Gadgetory

your writer your comedian your voice actor what do you see yourself first and foremost a Jew you may not recognize John Benjamin's face but you almost certainly know his voice from home movies dr. Katz Archer he played a can of vegetables in what hot American summer we had a chance to sit down with prolific voice actor just as he was wrapping up this past season of Bob's Burgers how can you recognize and is it by sight or sound it's by smell basically yeah you'd get that a lot yeah that's definitely John Benjamin yeah I'm not thronged by people but said daily do you ever like you do you ever like go to like a crowded burger place it's like I'm just gonna very quietly tell you my orders no one can overhear this not many people have recognized me to just by voice a couple times though hello sterling sterling listen very well boy smell you know what to do oh damn it god damn it what wait for it hahahaha leave it I mean people ask you to do voicemail I've very frequently how often do you actually do those voicemails very infrequently there's a lot of legwork and getting the voicemail up on a phone and a little they'll stop asking you the voicemail and I go through the menu I wait yes there was a kid who followed me for while I was walking to the YMCA for three blocks while he said it was setting it up without asking me like he decided just noticed I'm going to have you do my voicemail so that he walked with me and he was like hold on like I got a I just got to get it oh my god that's great walking with me oh no I just gotta set it up okay says it and I'm like I'm not doing it I'm on my way to the gym I can't do it no no no hold on no press too you know doing that for like but yeah wouldn't go away until I walked in the why and then he wasn't a member that was that was the escape route he wouldn't even know his car sorry just can't get in not doing your voicemail he's over in the entryway despite his numerous projects John bedroom has never actually ventured to what many argue is the next big boon for voice actors video game roles you're one of the few voice actors who have not even touched those why is that yeah I don't know I've never been asked and I'm a player I've played them what do you play well I I play a lot less than I used to but my son now plays so there's he's he's pulling me back in so we've been playing Red Dead Redemption oh really yes which is not a great game for a ten-year-old to play but there are moments he's learning about morality yes and about the West yeah and about rape I didn't know that about Red Dead Redemption did you know that no I haven't played it actually there is a rape apparently a rape okay a prompt like you actually you want to rape her press X to rape yes okay that's what he said I can't find that okay so I'm not sure whether either way that's bad yes if he made it up that's really bad right like he has right so even that the fact that that scene is lexicon is crazy when he gets there he'll he'll know so this is rape yes oh dear john benjamins curling the mists of two hit shows Bob's Burgers on Fox and our turn FX with two fundamentally different ways recording dialogue the archer sessions are very efficient and sometimes very quick like about an hour and a half usually for a full episode for a full episodes they do an episode and day I'm on the in the studio with headphones everybody has an headphones are right yeah so so are you at that moment are you in a booth alone are there other people with you I'm in a booth alone and there's an engineer outside yeah so nothing is that I mean so you how often you interact with your cast members in we're actually recording are the on the telephone as well no they don't if they Archer they record everybody's part separately okay so occasionally I will bump into a cast member but most of them live in LA I live in New York I think Jessica Walters who plays my mother lives in New York so I saw her a couple times how does that compare to Bob's Burgers well Bob's Burgers is done with everybody usually together so it's much more unruly and much more funky the way it smells feel so how much ed Lavin can you do on that show how much is in well that's encourage to do a lot of ad-libbing and it's not that Adam Reed doesn't encourage it it's just sort of not called for but in Bob's Burgers we'll we'll do a lot of improvisation when you are doing the different roles how do you differentiate the voice well with the chosen presently doing not much difference I thought I did suggest which was I think quickly shot down by Adam Reed like an effete accent for the spy which what would that sound like I think I don't mind I can't remember he might have the tape but you know I saw I was sort of doing this or something you know like doing a voice like make rights a spy right I don't know but he was like no no no no like dough stop like if I wanted that I would get somebody way better at doing that accent than you your to do I had to ask you know you go by John Benjamin mostly you're also H John Benjamin the Henry when did the H go silent uh at Birth you just you just stopped using it for your mom I was not told about the H for a long time and then it was sprung on me like I was adopted like I am son we have something to tell you your name is John but it's not just John there's an H in front of it so what Y was and I was like I was what so why was it picked in it like it was never like to be used it's not Henry though by Henry well that's what Wikipedia I'm not gonna tell you what it is but I'm gonna let them think I'm just kind of saying humdinger then that's about humdinger though that would be crazy I mean what is a humdinger no idea it's just when those words you hear like shenanigans it's just a blowjob right in the 20s you know they would call it I'll have a humdinger so the H is gonna be intentionally just a mystery uh yes I keep it that way by the only reason I've had the H was Laura Silverman who was a was on dr. Katz filled out my credit okay and she did it just to make fun of it ultimately though john benjamin is a comedian and even when interviewing him you're never quite sure if he's being serious or if you're just part of one of his really big elaborate jokes my name is actually H John Benjamin man dude there is a name attached to the H it's not just a lot but you just like the mystery like to keep people