Mark Interviews 2000+

King of Voice Roles

Former Jedi lends voice talent to Joseph: King of Dreams

Perhaps James Earl Jones' Darth Vader was the voice of the original STAR WARS trilogy, but it's Mark Hamill - the artist formerly known as Luke Skywalker -- whose vocal cords have taken Hollywood by force ever since. Hamill has earned a solid reputation over the last decade by lending his voice talents to hundreds of animated character roles ranging from the Joker on the Batman animated series to various voices on The Simpsons (including playing himself), Spider-Man, The Incredible Hulk, The Fantastic Four, Cow and Chicken, Scooby Doo and many more projects. We'll be hearing something new from Hamill again this week, when the animated family feature Joseph: King of Dreams is released exclusively on home video and DVD. As a parent himself, he's proud that Joseph is a poignant film that the entire family can enjoy.

"It's so gratifying, I'm sure, to parents to see that their kids can respond to something like this and that it doesn't have to be junk," Hamill told me in a recent interview. "I'm not totally against junk --have a Twinkie or two -- but don't think of it as real food. Joseph, which is made by the same team that produced The Prince of Egypt, was actually well into production before that hit film was released to theaters," Hamill said.

Based on the classic Bible story, the film tells the incredible journey of Joseph (voiced by Ben Affleck), a boy who has the extraordinary gift of seeing the future in his dreams.

Since Joseph is already his father's favorite, the realization of his gift sparks a deep division within his family. Blinded by jealousy, the brothers secretly sell Joseph into slavery, launching him on a 20-year journey in which he is ultimately faced with the challenge of forgiveness. Hamill voices the pivotal role of Judah, the eldest of the 11 brothers.

"When I was reading the script, I thought people were really going to loathe this guy because selling his brother into slavery is such a drastic and irrevocable act," Hamill told me. "But the filmmakers reassured me that he's redeemed at the end. I was just surprised at how moving it was because as it happens, I did that scene without Ben Affleck. I've never even met him, and yet they were able to bring it together with overlapped lines. I was just amazed at the artistry they demonstrated. You feel a scene that has that kind of nuance that you would have to be in the same room with the guy. I think it shows that animation is the best example of what composite art moviemaking is. You give the filmmakers all these jigsaw puzzle pieces, and they go away and put it together."

Hamill further explained that those pieces are not a only aplenty as a whole, but aplenty from each actor. "I might give them 10 different line readings purposefully," Hamill told me. "I might say 'Let me do this line, and I'll start out being this way and getting increasingly the way you want me to be and go past that' - so they have degrees that they can use from Take 1 to Take 15."

Animation Biz is no Joke(r)

Of course, to say that Hamill is well established as a film actor is a gross understatement. But perhaps the greatest training for his animated roles is grounded in the theater. He's won several accolades on Broadway for many different roles which range from playing Mozart in Amadeus to John Merrick in The Elephant Man.

"I really felt that Broadway was where I'm going to get to do the sort of stuff I did in College and High School. But then I came back to Los Angeles mostly because I wanted to write and create my own product, and I knew all the contacts and the meetings I would have to have were there," Hamill explained to me.

"The irony of ironies is that probably the best part I've had since Broadway is the Joker in the animated Batman series -- in terms of the sheer joy of the over-the-top histrionics," Hamill said. "This is such a great character. Aside from Moriarty to Holmes, there's no greater Yin and Yang than Batman and the Joker." Ironically, because of the depth of those characters, there has been controversy surrounding the upcoming feature-length animated video release, Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker.

Hamill tells me that he doesn't just suspect -- he knows that the holdup is because of the mature level of the material in the video. Of course, one of the greatest misconceptions of animation is that it is a "kids-only" medium, which couldn't be any farther from the truth. And while he says Joseph is clearly a film for all ages, Return of the Joker is no doubt meant for more mature audiences.

The debate about the content is so intense, in fact, that Hamill says a scheduled premiere of the film three weeks ago was postponed, as well as a slate of promotional events surrounding it.

"I called voicedirector Andrea Romano, and she was just crestfallen," Hamill said. "She said an executive stormed out of the screening room, saying, 'I won't even advertise this on my network.' Mind you, it was NEVER INTENDED to be shown on the network, but they certainly were going to advertise it. I'm sure it has to do with this current climate that Hollywood has been known to market movies to inappropriate audiences."

The thing is, Hamill isn't trying to pretend that Return of the Joker is a movie made for young kids. In fact, he admits that, if the movie were made in live-action form it might be "hard-pressed to get a PG-13 rating."

"There's no bad language in it. It's just so much the stuff of comic books," Hamill explained. "The objectionable scene to them was the fact that the Joker kidnaps Robin. That's one taboo - you're not supposed to threaten or harm children in any way, and our Robin looks like a young boy, he doesn't look like the grown-up from the movies. Then, Joker brainwashes him and urges him to shoot a gun at the climax of the picture. That was enough to upste the apple cart."

Whether that element was deemed appropriate by the powers that be, Hamill wishes that a decision had been made early on to avoid the current mess.

"What I find really unforgivable is that they had this picture on their desk in storyboard form two years ago," Hamill said. "Why do you wait until it is filmed and scored and finished before you flee the screening room? There's no other form of entertainment that is more easily micromanaged than animation. It's not like live action, where an actor can give a performance or handle a prop in a way that you didn't anticipate on the printed page. For a control freak, stop-frame and line-drawing animation is the ultimate because it's filmed at 22 frames per second and you know at any given time exactly what the effect is going to be."

A Long Time Ago...

Of course, you can't do a Mark Hamill interview without mentioning the original STAR WARS trilogy, which catapulted his career into the stratosphere 23 years ago. And like the indelible impressions left by such actors as Sigourney Weaver in the Alien series and Janet Leigh in Psycho, Hamill is completely comfortable with his identification as Luke Skywalker to the masses.

"For the most part, it's really a positive experience in the sense that the fans are so young, and they need an optimistic message like those in the STAR WARS pictures," Hamill said. "I'm really proud of being a part of something that was so uplifting and optimistic for young people."

"I can't go to airports anymore where people want just one autograph -- they want 34," Hamill said. "They have ten posters, seven games and five lightsabers and so on. Don't get me wrong, I love the fans, but I don't feel comfortable aiding and abetting the dealers because you know this stuff is going to go up on eBay. You look bad if you DON'T sign STAR WARS stuff, but it's just like it never goes away. That's the part that's kind of unsettling to me. I said to my wife, 'Maybe I should just fly under a different name.' It's a real split: if a seven-year-old comes up to me, trembling, and tells me how much he loves the movies, you can't help but be moved by that."

"But for the most part, it's like the comic book guy from The Simpsons with just a satchel full of materials. I'm not exaggerating -- I signed stuff for this guy and counted them at the end. There were 34 different items and I personalized them all because he said, 'Yeah, personalize them because I'm not going to sell them.'"

"That convinced me that there must be some way to remove Magic Marker from items now. They used to say, 'Oh, don't personalize it, because I don't know who I'm going to give it to,' and then you knew. It's just one of these things where you shrug your shoulders and say, 'That's showbiz,' and you move on."

That's not to say that he's ever going to abandon his STAR WARS fans; he's simply more concerned about what happens tomorrow instead of yesterday. "I want to be respectful of my past and acknowledge it and yet never give up on believing what challenges lie ahead of you," Hamill explained to me. "It's a tricky wire to walk, really."

But whether it's the past or the future, he loves what it all holds. For certain, it transcends peoples' perceptions of what it should be.

"I'm so grateful to be living my dream and being part of the creative community," Hamill said. "I'm always astonished with people who say, 'Gee, you must hate Harrison Ford.' I love Harrison Ford. I think he's one of the greates actors ever. It's always a surprise to me that people would assume I'm unhappy that I'm not as successful as he is. It's ridiculous. It always comes down to the idea of being grateful for what you have or being covetous of what other people have. I have to say I love what I do and sure enjoy performing." And that mindset doesn't preclude him from directing. He's been at the helm of such projects as the upcoming The Black Pearl video game (based on a graphic novel that he co-created) and looks forward to projects in feature films.

"I want to be as big a director as Rob Reiner or Brian DePalma, and I mean that from the standpoint of girth, not stature. I want to get fat and bald and not ever be photographed," Hamill said, laughing. "I don't want to get up at 6 in the morning and face the cameras. That's for the young, attractive people."

Unknown, 2000