and whatnot, where you were playing

some pretty major characters and some more side

characters. But then it seemed like you had a

track of time where you landed a great number

of leading roles there in the 80s with Ace McCloud

on Centurions, Rambo in Rambo Forces of Freedom,

Herc Armstrong in Inhumanoids. a bunch of other

ones that I could mention. How fun was it to

kind of make that transition and get a whole

string of leading roles there for some of those

cartoons? It was a very, very heady time. In

fact, well, before I ever got into radio, when

I was still a high school student, I met a radio

guy. He happened to live in the same neighborhood

I did, and he was very kind to me. and listened

to my nonsense and gave me some very good advice.

And one of the best pieces of advice he gave

me was, he said, now this isn't going to mean

much now, but I want you to remember it. And

I said, okay. And he said, kid, don't ever start

believing your own bullshit because that's the

beginning of the end. And I remember a day somewhere

in that period where for about 90 seconds I started

to believe my own bullshit. I just felt very

full of myself and on top of the world and quite

arrogant. And I was sailing down Vine Street

past the Capitol Records Tower. I'm Bad, I'm

Nationwide by ZZ Top was on the radio, and I

had it cranked up to full volume, and as I say,

I was starting to believe my own bullshit. And

then I got stopped at a red light at sunset,

and the song ended, and suddenly I could hear

this guy's voice in my head. Kid, don't ever

start. And I thought, oh my God, you know, I

almost started there. And I stopped, and I never

did again. But yeah, you sort of get a little

mini idea of what it must be like to be a Tom

Cruise or a George Clooney in a very miniature

way. But, you know, that's the arc of the career.

If you're lucky, you get these parts and then

you get a little bit older and suddenly other

guys are getting those parts and you're doing

the character stuff. I read a wonderful thing

by an English actor. He said, the arc of a career,

you start out playing one of the two soldiers

in the ghost scene in Hamlet. And then maybe

you work your way up to playing Laertes or Horatio.

And then perhaps with luck, you actually get

to play the melancholy Dane himself. And then

you get a little too old for that. And now maybe

you play the king or you play Polonius. And he

says, if all goes well by the end of your career,

you're playing the skull. So I'm not quite to

the skull yet, but I can see it coming. Oh, come

on now. Don't say that. You've been to a few

of the fan conventions. What are your thoughts

on them? I resisted doing that for a long time.

I had this vision of me sitting at a card table

somewhere in a huge hall being ignored. And people

kept saying, no, no, no, no. The fans love you.

You should do this. And I finally I thought they

had a bot con in Pasadena. They asked me to attend

and I thought, you know, it's just Pasadena.

If I get there and it sucks, I'll just. Give

them their money back and go home. And, oh, God,

I had a wonderful time. Just couldn't believe

it. And, you know, I've been doing various conventions

ever since. Some are better than others. But

I always have a great deal of fun, and I love

meeting the fans, and I've always been treated

wonderfully at these things. So I'm sorry I didn't

start doing it sooner. I bet that's what Frank

is saying these days, considering this year was

his very first BotCon ever. I don't know why

I haven't talked to him. I know he sort of was

resistant like I was, and I don't know what changed

his mind. But yeah, I saw where he's starting

to do that stuff. I don't know if he's going

to start doing it full -time, but this year's

BotCon to me was really special because... oh

my God, we've never been able to have him there.

And it's just one of those things where he went

and I saw the panel with him and whatever else.

And I talked to several people that actually

went to BotCon and said, oh yeah, he was saying

that he wished he had done it sooner, doesn't

know why he did it. I personally think it's what

Rob Paulson always says and what everybody...

in your honest profession says about Frank Welker,

he's just a private guy. He goes in, he does

the work, and he goes home and has his life.

Yeah, pretty much. That's the impression I get.

And as I said, utterly devoid of attitude or

ego, a very humble guy. A nicer fellow you're

never going to meet. Before we let you go, would

you like to remind our listeners and fans of

anything you have coming up? I know you've been

mentioning this book you're working on. Can you

give us any kind of detail or anything on that

or no? Well, as I think I said, it's just basically

my life in radio and voiceovers. And I don't

want to talk a whole lot about it because if

you talk about it, then you don't end up writing

it. Right, right. The only other question I'll

ask about it is because I'm curious, because

I know Dan Gilvezan did this with his book. Are

you going to do an audiobook version of it? You

know, I don't know what I'm going to do with

it. Okay. I may end up printing five copies to

leave to my grandchildren, assuming I have any

that they can throw away. You know, I thought

before I get involved in any of that stuff, I

should at least have a completed first draft.

You know, once that's done, then I'll start exploring

how do you market this, what's the best way to

go about it. But I want to have, whoever I approach,

I want to be able to say I have a first draft.

It's ready to go. All right. We would like to

thank Mr. Ross for taking the time with us here

on this All Things Transformers TFGM Podcast

crossover interview here on the Geekcast Radio

Network. Where can the people interact with you

online, sir? If anywhere. Interact with me. Well,

I'm on Facebook, but I hardly ever go there.

Okay. I have a website if you want to listen

to demos and stuff like that. It's really for

the buyers, but I don't mind if fans go on there

and poke around. Very clever name. It's NeilRoss

.com. I paid a consultant a fortune to come up

with that. Yeah, that's about it. I'm not good

with social media. I'm something of a Luddite.

I've never tweeted. I wouldn't know how. It just

gets people in trouble. Well, I tweeted when

I played Dwayne the Pig, but that's over. Okay,

we will ask you to hold the line. Kevin and I

will be back after this. Nobody would listen

to an uncharismatic bore like you. It's rough

out there, kid. All right, folks, there you go.

About an hour or so interview with Mr. Neil Ross.

from Transformers, G .I. Joe, Jim, Voltron, all

your favorite 80s properties. Well, that's it,

dude. You're not getting another birthday present

this year. No, you're not talking to me. Yeah,

I am talking to you. It's always fun to interview

these guys. I'm looking forward to possibly in

the future doing a lot more with both you guys

and with Behind the Voice actors, but it's always

fun. It's been a while, I think, since we talked

to Rob Paulson. I was on Maurice LaMarche and

Larry Kenny. In the very beginning of this interview,

when I asked Neil about the... About the upcoming

projects, and he started mentioning non -disclosures.

I almost told him the story of the Maurice LaMarche

flub that we had. Yeah. Just so you know, we've

had experience with that. We don't want anyone

else to get in trouble. Yeah, exactly. But yeah,

no, this is, you know, all things Transformers.

We just had our 50th. Steve just had the 50th

episode. He is... I can go ahead and speak for

him because I know that this is what he told

me. Steve Megatron went to BotCon this year,

as you heard in episode 50, and he's kind of

reinvigorated with the fandom. So all things

Transformers will be coming back in version 3

.0 with episode 51. But this will be featured

on there and on the original TFG1 podcast feed.

I do have plans to get a few other voice actors,

Transformers -based voice actors. So that's kind

of what's coming up. But no, talking with Neil

Ross is just absolutely hilarious and great.

He's a very self -deprecating kind of guy. I

wasn't really expecting that. I wasn't really

expecting him to be that guy of, oh yeah, nobody

wants to listen to me. How much you could be

mistaken. Yeah, exactly. I think he found that

out when he went to his first convention. Yep.

So yeah, always great. Uh, sounds like a really

great guy and it was a lot of fun listening or

talking to him. Yep. Absolutely. Anything else

you want to say before we get out of here? Nope.

All right. Transform and roll out, transform,

transcend all that good stuff. We will catch

you next time.