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Futurama Voices Could Be Recast
Svippy writes "According to reports surfacing on the Internet, Futurama may be recast. The animated series is due to return next year on Comedy Central, but may not be the same as we once knew it. 'As part of the announcement, the show's producers said stars including West, Sagal and DiMaggio had all signed on to return. Turns out that wasn't true. The stars had all expressed interest in returning. But with the budget for Futurama dramatically slashed, the salary offers came in well below what the thesps were asking.' Phil LaMarr posted 20th Century Fox's request for auditions on his Facebook page. However, some are skeptical about whether it's a real casting call or purely a stunt to reduce the salaries of the voice actors."
I want to point people to the following articles as well:
Both making very compelling cases.
Clicked pie.
During the commentary's for the both the movies and the season DVDs all the voice actors always said that it was their favorite show to work on. It was hard to tell if this was simply pandering but they sounded genuinely sincere. Especially Billy West and John DiMaggio who seemed to be to big fans of the show. And I don't think Katty Segal is being flooded with job offers. The only ones I see moving on are the greatly talented Maurice Lamarche and Tres McNeil who do a lot of work other than Futurama and only play secondary characters on the show. Read More... 3 comments top tags
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Not very? If you want the cast to stay on, either the cast needs to be appealed to, or the source of the money (Comedy Central) does. Not the production crew.
I work in the business and I saw a casting notice for this go out yesterday. Right now (if you're a member) you can see the notice on a site called Actor's Access here and the sides are up on Showfax.
Casting notices for shows like this almost never appear on a site like that (it's a step above Craigslist), so my best guess this is a negotiation tactic to convince the cast to accept contracts that pay less, in line with the reduced budget for the show.
I love how the 'goodnewseveryone' tag is being negated - and replaced by 'badnewseveryone' - by people who obviously don't understand that the phrase is supposed to be ironic and prescient of bad news.
Hand your nerd cards in at the door, please. You know who you are.
Corporation, n. An ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility. - Ambrose Bierce
20th Century Fox Television claims the voice actors wanted 75,000 dollars per episode. Which is apparently close to ten times as much as usual.
According to whom? The Simpsons actors reportedly earn $400,000 per episode. Sure, $75,000 might be ten times what a voice actor earns for an episode of an afternoon kids' cartoon, but we're talking about a prime time show.
Breakfast served all day!
At this point it's still cheaper to pay high quality voice actors than it is to replace them with software. We have the technology (heck we have software now that can decompile individual strings on a guitar (inside a chord, no less), voices and other instruments and retune the individual notes, remove, add or modify guitar riffs, choruses, bridges etc - google Melodyne or "direct note access" or just watch this video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFCjv4_jqAY), we just need a person and time to write the program. It doesn't have to be perfect, it just has to be convincing. Eventually it'll be cheaper to use software like that than it is to pay real voice actors - eventually 3rd rate cartoon shows will use/buy voice/vocabulary libraries for entirely new series, just the same way sitcoms have been using the Red Skeleton Laugh tracks for decades.
moox. for a new generation.
*Matt Groening comes up with Futurama. After a series of battle that he describes as "by far the worst experience of my grown-up life," Fox runs it for a while.
*Fox cancels it.
*Adult Swim picks up reruns at low cost, following the same formula they did with Family Guy. They don't fund anything new.
*Comedy Central helps produce four new movies, and airs them.
*The movies do well enough that they decide to pick it up for another season. However, this season is on a basic cable budget, rather than a network or movie one.
There was no "swap."
She's in "Son's of Anarchy", plus she's married to a producer, and the MWC royalties come in. Trust me, she isn't hurting for spending money or worrying if she'll miss the next slashdot dupe because the IP bill is overdue.
I know from watching the special edition of the Simpsons DVD special features (season 8 I think), they already do this in a limited way. Do you think that every 'D'oh!', 'Ay, caramba!', and 'Exccccellent' are created fresh for every episode that requires them? Because they are not. There is some kind of sound bank they keep clips of all the oft-used lines in. It's not too hard of a stretch to imagine that being expanded to more and more lines over time.
I judt got a nre Kinesis keybiartf so please excusr ant egregiou typos.
Are you sure that wasn't "Bad news, nobody"? Why even say anything and risk your nerd card?
Bewitched switched "Darrin Stephens" from Dick York (1964-1969) to Dick Sargent (1969-1972) and did well. Even spun off a few shows and cartoons.
Man, am I dating myself.
-- I have a private email server in my basement.
I believe it is Season 10, Episode 1 (The Return of Chef). http://www.southparkstudios.com/guide/1001/
This was after Isaac Hayes quit in a huff over SP's treatment of Scientology. The SP boys made a fairly nice "send-off" episode, but since Hayes had already quit, they used the library of his voice clips to do this episode. It is hilarious!
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
Anyway, although it does seem that [Joss Whedon's] involvement, while not lowering quality imho, does seem to doom some shows. Why is that?
If you listen to what fans are saying about Dollhouse, a lot of people think the first few episodes were pretty mediocre - one fan said the first five episodes were like five different pilots. But then things started to improve, and by the end of the season the show was absolutely great. Alan Tudyk's performance in the last two episodes was brilliant.
Now look at the ratings. The first few episodes did pretty well, but then the numbers start going downhill, and the final episode got the worst ratings of the season.
If Joss' involvement dooms a show, it's not because he lowers the quality. It's because the majority of the audience would rather be watching Friends reruns.
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Didn't he say: "Bad news, nobody, the super collider super exploded...". You had also better hand it over.
I've started a petition for anyone interested in signing! http://www.petitionspot.com/petitions/futuramarecast/