David Boreanaz

The story goes David Boreanaz wore a green t-shirt when he first walked into the recording booth for his first session of New Frontier. It was a subtle tribute to the character he was voicing, Hal Jordan, aka The Green Lantern.

“I like to get into my characters...literally," the current star of the series Bones and best known to Buffy fans as Angel said.

Boreanaz spearheaded a pretty impressive list of marquis names in this production. Some of them were quite familiar with v.o. work, like of Miguel Ferrer (J’onn Jonzz), Jeremy Sisto (Batman) and Phil Morris (King Faraday). For others, like Brooke Shields (Carol Ferris), it was a new experience. Then there were some that made you wonder you never thought of them before, like Kyle MacLachlan as Superman.

After all, director David Lynch said one of the key reasons he cast MacLachlan in such films as Blue Velvet and Twin Peaks because of the actor’s square-jawed, All American, boy scout look. Give the guy a spit curl and…

“Kyle MacLachlan is the perfect example – he sounds exactly like what you’d think a ‘50s era Superman would sound like,” said executive producer Bruce Timm. “He’s very righteous and good, but still very natural. We didn’t want the sound of Superman in 2008, and Kyle gave such a great, stylized performance in capturing that mid-50s feel.”

“There’s a sort of moral imperative that Superman has, and I think the language he uses is a little more proper. He’s just not a guy who uses his words casually,” MacLachlan said. “So maybe, unconsciously, that 1950s tone just creeps in there for me.”

Not that MacLachlan was in totally alien terrain in the sound booth. Many of his live action roles would have him repeating his lines in ADR sessions later. He used that to his advantage.

“When I’m synching to myself in live action, which is what I usually do, my mouth moves the same way and I can see it visually and it somehow connects,” he said. “This is a little more difficult because the animated mouth moves a little differently. The animation doesn’t quite have the same amount of detail that you would see in a real-life performance. Like the word ‘strategy,’ we were having trouble in the booth getting that one right because I couldn’t really see how it was formed in my animated mouth. But we made it all work.”

While one gets the impression Shields would have loved to have played Wonder Woman (it went to Lucy Lawless), she didn’t exactly sound like she was complaining about being Hal’s love interest, either.

“I’m so drawn to the concept of a female warrior as the lead character. I’ve loved it since before they had shows like Alias and Bionic Woman,” she said. “As I’m not exactly, let’s say, a dainty girl – I’m not frail, and no matter what I do, I’m not little – I’ve always secretly wished to have to go through some kind of training to do a big, physical role. I’ve trained with the Blue Angels and I’ve done triathlons, but ultimately, I think I want to be a super hero. Okay, I just want to play a super hero. I think that would be great. I’d love to do that kind of role.”

“I think the thing that I responded to with Carol, as a character, is that, if you think about the 1950s, people were not sympathetic towards women in any position other than the very traditional homemaker …and here’s Carol, this revolutionary woman for that period of time. There’s a strength in Carol. She’s not willing to lose her sexuality by being in a man’s world, and she’s determined to be respected for having the same intelligence and ability to stay on course, and be par for the course, with the men that she’s surrounded by. I admire her character from that perspective for that period of time, and I would admire her in this day and age.”

Then into this mix throw in Jeremy Sisto, the only one among the cast interviewed who openly admits he read comics when growing up.

“When I was a kid, I liked Superman; when I got a little older, I liked Wolverine; and then I found girls,” he said, jokingly, but this is a guy who also worked on shows ranging from Duckman to The Wild Thornberrys. “I think Batman is a great character in that he has a lot of internalization, and his heroics come from a dark place,” Sisto said. “You can have fun with that side of him, sort of showing his dislike for people and yet, at the same time, he’s all about helping people and doing good for society.

“I tend to get cast as dark characters, and I’m more drawn to those characters anyway – they’re usually more interesting. Plus, I got this deep voice from my father, and the combination of the timbre of my voice and my inflections tends to make people feel that there’s some darkness there. Batman is a bit of a loner. He’s very intuitive and, while the rest of the Justice League are using their super powers, he uses his detective skills to get to the heart of the matter and, in this case, help save the world. Throughout the course of the story, though, I think he learns that it’s not such a bad thing to have friends.”

"I think everybody, in a sense, can kind of lose themselves in this fantasy. I know I did," Boreanaz adds. "Where else can you partake in this level of adventure, in this amazing way of blowing things up in a fair and simple way without ever actually hurting anybody? It’s just so enjoyable. Hal’s an interesting character – having been part of the Korean War, he’s kind of damaged goods, but yet he’s striving to get back to being himself. I think Hal’s sense of a duality is fascinating – his holding onto his past, overcoming it, and being heroic with it. It’s about coming to an understanding of where your strengths are and where your weaknesses may be – and as an actor, to go into his dark place and work from there. I found that very appealing."

Also being a rookie on the team, his only previous work being some time on the game Kingdom Hearts, Boreanaz admitted he leaned heavily on voice director Andrea Romano a lot.

“Andrea was unbelievably fantastic in the way she guided me through Hal’s course of emotions, and really helped me get to know the character," Boreanaz said. "Once I got my feet underneath him and really got into character, everything fell into place and we just flew through the script. It was a great journey."

“When you’re doing a voice for an animated project, you don’t have the props and the different visual things that make it a bit easier for an actor to make a scene real for you,” Sisto added. “So you’re stuck in a booth alone and you’re kind of forced to use your imagination a little bit more.”

“The physical performance is fun, you have to use your imagination a lot more,” MacLachlan added. “It’s a lot of grunts and oomphs and ughs, which you just can’t help but act out physically. I’m sure it looks funny from the other side of the glass. Like in one scene, it was about getting hit with a pterodactyl wing versus getting punched by a super villain. There’s apparently a difference in that sound. So you have to shade it a bit and use the imagination.”

“I wish the animation process was done in reverse,” Shields then admitted. “It was such a different experience to record to picture versus just recording without the visual reference. I didn’t really know who she was as much without the picture. When we were initially recording it, before the animation, sometimes it felt flat. We worked on modulations, but I was not as clear on her character. I think I needed the picture in my head for it to take on a life onto its own. When we recorded to the animation, that made it much clearer.”

“I always appreciate how seriously this is all taken. There’s such a commitment on everyone’s part,” she said. “It’s not just a cartoon. It’s very real. It’s a very, very dedicated, smart, hard job that these people do. I’m so impressed by it. It’s all these things you don’t get to see that make these films great. It goes way beyond the voice actors; the people that make these animated (films) are just complete geniuses.”

“The edginess and the conflict between the characters is what makes this a great movie," Boreanaz said. "Super heroes or not, these characters are going to go at each other at times. There’s a fusion of a lot of strong, different personalities, and although they all want to achieve the same goal, they might not have the same approach. And Hal knows how to get the job done. So there’s good balance and a nice edge to the story."

“There’s an added joy to acting when you envision your children watching something and being engaged by it, and having that something be mommy,” Shields said. “You’re always trying to be cool in your kids’ eyes, even when they’re young. To me, I have much more of a connection to do that sort of thing.”

Plus, it just seems to be fun playing Superhero, even when you’re in your 40’s.

‘There’s nothing silly about animation to me,” Shields said. “I’m always impressed with the artists and the technology. It’s also really nice to be behind the scenes, but still be an actress. The characters themselves precede you, but you’re still right with them, supporting them. There’s a wonderful thing that happens when you have the cans (headphones) on and there’s time and place to sort of infuse these characters.”

“Superman stands for so many things that I believe in – strength, justice, fighting for what’s right,” said MacLachlan. “You just can’t turn down the opportunity to play a guy like Superman. Once you’ve done Superman, it’s hard to go anywhere else. So I think I’ve reached the zenith of my superhero experience.”