 Welcome back everyone. Today we have a very special video. Today we are going to be interviewing Xanthe Huynh. She's a voice actress. She's voiced characters in many different TV shows, animes, video games, including Persona 5. And she was the voice actress for Nira in the Dragon Quest movie Dragon Quest Your Story. I have gotten the opportunity to interview her and I hope you guys enjoy this interview. So thank you for joining me today Xanthe. Yeah thanks for having me. So let's just get started. I just want to ask you some questions about your career and how everything started. How did you get into voice acting in the first place? How did this all happen? So before I was in voice acting I had studied a bit in theater. I was doing it in middle school and high school and I also got my degree in it in college. And while I was still in college I was just watching anime and somehow it just kind of clicked in my mind that you know this could be it would be cool to you know to act in like something like anime because you know like I don't know I never really thought of it as a career that I could actually do but I was talking to some of my castmates in rehearsal about it and one of them mentioned that there is there was a competition at Anime Expo for voice acting and so I looked it up and I entered and I made it as a finalist and from there I the studio bang zoom invited me to come and audition and I've been working since so I've just been really lucky it's not a path that a lot of people you know are able to follow. Yeah so you start off as a fan and then you ended up just getting into it then so you were an anime fan first that's interesting yeah yeah because usually most people I've talked to voice actors it's usually just a job to them it's not really a hobby first it's more of a just just working not really interested in the things that they they were taken so you're a big anime it depends on the type of genre that you go into right right from what I've seen at video game voice actors a lot of them just it's just a job to them so you're an anime and a game fan I watch a lot more anime than I play games but I do like to sometimes like watch like play throughs and things like that. I see what are your favorite animes um off the top of my head I really like KonoSuba and One Punch Man and I religiously rewatch monthly girls Nozaki Koon and initial day yeah I guess mostly just like the comedic comedic actiony type stuff yeah those are good I've seen those two KonoSuba is one of my favorites I I've been waiting for the 30s did you watch the movie that came out last year there's a movie in theaters yeah I did go to see it in theaters it was fun we're a lot of people like laughing in the audience while you're sitting there yeah it was it's so it's so interesting like to watch something like that in theaters because then you kind of get this communal experience like you know you get the inside jokes and you you know you kind of like you know just kind of getting to see everybody else's reactions compared to your own instead of just watching alone at home exactly yeah it's a lot of fun going to theaters to watch anime moves I wish they would do more of those but it's you know with everything going on it's a little bit harder to have something like that done yeah but even then like when anime movies came out that they'd be like you know certain days only and if you didn't get to see them then you missed out yeah it's like a limited release is just one weekend things like that mm-hmm so what were your first roles like in the industry with voice acting like how did you start you did say that you start off with the anime expo competition what was that what was that role for that you got so I didn't get any particular role just for from like that competition per say because I think at the time the the winner got the chance to go and like get the studio tour and like a chance to audition and I didn't win but they still liked me enough to bring me in anyway and the first thing that the first show that I worked on was the familiar of zero it was like 2007 2008 era and yeah it was she's a really sweet character very fun has a lot of like magical elements to it and yeah I was super nervous going into my first session for sure because I had zero experience in voiceover and I was very lucky to have gotten the chance to kind of like learn in the job but I did have my acting experience before that so I think that really helps me to transition into doing voiceover I see and you're acting at your previous acting experience was a play it was mostly plays and things like that right mm-hmm okay so you were in like the high school play or yeah any memorable roles that you had when you're doing that oh my goodness um now I had to like think back away way back um so one of the most memorable shows that I had ever ever worked on was actually in college and we did a play called dogs Hamlet cahoots Macbeth and they're they have like kind of condensed versions of Hamlet and Macbeth in them but they're with it's like a play within a play and the characters themselves that are putting on these plays speak this other nonsensical language and the language is made of English words but the words have different meanings so it was kind of like a kind of like rax or brain a bit because you're having to memorize these lines that are like all sorts of like jumbled words and it was kind of crazy because after a couple of weeks my castmates and I were like you know what I think I understand what you're saying now oh no I have been in this play for too long because now I you know but it was a lot of fun and like kind of zany doing like the 15 minute Hamlet and then like doing a one minute Hamlet trying to rush through it's it was a lot of fun I loved it yeah I can imagine that sounds really crazy like a lot of wild stuff going on there so how did you train to become a voice actor said you didn't have a lot of experience but obviously you've gotten a lot better over time what do you typically do to train your voice so I still actively take a lot of classes depending on like what it is that I want to sharpen so if I feel like I need some input on like trying out different characters and I'll sign up for like an animation or a video game class to get some feedback and like some tips on how to improve or just to see what different casting directors kind of prefer and also taking classes in commercial voiceover because that's a completely different style so yeah I I just actively take classes and keep training and practice a lot and now it is I can just call my auditions my practice cuz I constantly do those so you do a lot of auditions yeah okay you said you do voice over voiceovers as well do you have any commercials or anything like that or not too many I've only signed with my agent last year so I've gotten the audition for a lot and I've only booked some like smaller or minor stuff but not not too much yet it is like a field I'd like to break into a bit more yeah what kind of commercials you could you picture yourself voice-overing what do you think I commercial wise I guess I'm the type that's probably like more like home type stuff either like motherly type stuff or like food type commercials or like back to school type things just because my voice kind of leans a little bit younger sounding but yeah that would be fun I guess so which role do you think yeah is your favorite that you've done like like ever hmm that's always a hard question I feel like every time it's asked I always give a different answer yeah cuz like I like them all for different reasons um let me think well my brain is like what okay um so one of the first roles coming to mind right now is menma from Anohana just cuz that was I got to play a really really cute kind of rambunctious kind of character full of heart and yeah I'd had a lot of really great emotional moments too that the director Patrick Seitz was really good great at like helping me and the other actors kind of work through cuz there is a lot of like emotional crying in these in that show and you know sometimes like even if like a scene is like like three to five minutes long maybe it's taking us like anywhere from like 10 to 15 minutes to go through because we have to like start and stop so much and the engineer has to like tries and try to match it to the picture to make sure that's all fitting and their levels and everything else sounds great or like the director needs to you know adjust something and the actor has to do it again and so like you know like you're working up to this emotional state and then you kind of have to like stay in that moment while everything else is like being taken care of and then continue on with the next line and then get interrupted again and then do the next line and so I don't know seems like that they're kind of they can be a bit tiring but I kind of love them and I kind of thrive in yeah it sounds it sounds like an emotional rollercoaster having to cry and then stop all of a sudden is it like that or yeah it can because you're like depending on if you do like how the lines are spaced out like if like you say something and then the character like responds with something then you have to like skip and then go into your next line it can be kind of difficult because you have to like stop and stay in this emotion while the engineer is doing all the other stuff and then continue when we start on the next line again yeah that was I have a friend who talks about it a lot yeah I should probably check it out yeah it's a lovely show it's on Netflix now I think it is okay so I was looking you have a youtube channel don't you I do I don't post as much in there but yeah I said you said on your youtube channel though that you do a sound design as well as voice acting um what about that is there anything else about that um so that's um that is a very recent video actually um I I used to sound design for some small productions um in college um and a friend of mine from college recently reached out and asked me to do the sound design for um a musical that he was planning to do but because of COVID we haven't been able to um go forward with that yet and so we did like a little um online concert as a way to get the word out and to kind of fundraise a bit so that uh we have something to hit the ground running with when things are okay to um you know to get rolling again next year when it's safe to go into theaters again and um so I would say for me it's more of like a hobby and something that I'd like to play with and learn to get better at um but yeah I mean I do enjoy sound design and I think it's really fascinating what um a lot of engineers like you know do to create sounds um you know in a very like illusionary kind of way right it is pretty cool like it like in movies and how they use you know random objects around the house to create different kinds of sounds and stuff like that right mm-hmm yeah it's pretty cool um so I was wondering compared to video games and anime how is a different voicing a video game compared to an anime series um so for anime there's a lot more technicalities mainly because you have to um match the lip flaps so like a lot um generally um the scripts are written to match the time but then sometimes when you um you know you're you're performing the line and then the the director will look at it and be like well actually um can you um slow down the first three words of the sentence and then I need you to speed up the rest of the sentence so you have to and then you perform again and then you have to like keep that in mind so that you're matching whenever the character opens and closes their mouth and sometimes um because of how it was animated in Japanese for the Japanese you know we have to kind of alter and add little weird um uh pauses in between to make sure it matches and for it to still flow in English without sounding really clunky um so there's that um I would say that's like the main um difference between the two um for for dubbing like like a jrpg um a lot of times you're not um you don't have the restraints that that anime does because you're not matching to picture unless it's like a cutscene then it's um almost exact same process um and I feel like video games they tend to go quicker because they're not having to match to picture um dubbing does uh is sometimes a really long process and the director will have to like uh rewrite lines just to make sure that it fits better depending on what they see and how an actor performs some you know some actors talk really fast some talk a little bit slower or um yeah I I say that's about it I see I didn't realize that that was part of the process like matching the mouth with the the lips to make it like to paste it like that I thought I thought that they did in like post processing to fix it like that but you actually have to paste yourself with the original Japanese version I wasn't aware of that yeah well the engineer will sometimes kind of like manipulate a little bit to make sure that it matches perfectly but then if they're um doing it too much then you can kind of sound uh you can hear the the audio like processing in it and it sounds a little like strange so then you have to do it again um just so it sounds natural um yeah okay um so I wanted to talk more about some of your roles in uh in a little bit more detail uh the first one just earlier this year you played Nira in the netflix movie dragon quest your story yeah yeah and I made a movie that so can you tell me more about that how did how did you get that role um so I I got the audition for Nira and Bianca and um when I was auditioning for Nira I saw in the instructions that they had said oh if um for anybody that saw auditioning for Nira we'd also like to hear you audition for the old lady um but you know at the moment we we haven't decided if we want to cast one actress to do both or if it's going to be two people yet but just try for both and so um I didn't get the audition for the old lady so I had to ask my agents I was like oh they say it's required do you guys have it and they're like oh yeah here here it is and so I auditioned for her as well um even though I wasn't sure if I would get it and I was like I wasn't really concerned because I was like oh they're probably just cast me as one and maybe not the other um and I was really surprised that they had me do both um yeah because like I up until then I had not played a character above the age of 30 and she is like ancient she is like an unknown age um but um it was a lot of fun I that at least that was like the the audition process itself um when I went into record um everybody was like oh you're really impressed with like your your old lady you couldn't we you know we had never heard you do that voice before and I was like yeah I never get to audition for them so I yeah I'm a little surprised too but um you know like since they were so excited I got a little bit uh panicked I was like oh no I hope I hope I can live up to their expectations now well it was a very convincing old lady that's uh I didn't see it coming that she was actually uh a younger a younger person at first ah thank you I'm so glad I was hoping that the illusion wouldn't be broken yeah because uh because in the story the old lady was actually near pretending to be the old lady right yeah right um so uh when did you record this like uh what how long did it take and what was like the timeframe do you remember that at all or um see so it was like it was oh my gosh anything that's early this year feels like 10 years ago because of quarantine but um it was early this year um I I would say almost like maybe four or five days after I auditioned like they had a really short time to um get this um out I don't know why like they had such a short production time um but yeah I I literally got a text in the morning um and so asking if I could come in like well when I it was like a text at 8 a.m and I didn't like see it until like nine and they were asking if I could come in at 10 and I was like that is impossible I I can't make it by then but I am free after like in like you know like this time and she was like okay we need you to come in like um in the afternoon then just so we can get the trailer because it it like the trailer comes out in like two days I was like what so so I came in I did like the trailer and we um started recording for the the movie itself as well um so it went pretty quick I would say I finished in like a few sessions and it was very last minute so like you finished like a month before the movie came out right something like that yeah we were working on it like a month before it came out because like I think when I was recording the trailer I was like wait they're saying it comes out on this date what um so what was how was the recording session like like how is it much different than recording an anime is it is it uh similar or um I think it's I would say it's exactly the same um I think they were a little bit more lenient when it came to the um matching the flaps just because they were super duper short on time um so we tried to match timing as best as we could um yeah but yeah I I really liked working on it um the director Mike Schneider is like really fun and energetic and positive he's a really great guy to work with yeah uh was there anyone else on the cast who you worked with previously uh who you recognized or um well I was uh I thought it was really cool that um you were alone though wasn't it um but yeah I mean I while I was working on it I had no idea who was in it or anything like that until it came out oh so it was like separate it was you were like in separate rooms recording the lines yeah most uh dub projects are are recorded solo you've never recorded with anyone else right uh so you you just didn't know who was in it until the movie came out I see mm-hmm okay uh did you watch the movie when it came out yeah uh what do you think uh did you like it I I did like it I I'd have to admit that um I hadn't like played any of the game so I wasn't really familiar with the franchise so I watched it from the point of some view of someone that didn't know anything about Dragon Quest and um I found it to be very um I feel like the pacing was kind of quick like kind of episodic um like maybe it makes more sense for fans because it's like oh yeah that's when that happened in the game and that's when that happened but um from my perspective I was like oh like everything like time goes so quick I know that that's a common complaint about the movie that a lot of people have had mm-hmm but it's still like it was still very beautiful and I wish I wish Narra had a bigger part in it yeah in the uh in the video game that it's based on you could actually choose to marry Nira or Bianca so you could spend like the rest of the game with either one of them but I guess they uh they chose Bianca to be the the main girlness and you you auditioned for Bianca you said right mm-hmm oh really uh and uh so you were interested in that role so they made they made you audition for both of them or how did that happen uh yeah so I got the chance to audition for both of them they were just both sent to me by my agent okay and uh you got Nira mm-hmm that's cool so um let's see I'm gonna okay let's see so uh anything else interesting happened with the the Dragon Quest your story recording sessions at all uh anything people don't know about mm-hmm I guess that's about it I'm I'm not sure if most people realize that I voiced the old lady but uh it's just that I think people might not might not know that but it's a it's a very convincing old lady I I'll tell you yeah and I I don't mention it just because I I want it to be a surprise because you know I don't want to ruin that part of the story um because it's revealed later but uh but yeah it was very fun she's very like over the top and I imagined Nira having like a lot of fun being kind of bossy towards Luca and making him drink that like crazy potion the potion that made him like fall asleep and have like a weird dream and hallucination yeah yeah that's funny anyway yeah that that's a great great role you did um as Nira we all liked it a lot the fans thank you mm-hmm I'd like to talk about another role you did um my viewers might not realize but I'm actually a big fan of the persona franchise and oh yay yeah you played Haru Okamura in that game and that's uh that's one of your bigger roles would you agree or yeah I would say that's um one of my most known roles so um I just want to know the story how did you get that role I so this is one of the rare occasions where I was just cast and I didn't audition for for this uh for persona or for Haru for anything they just found you and said hey you're Haru so that's what happened yeah I mean they I just got an email saying like hey we have a project we'd like you to work on uh can you come in and like I so it was super vague I didn't know anything until I signed all my NDAs and they were like okay so we're working on persona five and this is the character you're going to be playing and then they described her to me they showed me a picture of her and yeah and then you basically just like jump into it they just kind of tell me like you know scene by scene what's happening who I'm talking to and my relationship with that character just so I can deliver lines like in a way that um makes sense I guess yeah I see and uh that's an rpg a really long game so how long was the recording session for that like how long did that take it was really long I would I don't I I would say it was like about a spread out over a year um I mean I that's at least that's how it felt for me and you know my character comes in like pretty late in the game so I can't imagine what it was like uh for some of the earlier characters all their recording sessions but it was spaced out um over many many months I see so yeah I can imagine that so it's it's a lot longer than most anime projects you'd say or I see uh and there was a there was a persona anime series you voiced Haru in that as well or yeah yeah we did um it was really cool because like we we did really want to do the anime and um it just kind of took a while for them to um get around to doing it and I'm glad we got to do it though I see yeah I haven't watched that yet but I do know there's an English tub for that um so I would hope that they would cast the uh the game the game cast as the characters as well in the anime version um did you play the game after it came out or yeah I did I'm uh I played through Persona 5 and I'm like at Futaba's palace right now in royal all right so um so how's it like uh when you're playing the game and you like talk to a character and just your voice talking to yourself how does that feel um well um you know at first um it's kind of weird because like I recognize not only you know it's my voice and it's like ah it's my voice um and you know I recognize all the other characters voices um as their actors and so like it it takes um you know a couple hours for me to like get over that connection and just like hear that voice as that character's voice and so just to have that kind of disconnect um same when it comes to playing um and hearing my own voice come out of Haru's face yeah so um who did you date in Persona because you can date people in Persona who did you choose of course I chose Haru she chose herself mainly because I wanted to hear how the lines that I recorded for her turned out so I was pretty aggressive um with trying to uh get her maxed out that's funny uh so um has this role like changed your career a lot like uh has has it made a big difference at all you think I I would say so um well it's I guess it's kind of hard because like I feel like my career in general has been just very steady when it comes to like um like a steady rise um but I would definitely say um being a part of like a massive franchise such as Persona 5 has um I don't know maybe given me a little bit more um uh how do you say uh kind of a most prestigious light I suppose that and also like Persona 5 has um you know we've like crossed over into a bunch of like different other little games like we were in like Smash Brothers and we're in Catherine and um oh yeah you voice a character in Smash Brothers technically right that's that's true technically yeah we're in there did you sit down and like record new lines for that or what happened yeah I did I think we all did um even though it's prominently just a Joker but um yeah I was like really excited we went in and uh we did the announcement trailer for um the game awards uh I think and um we did that literally two weeks before and like I asked them I was like oh when do you guys think this'll like come out just so that I can kind of have a gauge for it and they were like oh probably next spring and I was like okay so a couple months from now which is pretty common for games and they showed the trailer two weeks later I was like what so it was kind of a surprise for all of us oh so you thought very pleasant one you thought it was gonna come it was gonna release next year like the trailer yeah we didn't we didn't know all right so you were probably really surprised did you did you were watching the game awards and all of a sudden it just showed up and you're like oh that's me yeah I was like oh it was it was just very exciting just to see like the the animation and the infiltration infiltration and all that right um have you voiced in the other video games as well because um I was like trying to look at your Wikipedia page and see what else and I've noticed a few other roles um you voiced uh the Legend of Heroes series and the Fire Emblem you voiced the character Fire Emblem Three Houses as well um can you tell me a little bit about that one um so in Fire Emblem Three Houses I voiced a character called Marianne and she's one of the students that you can uh recruit to your house um depending on which house that you you joined so if you're already a part of the Golden Deer then she's already in your house um but she is um uh very unconfident she has a lot of familial issues and uh she generally tends to avoid conversation whenever possible uh very religious she loves animals and she um has a really great great arc I think she's uh very relatable at least I found her to be very relatable to myself um yeah she's very strong a great uh magic caster uh because I joined the other one um the uh I forgot what the guy's name the the blonde guy the the prince uh blue lion yeah I joined his when I was playing and I haven't done the other playthroughs yet so I haven't met your character or talked to your character much yet so I didn't know you did voice a character um is she in that that mobile spinoff also did you voice her on that one or um she's uh she's not in Fire Emblem Heroes I do voice a character in Fire Emblem Heroes uh called Air um she had a really big um story arc last year um but yeah she is the uh um princess of the realm of the dead that's cool so um did you voice any anything else uh recently anything major or um so I think you mentioned um Legend of Heroes the Trails of Cold Steel 4 that just uh came out was that last week last week or two weeks ago very recently um yeah so I I voice Altina um and uh yeah I've been playing her for a couple of games now and I really love her she's had a very gradual change over time because she started off very um very robotic almost like uh well I think she was um an antagonist in the first um game that she came out in in the second game and um yeah over time she's kind of slowly warmed up and starting to show more emotions in her speech and yeah it's it's really sweet and I like how sassy she is right and yet they kind of change your voice up a little bit as the the games go on and the characters develop right yeah it is kind of hard um I do have to rely a lot on the director and the team them there to make sure that I'm um fine staying within a good balance because she does kind of talk kind of monotone and kind of emotionless but um you know gradually over time she does have like hints of more warmth and just um you know just showing other emotions um other than just being kind of blasé like a little I like to call her like a little soldier you know and um also this is not on your wikipedia page but I saw it on your twitter feed you said that you voiced the character in 13 sentinels aegis rim which just came out recently uh yeah I actually played that that's a really good game you you voiced miwako uh sawatari in that game yeah yeah oh yeah I know that um story wise she um well I remember the one of the very first recording sessions uh the director was kind of explaining to me the general story because I was like oh can you tell me about it before we get started and he was like so yeah there's a lot of like timey wimey stuff and like you know all these characters are fighting like these kaijus and trying to save the world but none of that has anything to do with you so I was like oh which is amazing so she's just kind of kind of there to talk about food and boys and have a good time yeah she's like very much a side character I thought when I when I when I heard that you were gonna be in the game I thought oh wow can't wait to see what uh was auntie's character is gonna be and I was playing playing 13 sentinels and it's like she's she's really like unimportant and very much a side character yeah and the story is like do you want do you like still understand a story at all or can not really like for 13 sentinels so I only um I only really know everything from miwako's point of view I haven't I have it but I haven't played the game yet so I only have a general understanding of what the game is about but yeah yeah it's pretty hard to grasp it's it's it's all over the place that game but it's fun it's a good game though I you should definitely play play when you get a chance um so these roles like legend heroes and 13 sentinels these came out during the pandemic did you have to go to a voice a recording studio during the pandemic to to voice these characters or was it earlier so for trails um we recorded that um before the pandemic so um that was in studio and um for 13 sentinels that was actually the very first project I worked on during the pandemic so there was a lot of like a whole lot of nothing for the first few weeks um while all the studios were trying to figure out how to get set up and record remotely and um yeah it was it was kind of uh I was really nervous leading up to it I was like I hope that my setup is good enough um and everything but uh luckily you know I had I had to send them sent um sample recording samples and I had to send them like a list of all my gear and make sure that you know that everything would be compatible and like up to speed to be able to connect and record with them um but yeah luckily luckily it worked out and I've been recording a lot from home I see and uh you have like really high quality gear and like a little sound studio in your house or is it like I'm just wondering how how you do it well I'm sure a lot of voice actors do but for me um so I record out of uh my walk-in closet and um actually uh it's it's I am kind of a hoarder when it comes to clothes so I have a lot of insulation already because it's just jam packed full of clothes and um but it's like the perfect like quiet space um in my apartment and um um and like a lot of the equipment I already had because I was already just doing auditions from home and I um was already recording like indie projects from home so I kind of had like a basic setup and um after getting you know feedback from some of my engineer friends like they said that my sound was pretty good and so I just kept with what I have um and luckily like a lot of studios have approved of it I haven't had any complaints yet um from anybody like saying like oh you know that you know they would like to hire me but my quality wasn't good enough I haven't had that remark yet we'll see but um but yeah I think um there are some some studios that um give the option to coming into studio if I'm not if I was unable to record from home so that's kind of nice for people that may not have like a setup that's um considered broadcast quality right that's interesting I never thought about going to a closet full of clothes to record I should try that in the future that's a good idea yeah because like um you know uh um a sound proof booth can cost like thousands of dollars and not everybody has the money or the space for that um and you know you kind of get to work with what you got and um luckily for me it's just a closet full of clothes um so are there any um roles in the future that we should know about that you want to talk about at all um uh so um I'm trying to think of what what can I talk about because I'm recording a couple of really cool things that may be announced soon maybe even like next week soon but I can't say anything yet because it's not out yet um well um early next year uh I have a game called Fallen Legion Revenants coming out um I did a lot of production work on that um and I actually directed it and um it's a really great uh little indie game and I also uh return as a small character in it um yeah so there's that coming out next year your most recent project is uh what's your most recent project to say or um so besides uh Trials of Coast 204 I guess right now I have uh Operer Aman which is like an anime on Funimation uh it's about like uh it's kind of like wacky racers um they're racing across the country and uh my character is there to support one of the racers and it's also the first time I get to um dub with an accent um this one is specifically French uh so yeah that's uh that's it's like an ongoing uh anime right now so be sure to check that one out yep everyone check out her french accent let's hear how that sounds well um I think that that's uh uh I think that's a pretty good interview we had uh I wanted to thank you for uh agreeing to talk to me for this time I really appreciate it thanks for reaching out yeah uh so yeah uh thank you and everyone uh check out Xanthe on her social media you want to plug your social medias you can go ahead right now yeah um you can find me on facebook instagram and twitter at it's xanthor at it's xanthor so it's all the same thing mm-hmm all right well thank you and uh everyone we'll see you next time thank you