Acting Analysis
by Cathy Michaels

Originally Posted: 3 April 2000

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First off, my apologies for the length of this whole thing. I didn't know how long it would be because I have so much to say on the subject but after reading and re-reading this piece, this was my final result onto all I felt necessary to say. I should also note that I don't participate in chat rooms and message boards so if the subject's already been touched upon in these places, I do apologize. Here I go...

Acting is one of the most fun experience you can ever go through in life. It's also extremely hard work. But with enough heart, it's worth all the effort. Most DBZ fans are aware of the Dallas Observer article and the jolt it sent through several fans. While I agreed with people on several points made throughout various editorials, one thing stands out that I wish to clarify for DBZ fans. At first people complained that FUNimation had the nerve to hire a librarian for an actor's job. Then this librarian corresponded with the likes of VegettoEX and Steve Harmon and we found that she was indeed professionally trained. Most people cooled off on that matter but there's something that still bothers me about this. If you're going to complain to FUNimation for not hiring professionally trained actors, you should complain to anyone who has ever hired an actor period. In the acting industry, when you audition, the people hiring you do not look at your training so much as they do your capabilities. That holds true for just about every production. It doesn't matter how much training you've had, if there's another actor more suited for the part, that actor gets the role. It's not done like several other careers. To be a doctor, you go through intense learning and several years of school before you can ever actually be a doctor. But for an actor, it doesn't matter how much school or what school you went to; you have to show if all that schooling actually did any good. And if it didn't then this person who is trying out the acting bit for fun and is better at it than you will get the part.

I tried to point this out to a fellow DBZ fan (the webmaster of Ide Yo Doragon) and went into a few details about my experiences in acting which mostly consist of stage acting. That person gave me this rebuttal: "You see, the acting you're referring to is a different kind of acting as well. In the acting you're referring to, you use your whole body. People see your facial expressions, your body movements, and they hear your voice. It's a wonderous mixture of art. VA's on the other hand, only use their voice, and thus, train it well. That's the only thing they can use to convey their message to an audience. Nothing else. So if you ask me, they should train that extra. But I must admit, you're starting to convince me. They really don't need to go to years of school, do they?"

I will admit that stage acting and voice acting are entirely different forms but told this person that I seriously disagreed that VAs are limited to their voice and only their voice. You see when you're acting and you do it right, you basically have to learn to become an entirely different person. Your mind body and soul are no longer yours but your character's. You need to be thinking what they are thinking. Some actors can get away with thinking in the back of their mind, "What's my next line?" but this terribly weakens the performance and the actor should have the inner monologue of the character he/she is portraying. As for the body, this might be hard for me to explain because movement was a major weakness of mine in stage acting. Let's say as a person that I'm not very expressive with my body. I mostly fold my arms or hang them to my side but don't use them much otherwise. Now let's say for the heck of it I have to be Bulma. Bulma's extremely expressive with her body. She waves her arms frantically, she bonks people on the head, she jumps up and down in a fit, etc. If you've seen her, you know what I mean. Even though the audience won't see me wave my arms frantically, if Bulma's doing it in the show, it will help me as an actor to do it as well. The actor is given several tools to use. In stage acting, your tools are your body, voice, and sometimes your face if people sit close enough. In film acting, your eyes and face are valuable tools. And in voice acting, it's obviously your voice. But out of all three, your most valuable tool throughout acting of any nature is your heart. By heart, I mean your soul is no longer yours but you've given it to the character and your audience. If it's in Bulma's heart to wave her arms crazily, it should be in my heart to do the same. Maybe I can explain why professional training isn't quite necessary by explaining what it really takes to be a good actor to begin with.

These are in no particular order of importance:

(1) acting is more or less re-acting. Every action that a character ever does is in reaction to something that's already happened. You need to know what it is that you're reacting too. People are like icebergs. You have a small white tip on the surface for the world to see but underneath there's a lot more going on. Memories of what once was. Thoughts on the way things are. Fears of what's to come. Experiences you've been through. All this stuff is buried inside and it's up to the actor to understand what's below the surface.

(2) don't indicate acting. This is where you fake it. You're not really the character but an actor trying to act like the character. You can fool some of the audience some of the time but you'll never be able to fool all of them any of the time if you do this.

(3) know your character's motivation. What is it that you're character wants and hopes to accomplish by what they're doing?

(4) have an inner monologue. Know not only what you're character is saying but what are they thinking before and as they're saying it

(5) know specifics. This is by far one of the biggest helps any actor could ever ask for. Example: one time, we did as a play the book of poems called Spoon River Anthology. If you don't know what that is, I'll briefly explain. It's a collection of poems of voices of people speaking from beyond the grave. Each person tells his/her story. The book is basically put in a play format. I portrayed a woman named Pauline Barrett. She had to have an operation to where she could no longer have children otherwise she would have died. But she lived in a time period of a double standard for women. It was her purpose in life to be a good wife and a good mother. Yet she wondered to herself, if she could not give birth, what was the point of her living? On her tenth wedding anniversary, nearly a year after this operation, she committed suicide in the guilt she felt over her operation. My role was to have Pauline tell her story to the audience. It was by far my greatest moment as an actress ever. Looking at the script, I saw the amazing potential this scene had. Here was a time when I could totally let go of myself. It was the prime poem for a build-to-climax speech which I refer to later in this editorial. My teacher/director and fellow students were impressed and I never had so many compliments as I did for that role. Well, as fun as it was, this role was a lot of hard work too. So what does this have to do with specifics? On my own time, I improvised some of the stuff that happened that same night before Pauline committed suicide. She and her husband had gone for a walk and he'd picked flowers for her. I improv'd that since my character has a flashback of this scene during her speech. I also improv'd the scene where she's actually looking in the mirror and does the deed. Thanks to my knowing exactly what she went through with these events, I managed to convince my audience that's what happened to her. People would tell me that I gave them chills when I rehearsed/performed this. Knowing specifics will bring you deeper into the character you are playing.

(6) rehearse! rehearse! rehearse! This is where you learn the most about your character.

(7) I'll end it here even though I'm sure I could go on. If you understand this next concept, I give you a massive congrats because it took me 2-3 years to figure it out and I'm not the only one who had trouble with it. If you don't understand, I'll do my best to explain. Here it is. Though I can't speak for other actors, this is what helped me the most: The audience is more important than the actor. Explanation: Several actors are weakened by stage fright. They fear all the possible mistakes to make might happen. They wonder if they'll get this line right and what the audience will think of the actor as a person after the role's said and done. This is when the actor unintentionally thinks of himself/herself as more important than the audience. When they're wondering "will they still like me at the curtain call?" they should be wondering "what is the best possible way I can portray this character to the audience. How can I make this scene to where the audience will look on in awe at my work?"

Let's step back and look at what I said before all of this. You don't need professional training to be good actor. Now, how do the above acting tips relate to my previous statement? You don't need to go to a school to learn how to be angry. You don't need a voice trainer to tell you what an enraged person sounds like. You need to be angry become enraged and then the line and feeling should fall into place. No one will ever teach you how to put your heart into acting. It's something you have to teach yourself. Though training may tell you and any and all of the acting tips I listed, you'll never really know what they mean until you do it yourself. What training usually does is provide you with something most actors can do on their own: practice a.k.a. (and more commonly so) as rehearsal.

To help me incorporate this long bit on acting and tie it in with the dub I took one episode and decided to break it down and analyze it studying the voice-acting on both versions. I never liked critiquing in theatre but it's something we were forced to learn and once you get the hang of it, you feel more free to express your thoughts, especially when you realize that it's OK for people to have a different view on the scene than you did. After that, critiques are a major help to both you as an audience and you as an actor because you learn so much from watching what other people do both right and wrong. I should also note that critiques are tricky because they are a combination of both objective and subjective observation by critics. What works for one person may not cut it for another. Yet if there's a general agreement amongst the audience, you can usually tell what was done right and what was done wrong. By breaking it down like this I hope to accomplish a few things. One is that several people say the dubbed VAs "suck" and don't go much further than that. I am aware that there are DBZ fans who do it take it a step further by saying the actors lack feeling or are expressing no emotion, etc. yet I feel they still need to dig deeper. Why isn't this actor having any feeling? What are/is the mistake(s) blocking this person from succeeding where the original VAs did (on a side note, I personally don't think DBZ should be dubbed to begin with but...well, it's pretty obvious I don't have much choice in the matter). As an actor, I may say to myself. "OK, so you don't believe me as I play this character. Why? Where am I going wrong?" because there's plenty of room for error. "Is it that my inner monologue is off? I'm thinking this whereas the character should be thinking this?-am I lacking an inner monologue? Am I playing this character with too much anger when she should be more sad? Was the tone in my voice of? My inflection not quite right? Would my character have delivered the line with subtle anger or screamed it out instead? Did I focus too much on one emotion rather than putting in everything my character felt?" I could go on forever. Another thing I hope to accomplish is to get through anyone involved in acting-if my words are taken in with an open mind, whatever actor reads this can probably improve. I chose the US episode "Explosion of Anger" and its equivalent is "Anger Explosion Goku Gets Revenge for His Friends" in the Japanese version for various reasons. It's my favorite (of what I've seen so far), it's one of the few tapes I have in my rather small fansub collection (a large portion of the original DBZ I watch are borrowed tapes) and it contains a few noteworthy voices that people tend to focus on. This is the episode right after Goku's turned Super Saiyan for the first time. If you've never seen the episode, I'll tell you what's going on as I go. And if you have, simply take note of what I'm describing and focus more on the actual critique of the acting.

Let's start with the opening. In the original version, we're usually greeted with some music, clips of the last episode, and then the narrator says his thing and the episode starts. In the US version, the narrator is the first thing to greet you. He then states things that most people could probably figure out on their own by simply watching the clips. Anyway, here's the difference: the narrator VA for the Japanese version tells the audience what happened in the last episode and sets the tone for this one; the dubbed narrator goes overboard. Not only does he tell you what happened but he bangs you over the head with the fact that Piccolo was willing to sacrifice himself for Goku. He exaggerates the previous events setting up an all-too-obvious-over-dramatic stage for what's to come. On a side note, Kulilin sounds more helpless as he cries out "Goku" right before his death in the original version than when he says "Help me" in the dubbed version. Why? Not only does the calling out of his best friends name have a stronger impact on Goku, but the original VA sounds more desperate as well. My guess is this: the original VA knew Kulilin was about to die and thus, so did Kulilin. The poor bald character already knew he was a victim before he was imploded. He screams out desperately for his best friend to save him knowing that Goku is his only, if any, hope . In the dub, all Krillen knew was that Frieza had control of his body and Krillen had no choice but to cry out for help. He didn't know for sure what was going to happen. I could be wrong but that's what came across to me as a viewer.

Now the actual episode begins. We get to hear Goku, Gohan, and Freezer. Goku is fuming with rage. But he's not mad at his son; he's mad at Freezer. However, people tend to get mad at the world when they're mad at one person and Goku shows himself to be no exception. Goku tells Gohan to take Piccolo and leave. The Japanese VA says this with a calm bitterness as Goku looks on at his actual enemy. The US VA simply tells Gohan what to do but lacks the subtle fury the original VA had. When Gohan resists, both VAs show that Gohan's pushing Goku's anger further as Goku yells at his son. Gohan sounds much younger in the original version. I think he's supposed to be around 5 or 6 years old at this time and, originally, he sounds it. In the US version, he sounds more around 8 or 9 to me. And then of course there's the infamous Frieza who so many DBZ fans have grown to hate. Occasionally, you'll read an editorial actually defending this voice saying it matches Freezer's androgynous appearance. I've heard Freezer in English, Spanish, and Japanese and I can assure you the English voice does not do Freezer justice. The Japanese and Spanish version of Freezer's voice contain a certain deep evil that simply does not come through with the rather effeminate US version. At the beginning of this episode, Freezer remarks to himself in shock and wonders at the unusual transformation that he's just seen. In the original version Freezer sounds genuinely surprised. He's not sure what just happened. He knew that Saiyans turned into apes...but what was this? My problem with the US version is that as Frieza remarks on how he's never seen anything like this before, I'm not believing a word he says. It sounds like he's acting shocked whereas it should sound like he's shocked.

When Gohan starts to leave, Freezer laughs, points his finger, and is about to blast the young half-Saiyan right before Goku steps in. To be honest, I thought both VAs did a good job on the laughing part. Yet where Freezer says he won't let the kid escape (actually the line is different in both translations but I'm studying the acting here so bear with me), the Japanese VA sounds like he has every intention of killing Gohan where the US VA sounds like he's just trying to keep Gohan from leaving the scene. Then when Goku steps in, I'm still having trouble believing that the US Frieza is totally shocked by Goku's newfound power.

As Gohan's flying carrying Piccolo over his shoulder, the young half-Saiyan remarks to himself in pride over his father. The Japanese VA conveys the youthful beaming admiration Gohan has for his father. In the dub, the actor blurs the line between acting and believability on this part. Maybe this person is halfway into the character?

There's a clip to Earth including the voices of Dr. Briefs, Chi-Chi, Kamesennin/Roshi, and Yajirobe. For Dr. Briefs, I liked the voice equally in both versions. In the Japanese version, Chi-Chi sounds like an angry mother anxious to get to her son. In the US version, she sounds like an angry woman anxious to bitch someone out. Here's the part where specifics become important. Chi-Chi's motivation is to get to Gohan. She's terribly worried about him and willing to do anything to find her son. This makes her angry that Dr. Briefs is taking so long fixing the ship (there's even more I'm sure but hopefully this will be enough to get my point across). The Japanese VA probably understood this and therefore portrayed Chi-Chi this way. The way the US VA does it sounds like all the actor knew was this: Chi-Chi's angry that it's taking Dr. Briefs so long to fix the ship. See the difference? I hope so. Then we hear the voices of Kamesennin and Yajirobe. Kamesennin sounds like an old man who has known and trained Goku and understands that something's going on over at Planet Namek. Though Yajirobe's voice is different in both versions he sounds like the same character to me. Does that make sense to anyone? But Roshi, the US version puts the turtle hermit to shame. I'm not sure how to describe it but it's simply not an old man. It's more like a person trying hard and failing terribly to sound like an older person. For starters, it's too high-pitched and secondly, I wonder if this actor knows how to portray someone with age. Playing older characters is really hard, especially for younger actors. The reason for this is that you've got a massive hole to fill with all those years of experience that character has had. If the character is older than you are, the iceberg for everything that character has been through is much larger than your own. Somehow the Japanese VA pulls it off but the US VA fails.

We are then taken back to Namek as Goku looks on angrily at his enemy. In the fansub, the line goes something like, "I'm really...I'm really...I'M REALLY PISSED AT YOU FREEZER!" In the dub, the line is like, "No more...no more...NOW YOU WILL KNOW THE HORROR FRIEZA! [and there's an echo]" While some people may not like the "horror" line, I personally like it more than the "pissed" line. Guess that one's debatable. Either way, both VAs are given one really sweet line and if you don't know what I mean, I'll be happy to explain: this line is perfect for a build-to-a-climax delivery [which is the most fun kind I might add]. The first phrase you can say rather quiet and low, the second one you can say again but take it up a step and the third one you can totally let go of yourself. Both VAs almost did this. See, although these lines are perfect for the climax-build an actor always runs the risk of taking it too far. Both actors realized that the final phrase could be easily taken overboard. The Japanese VA did the first two perfectly. One was calm and low, the second was a dash angrier and then the third she probably could have screamed and said at a much greater volume than she did but she didn't want to give us too much so she didn't. Though I can't speak for other viewers, I would have liked to hear her go all-out. For the dub, the first "no more" was angrier than the second and it should have been vice versa-would have had a much more profound impact. As for the third phrase, the actor decided to take the risk of going too far. Did he? It depends on which member of the audience you ask. If you ask me, I'd say with hesitance "no." If you ask someone else, they may say "yes." It's blurry. Then Goku starts to kick major ass (^_^ I love it when that happens). Freezer gets knocked down but raises himself up and speaks to Goku (actually there's more to it than this but since I'm trying to limit myself to critiquing the voices, I hope you'll understand why I said it this way). In both versions, he mocks Goku saying that the Saiyans were also a bloodthirsty race who killed innocent people. Yet there's a difference in the way these lines are said. For the original version, Freezer sounds like he's mocking Goku's anger whereas in the US version, Frieza sounds more like he's criticizing Goku's anger. By mocking rather than criticizing, the Japanese VA is being more true to Freezer's character. Freezer tests Goku's speed and finds that it's increased dramatically. Then Freezer starts to do a bazillion blasts at the Super Saiyan. Blue smoke clears and Goku's still standing there just fine.

Gohan's carrying Piccolo when he looks back to see a bunch of blasts are going on where the fight is. In the original, he remarks "Dad", thinks, and then decides to move on. In the US, they also added an inner monologue where Gohan tells himself to not look back. The simple murmur of "Dad" worked in the original and summed up what the clip is about. The US version, the actor is given a script forcing that actor to spoonfeed the audience. The animation is good enough to tell us what Gohan's thinking-we don't need any help. I guess we can blame the script more than the actor for that one. But since I'm analyzing the acting, I do have to ask how'd this line go. Because of its brevity, all I can tell you is that I thought it was OK.

Freezer does virtually the same thing (a bunch of blasts) only the blasts look different. He starts breathing heavily as he uses up all this energy. The breathing is good in both versions-sounded about the same to me. I did notice something though while all of this happened. The Japanese VA for Freezer makes an unusual sound when furiously blasting. It sounds like an extremely short, high-pitched yelp and is done several times at an extremely fast pace. The US version mostly does tiny grunts. Personally, I didn't like either VAs delivery on these sounds. I don't like the yelps because they make Freezer sound odd. And I don't like the grunts because...well, you'll see...I think they should have cut the yelps and grunts and stuck with the breathing.

Speaking of grunts, this next part surprised me when I took this episode to the analysis level. Freezer and Goku start punching each other-you know, the usual DBZ punches, jabs, and kicks, that non-DBZ-fans probably stereotype the show to be. In the US version, at first, you notice that they're both grunting as they do this. Then you notice that this grunting isn't real grunting but simply acting-like-they're-grunting and then you notice that it keeps going. And the more they grunt, the more obvious it becomes that it's like the actors were told to grunt and they did rather than each character is actually feeling the impact of a hit.

After the punches in the sky, then Goku and Freezer land on separate rocks. Freezer blasts Goku but the Super Saiyan easily dodges it. And Freezer cannot believe what he just saw. In the US version, the volume that Frieza says this is impressive but lacks believability. So that volume doesn't do any good. The actor's too focused on projecting rather than on being amazed. And Frieza also has a line that's something like, "Hey, why can't I hit you?" In the fansub, the line's more like, "If this next blast hits you, you'll be..." To me the problem is obvious for the US version. How in the world do you convey a line as ridiculous as "Hey, why can't I hit you?" One could argue that Frieza would say this as a rhetorical question but what purpose would it serve? I could understand him asking "Who are you?" even though he already knows but the "hit" line just...as an actor, I'd be lost as to how to say it. So since the VA is given such a difficult line, it sounds retarded when asked. Even if the VA could do it convincingly, Frieza would simply sound stupid. In the fansub, Goku invites Freezer to go ahead and hit him. Never mind my complaints with the script differences, both VAs did a good job on the smirky invitation. Freezer's blast hits Goku because Goku lets it and his head falls back but he comes right back up barely impacted and then he has his lil' speech. I won't get much into how different they are because my main complaint is the closing line. Fansub closing line (something along the lines of): "I am the Legendary Super Saiyan Son Goku" Dub closing line: "Ally to good! Nightmare to you!" I have to confess that I liked the dubbed speech at first but the more I listened to it, the more I disliked it. And after seeing the original version, I think I know why. It's extremely out of place here. In the original, Goku's telling Freezer he's the legendary Super Saiyan. In the dub, Goku's telling Freezer he's the savior of the universe. While I'm happy to have Goku save the day the focus is supposed to be on the Super Saiyan legend. I'm not sure if anyone else noticed but in the dub, not once does Goku ever proclaim himself as a Super Saiyan. Because the dubbed speech is out of place, the US VA only sounds worse and worse every time I hear the speech. I do like how the Japanese VA conveyed her speech though. She again is given the opportunity to build to a climax. This time she ties it in perfectly. She starts off calm and low taking a step up with every word until finally she's reached a peak where anything more would have been too much and anything less would have left us wishing she'd gone further. Episode ends.

Just as I was about to wrap up this long piece I realized I should probably remark on the fandub featured at Daizenshuu EX since it also focuses on the voice-acting. My advice to anyone reading this would be to open a new window, view the clip, and then start reading again right here. Sadly, there were a few fatal problems with main performance given (the Vegeta and #19 clip). First complaint: technical but still important. The VA has terrible enunciation. It took me around 3 or 4 times of watching the clip before I could hear the words clearly. This had a really negative effect on the performance. Itsy bitsy picky thing: too much emphasis on "I know"-it doesn't fit. Now it's time for me to say a few things about Vegeta's character before I go on. For me, the first time I heard Vegeta's original VA, I was amazed. Though several defend Brian Drummond, there was one major problem I had with him compared to the original: The original VA sounded like an arrogant Saiyan prince; Drummond sounded like an evil Saiyan. The fandub VA is a cross between the two. He's evil and has a big ego but that ego's big because Vegeta's a Saiyan and not there because Vegeta's a Saiyan prince. The regality the original VA manages to convey isn't there in the fandub. Here's something else that bothered me. I'm not sure if this is the fault of the technical working or the actor but the volume used for #19 is significantly lower than Vegeta's. You can barely hear the robot. I had to turn the volume up to hear him and I shouldn't have to do that. Another too-much-emphasis complaint: "mere" was overdone. This next one isn't so much a complaint as it is a suggestion. Vegeta asks, "Can you artificial humans feel fear too?" This is a good climax-build line. The fandub VA says it with the definite flavor Vegeta would have but he would have gotten an even more delicious taste for the words if he took the build-to-a-climax approach. He can say each word with more and more evil joy until he reaches "fear." How he would do "too" I'm not sure and would leave it up to him. He could take it up another step or bring it down a step-whichever felt more effective for him. Personally, I'd cut the "too" since I think "fear" would make a better closing word for the statement. Then he makes sounds I don't know quite how to describe (elongated grunts?) as he transforms into a Super Saiyan. Again, I go back to the "build" idea. He actually does this to some degree. With enough rehearsal, he could perfect it and it is perfect right around the end where the transformation completes. Whoever voiced Gohan needed to be more prepared than he was. As for Kulilin, he strikes me as a difficult character to voice but I'll honestly say I didn't like it. He sounded too wimpy to me. Kulilin may be human and weaker than Saiyans but he's had his fair share of battle. I would have aimed for something along the lines of more surprise rather than more fear. Then we have some more Vegeta but my critique would again be about the regality factor. I could go on into the other samples featured but won't. If you've read this far, I'm grateful and should anyone reading this actually wish for me to critique the other smaller clips I will but only on request-since I don't know if my readers like my critiques so far. Whenever I critique I get varying reactions. Some people agree with me, some people disagree with me and some people think I'm too harsh. If anyone thinks I'm being harsh please read this knowing that I have been critiqued in much the same manner and know how grueling it is to rehearse and rehearse and rehearse some more in capturing the moment just right when performing.

That wraps it up. With any luck, DBZ fans will gain a better understanding not only to what is necessary to be a good actor, but anyone coincidentally involved in acting who reads this may learn a few things. THE END!

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