Gladys Hoover: 'Kung Fu Panda 2' Stars Call Voice Acting 'Cushiest Job In The World'

Thursday, May 26, 2011

'Kung Fu Panda 2' Stars Call Voice Acting 'Cushiest Job In The World'

'It's cushier because you can do it naked,' Seth Rogen tells MTV News at film's Hollywood premiere.
By Kara Warner

Angelina Jolie
Photo: Kevin Winter/ Getty Images

HOLLYWOOD — From the outside looking in, voice acting seems just a bit more lax than regular acting. MTV News headed to Hollywood on Sunday for the "Kung Fu Panda 2" premiere to find out what the cast thought of the gig.

"It's the cushiest job in the world," Angelina Jolie, who voices Tigress in the film, told us. "You can bring your kids, you can go in your pajamas, [director] Jennifer [Yuh]'s really good about whatever you want to order for lunch, so you end up ordering pizza with your kids, snacking — it's great."

Jolie admitted that it's not all fun and games and pizza, though.

"What's challenging is that you're not with the other actors, and you have to come back sometime to respond to each other," she said. "You don't know exactly what they're doing with your voice, but when it's a great team like this, you can relax."

Naturally, Seth Rogen and Danny McBride, who play Mantis and Wolf Boss, respectively, took the G-rated subject to a more R-rated place.

"It's cushier because you can do it naked," Rogen said. "And that doesn't come across on voice."

"You always want to do roles naked," McBride pointed out.

"I always do. ... I finally found a way to do it," Rogen admitted. "And I also sit in a big bowl of custard when I do it."

"Oh, that's great," McBride added.

"Yeah. Naked in custard," Rogen continued. "I can finally do all the stuff I like doing at home, at work."

Lucy Liu brought us back to logical territory, echoing Jolie's comments that the challenges in voice acting are doing the recording sessions solo.

"What's difficult is that you don't actually get to see your other fellow actors until you get on the red carpet in Los Angeles. That's always fun, but sometimes you would love the energy of someone else reading with you," she said. "Sometimes you don't really know what's going on because they've made massive changes behind the scenes, and suddenly you're reading something, and then you watch it and you're like, 'Oh my gosh, that's what it was about.' "

"It's the same as any acting thing, really," Jack Black assured us. "You're just trying to imagine fairy-tale scenarios and make them as real as possible."

Black also revealed that, much like his regular acting gigs, he doesn't hold anything back even though he's just working with a microphone.

"I definitely let it rip. But when I go blooper reel, I go pretty blue," he said. "I don't think it's anything that's going to be used on the DVD outtakes."

Veteran actor Dustin Hoffman, who voices Shifu in the film, said that he found the recording booth to be pretty intimidating.

"I would rather do regular acting. I'd rather do interviews — and that's not high on my [list], they're difficult — than going in a room by yourself with a microphone," he said. "You feel like a first-year acting student."

Check out everything we've got on "Kung Fu Panda 2."

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