Alicyn
Welcome to Alicyn's Wonderland. I'm your host, Alicyn Packard. Join us as we journey through the looking glass and down the rabbit hole into the wild and wonderful world of animation and video games.
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Hi, everyone. Happy Wonderland Wednesday. Thanks for tuning in this evening. It is Wednesday, November 4th, and how are you doing? How are you hanging in? I know it's been a bit of a stressful week for a lot of people. So I hope that this was a little momentary distraction, and I hope that you're getting through your week okay. I'm really excited because our guest tonight is Bill Farmer.
Bill Farmer is a Disney Legend. He is the voice of Goofy as well as Pluto as well as a million other things Disney related and not. And Bill's amazing. His credits read like a list of every Disney show you've ever seen before. And we're really excited to bring him on the show today. Let’s see, I don't think he's on just yet. But I'm sure he'll be joining us shortly. So yeah, just if you have a second, go ahead and type in one word with how you're doing today. Let me know whatever that word is. However you're feeling is totally fine.
Hi, Bill. It's good to see you. Hey, Ed. Hey, Tim. It's really good to see you guys. So I'm going to go ahead and add Bill right now actually, yes. Oh, he even requested that made it so much easier. So thank you. Okay, word if you guys want to give me one word how you’re feeling today that would be awesome. Let's see - Hey, Jeff. It's good to see you. Thanks for tuning in, guys. Hey, Phil!
Bill Farmer
Hi. How you doing?
Alicyn
I'm so good. How are you?
Bill Farmer
Very good.
Alicyn
It when it goes to two people.
Bill Farmer
It's like shut up a little bit more. Yeah, there.
Alicyn
Yeah, I'm gonna pull the camera back.
Bill Farmer
Hi. Good to see you. Thanks for having me.
Alicyn
Oh, my gosh, it's so good to see your face. I haven't seen you in months because of the pandemic.
Bill Farmer
Yeah, I haven't seen anybody in months. Yeah,
Alicyn
I think I saw you probably just right as ever. Maybe February or early March. I feel like I saw you just right before everything was shutting down.
Bill Farmer
The I've gone through about two tanks of gas since March and my car. I had to actually jump at the other day because it just petered out the clock ran it down. So I got to get out and drive more.
Alicyn
Yeah, go see the lovely San Fernando Valley. It's just so scenic and beautiful here.
Bill Farmer
Yeah, and it's not 110 degrees either. So that's nice.
Alicyn
Yeah, the weather was gorgeous. today. Were you outside at all today?
Bill Farmer
Oh, yeah. Yeah, I've been hanging out by the pool and taking down Halloween decorations.
Alicyn
Oh, do you go all out for Halloween?
Bill Farmer
Oh, absolutely. Even with pandemic now our street normally gets blocked off by the city. So there's thousands of kids. And we usually give out about 500-600 pieces of candy. But we didn't know what we're going to be this way. But we decided hey, people drive by you might as well brighten their day a little bit. So we still decorated like everything. And we passed out candy.
Alicyn
Yeah!
Bill Farmer
We had what we call the candy cannon.
Alicyn
Ooh!
Bill Farmer
And I mean a pirate out there. But basically it was a big PVC pipe about six inches. And I made it look like a cannon. And so the kids who put their little box and everything at the front of the cannon, and then outcomes get ready for that candy. And then down it comes and social distance. And people were saying, “Oh, thank you so much for doing this.”
And the kids were like all bombed because it couldn't do Halloween much. And people would drive around and they'd see people that were passing out candy. Yeah, and it's a fun. Yeah, they loved it. They loved it. And we gave candy to about 80 or 100 kids.
Alicyn
Oh, that's a fair turnout for a global pandemic.
Bill Farmer
Yeah, then we went in the back and drank.
Alicyn
That's so perfect. Did you dress up like a pirate?
Bill Farmer
Yeah, yeah, absolutely have to have the candy cannon. You gotta be the candy pirate.
Alicyn
What is your pirate's drink of choice?
Bill Farmer
It's bourbon. It be bourbon should be rum. But it's bourbon.
Alicyn
Yeah. Wait a little creative liberty. Right. A lot of people jumping on and saying hi. I know. It's hard to keep track of the timeline at the bottom. So don't worry about that. But I do see we have one question has already come in. Great. I want to just let everybody that's just jumping on for the first time. No, this is Allison's Wonderland. It's a weekly show we do where we interview people that work in animation and video games. So today we're with Bill Farmer. Yes, right down there. The voice of Goofy. Most Pluto you probably Like people generally say Goofy, and then like… yeah,
Bill Farmer
Yeah, its voice - it’s number one in the list. But there are others.
Alicyn
Yeah, I know. I was like, your resume is basically a list of just every Disney TV show for the last 30 years. You've done a lot.
Bill Farmer
I try and keep it actually, it's odd during the pandemic. The one thing that hasn't shut down is animation. So I'm on about six shows right now. And I do the mall right from here. And I don't have to, I don't have to wear pants. So you come in, you get by in the microphone, and you do it via zoom and record here. My son's an audio engineer. So he engineers them for me. And we send them the wav files and boom, it's perfect.
Alicyn
But how do you prefer going into the studio? And or are you just as happy working from home?
Bill Farmer
It's easier working from home because I just come in down the hall. But I like going in just to see people if nothing else, because you get you just go a little stir crazy with all this virus stuff. And so you want to see people and occasionally have Austin's working on something else. And it's a long session I or ADR or something like that gets a little tricky, and he's not here. I will go into outloud audios where we record a lot of the stuff for Disney. And I'll go in there. And I've done that several times. And that's been an easy experience. Well, they're very safe COVID wise. And so you go into different of the back door and then they just share it right into the room and into the recording booth. And your fine, it was very easy.
Alicyn
No coffee and tea though.
Bill Farmer
They'll bring it to you though. Oh, really? Oh, yeah. Like that was one of the personal service.
Alicyn
Personal service? Wow, I wanted to start off at a little bit of a different note. Because yeah, everybody's familiar with voice acting work. But you have a new TV show on Disney plus where you are the host and show creator producer on the show. And it's a dog's life with Bill farmer. How did that come about?
Bill Farmer
It was funny a friend of mine who lived in Reno and as a camera man on the show The Amazing Race for 20 some seasons wanted to put together a little kind of a sizzle reel to sell an idea to the local TV shows up in TV stations in Reno. And it was just human interest stories. But the place he picked was an equestrian center. And they have people from all over the country keep their horses there. And they go on these like Fox hunts like the old English Fox hunts with the red outfit and the little hat and the 50 Walker hounds that, you know, there's no Coyote, there's only coyotes there aren't any foxes. And they don't really chase the coyotes. So they're just out for exercise, really.
But I went up there and we interviewed this kind of eclectic lady that started this Equestrian Center. And we were seeing the hounds and all of that and we got the footage and the footage of me playing around with the hounds just jumped out at it cuz you know, I just did a mood and so I start doing like Arnold Schwarzenegger, like your dogs are gonna get out there you'll flabby the coyote is going to run away from you just that kind of stuff. But that footage jumped out at us. And we decided why don't we try and make this into a TV show about me talking about dogs stepping out from behind the microphone. Since I've been doing dogs for 30 Some years and finding out about real dogs that have jobs. Long story short, we were able to get a meeting over at Disney plus. And we presented the idea and they love the idea and bought the series on the spot. And that as I understand never happens.
Alicyn
I…Yeah.
Bill Farmer
So we did 10 episodes 20 stories. We went everywhere from Hawaii, to Maryland, to Texas to New York to California to Huntington Beach, everywhere to Colorado and found out about dogs that do interesting jobs. So they buried me in the snow and Telluride, Colorado and had the avalanche rescue dogs find me. We went to Rabbit Hash, Kentucky. Their mayor is a dog. But we went up to upstate New York where they have Guide Dogs for the Blind. But this is a little differently because it's Olympic Paralympic athletes who run and they run. They're blind, but they have a dog, a guide dog that runs with them in the mile or something like that.
Alicyn
Funnily enough, Kyle Lineberger just said that they are watching it at this interview at their guide dog group. So oh my gosh people tuning in right now at a guide dog base. Oh, funnily enough. Wow, that's amazing. Any of the other what are some of the other places you went to?
Bill Farmer
One of my favorite ones was the first episode where we went up to near Vancouver, went on a boat with some scientists from the University of Washington to Find whale poop. Yeah, killer whale poop. The scientists have to collect it to study how well the whales are doing, what they're eating, that kind of stuff. And just looking for it if it floats for about 10-15 minutes, and then it goes away. That dog though will let you know if it's in the area. They got a little dog, a little Jack Russell Terrier Pitbull named Eva that gets on the boat. And when she smells one, she goes nuts and on all of this, and they find the sample they take it in and they learn all about the the killer whales.
Alicyn
My son was so in love with that episode. The last thing you need to do is get like a four and a half year old boy more into poop than they already are naturally.
Bill Farmer
Yeah.
Alicyn
Like whale poop? Like this is on television. Whoo, this is the best thing ever.
Bill Farmer
I'm glad he liked it. I'm glad he liked it.
Alicyn
Yeah, yeah. So that's amazing. So you did 10 episodes. And your wife, Jennifer Farmer also was involved in that project?
Bill Farmer
Yeah, she was an executive producer along with me. And it was like we had 20 Some employees. And we had researchers, we had to, it's quite involved to do a television show even a little one like ours on Disney Plus. And we just had a blast. And of course, last 30 years, I'm stuck in a microphone booth. And that's kind of fun to get out once in a while and travel around.
Alicyn
I was thinking about that. Because people who know you may just know you from your voiceover work, but your your background is in stand up comedy and acting. You did stand up for years.
Bill Farmer
Yeah, that's, that's I think the hardest thing I've ever done was stand up. But it was also the best training for voiceover.
Alicyn
Tell him about that.
Bill Farmer
Yeah, it's like when I teach students, I, you got to get out in front of people. First of all, it's a little intimidating to go into a booth and they're looking at you through the glass, and you're doing an audition for them and everything and you're sweating it out. But you've got to take these words on a page and bring life to them, make them jump off the page.
And the best way I found that taught me was doing stand up, because if any funny, they're not gonna laugh. It's true. It's not like your wife, or husband. “Oh, that's great. Honey, that was just wonderful.” No matter how bad the joke is, but if you do it in front in a comedy club, and it doesn't fly, you know it.
So I taped my shows, listen to it. Figure, why didn't that joke, go over? What could I have done differently? What different? How can I change the punch line, the delivery, all of that, and you get to learn after a while what works with an audience. And that comes invaluably in, in a booth. Because they give you a script and boom, you've got to bring it to life and make it better than it is on the page.
Alicyn
Yeah. And the thing is to I feel like stand up is the type of thing where you can start in any city, and maybe small towns, and they have comedy clubs or open mic nights. And you can just go it's not oh, I want a voice actor where you have to generally move to Los Angeles or New York and start auditioning. And there's a lot of XYZ and we can get into that later. But stand up comedy, you can just find a place where you can go open mic night and get up there and start yelling and failing because that's how you learn.
Bill Farmer
Exactly. And when I first came out to California, I took classes from a guy Daws Butler, who was a great voice actor. Hanna Barbera, Yogi Bear Huckleberry hound, Captain Crunch, Elroy Jetson about 40 some major characters, and he was the one that really said, You're not doing voices, you are portraying characters that may have weird funny voices. But it's the personality. It's the emotion. It's the situation that you're really doing. You are acting. It's not voice acting. It's voice acting emphasis on the acting. And that was the best advice I ever got. In the beginning. Take acting lessons. That's important.
Alicyn
Yes. Yes, absolutely. So then how you tell us a little bit about your early days. I've heard a little bit of a story before but take us back to the comedy clubs in Houston. Take us back to the early days. And when you came out to LA,
Bill Farmer
oh my gosh, even further back than that. I had always wanted to try showbusiness. But I grew up in Kansas, and there's no outlet for that. Long story short, I got my degree in broadcast journalism kicked around and radio for a number of years, which gave me some on air exposure of you know, ripping and reading the news, doing not playing records, all the things DJ does, uh, got out of that because there was no money in it. Now when very satisfied, got into electronics for a few years still wasn't satisfied. And they had an open mic night at a comedy club in Dallas, but Back in 1982, and I went one week and I saw the guys and I got it. I needed to try that. So I wrote a little routine and went up the next week, and got a pretty good response. And the house comic who's famous now by Bill Engvall, who was on the call, if you remember like, Larry, the Cable Guy, Jeff Foxworthy, the Blue Collar Comedy Tour, yeah, he's on that. He's also was on Dancing with the Stars last year. Anyway, he's been very successful. And he was the house comic working out his stuff. And he was the one that said, You got to try, you got to give this a shot. And I did that for about five years worth my time.
The first time he said, but you don't need to, yeah, give this a shot, give it a few rounds. And you go up and you fail. And then you at some dates, it's better than others. And you get better if you keep doing it. And before long, I was traveling around Texas and the South different comedy clubs. Then I moved out to California on the advice of an agent I had in Dallas, said all the voices you do and impressions and stuff. Why don't you try it? In Hollywood. I left my wife in Dallas, I got an apartment out here and was able to get an agent right away. And about five months after that, I got a call and said, “Do you do any of the Disney characters?” when I I've never really thought of doing any? I said do you played around with voices so I could do a Mickey and oh gosh. Yeah, you can do that falsetto, you're in the ballpark. And worse, but goofy was right, my wheelhouse.
But I've never really done it before. And I just got to kiss sat with the original voice. Got it over a weekend copied that. And about a month later, they called and said they'd like to use your Goofy. Now it's not you're now signed to a 30-year contract. It's just day player stuff. One job. If you suck, they won't call you again. Luckily they did call me again and again. And by about three years into it. I figured maybe I've got maybe I've got the job. And now this January will be 34 years. And so I guess I have the job finally,
Alicyn
I guess you have the job. Nobody on this like trillion. By the way. If anybody has questions for Bill doubt, be glad to answer anything, but we can try to get to those towards the end. Yeah. Wow. That's so amazing. His impressions. So what other impressions do you do?
Bill Farmer
Oh, gosh. Well, in the old days, I used to do a lot of stuff on TV. Mostly I wasn't. You know, I do cartoon characters. Some of when I was listening to Daws Butler, I'd work on Yogi Bear. Oh, go away. Yeah. Hex it stage left. Suckerin’ succatash. We were Tweety Bird liked what I love. And is it and I just would play with all of those voices and stuff and characters on TV I'd listen to and try and copy like Green Acres was a fan favorite of mine swatch start doing that. Mr. Haney, Pat Buttram used to come out on that show, and jam a score course all of those voices are great training. And on your study the box. I am doing it over and over and you get better at it and stuff like that. You know, cat deactivation? What are you bringing in all the more ones. And I just played with it and just added a little repertoire of comedians and movie stars and animated characters and never thinking that I get a chance to actually do it. It was just a fun thing to do. And I didn't think of it as a career.
Alicyn
Yeah, and there's definitely a whole ADR and looping and matching voices is…
Bill Farmer
Yes, I've done a lot of that.
Alicyn
Yeah, pretty popular line of work for a voice actor these days.
Bill Farmer
And it's so great because you get to do all sorts of characters. I've been doing some movies for illumination, like saying, and I was again another dog a dog Reporter The Lorax let me say Horton Hears a zoo. And of course a lot of Disney ones in the beginning from Beauty and the Beast and Hunchback of Notre Dame and Tarzan and Toy Story two Bug's Life Monsters Inc, stuff like that. And the loop group and the joy of working I love doing it. And I got to do some of the Warner Brothers characters in Space Jam, but Sylvester Yosemite, Foghorn and Robot Chicken I got to do Bugs and Daffy which was a lot of fun and…
Alicyn
Talking about the Space Jam sequel. Do you know anything? Can you tell us anything?
Bill Farmer
No, I think they use Eric Bauza and Warner Brothers is totally different than Disney in that they They switch voices a lot Disney with Roy Disney and Michael Eisner. When we did ours there were about four or five guys doing goofy and, and Mickey and everything down at the park in Florida. But they decided they wanted to settle on one voice. So you always heard the same voice because everyone's different. And luckily, I got those characters and they're still sticking with it.
Alicyn
That's great. I know that brand loyalty is, is a good thing for voice actors. For sure. Yes. So speaking of you mentioned that you were dogged at interviews. I know that you had a cameo or like a small role in RoboCop.
Bill Farmer
Oh, I did that when I live back in Dallas. Yeah.
Alicyn
Can you tell us that story? Because I think that's it's such a funny, interesting credit that you have.
Bill Farmer
There’s a shot a lot of that in Dallas, and I didn't know anything. Who's this Paul Verhoeven guy, and this Robocop. What, okay, I knew it was a movie, and they wanted an on the street reporter. And I'd done news for years and years, with the big over the top, Gary. Oh, and this kind of thing, right?
Alicyn
On the radio.
Bill Farmer
But this is, yeah, this is live on the street. And I can remember to today, exactly what I said. It was I had a paragraph and it's first movie I ever did. So I was terrified. And it was like, terrorism has never been a factor in the city's politics before. But all that changed with with me. But all that changed when someone entered the upstairs with the lieutenant. Let me see. I can't I can't remember. It's only been 30. Some years. I know. I should have done it. And then I go and look into Hitchcock. When we did it on the set. I did it about one in the morning. It was about 95 degrees, because it was in August of 1986. And Peter Weller in the Robocop outfit was dying. Well, he'd do one take, and then they'd have to blow air up his sleeve because he's gonna faint. So we do that a few times.
And then Paul Verhoeven said, Okay, that's too long for you to back up and hit your mark. So I cut this and this, and I'm going, I just spent three weeks learning this thing. And there were cars zipping in and all of this kind of stuff. And so on the actual thing I just paraphrased I said, “Terrorism has never been a factor in the city's politics before. But until a man, Ron Miller entered city hall with a gun, he's now on the second floor office holding Mayor Clifford Gibson and his staff hostage, Lieutenant Hedgecock, what's next, and I'm trying to stumble my way through it. And I look at terror was on my face. And I didn't know if the guys were really stunt drivers in the cars. But we got through it. And yeah, it was quite terrifying.
Alicyn
But this reporter probably would have had some nerves as well. So you were like, Oh, yeah.
Bill Farmer
And so it looked it was real terror and excitement in my voice and eyes. It made it easy to act.
Alicyn
They're like, Wow, that guy. They just want to say so if anybody has questions for Bill, make sure to put him don't just put him in the timeline, please. There's a question button at the bottom and you can enter them in there. And that way I find them. I did see one question go through about what's your favorite type of dog. I know you have a dog.
Bill Farmer
Yeah, so I have a black lab pit bull mix named Boo. We call her boob because she's got a white spot, some patch on her chest that looks like a little ghost. And also she's afraid of everything for part Pitbull, she's just afraid of everything. She's afraid to go in the car. She's still in like car rides. If I say you want to go in the car, she'll just turn around and go on the house won't go.
And we also have a smaller dog, a Westie mix, named Roxy who loves the car. So they're all different personalities. And but oh, I had a golden retriever for 15 years. And they are the best dogs ever. Their mind was just totally nuts about the tennis ball and would sleep with it and his mouth and everything. But as far as a nice, great dog, he can't beat a Golden Retriever.
Alicyn
Okay, let's see. The other thing I wanted to chat with you about this kind of segues into Jeff's question, which is so you in addition to being a voice actor, also a coach for voice actors as well as a demo producer.
Bill Farmer
Yeah.
Alicyn
Tune House Productions is your production company and -
Bill Farmer
Toon House Incorporated. Yeah. And people can check it out online at tune house.com. T-O-O-N-H-O-U-S-E.com. My son followed my footsteps a little bit, but he's much more musical than I am. He's a professional drummer, and an audio engineer. And he went through audio engineering school and he's working this week on a couple of TV shows, doing audio and he does my audio and he's done albums. And if you go to his website, which is drumfarmer.com You can see movies they him do on and he's got a lot of music and stuff that he does on that and he helps me out Hear and when we I teach via zoom or online, and or when COVID is over, hopefully here in the studio, and I've got a whisper room out in my garage, which when we do demos, we just run a very long mic cable from their, into my end of this room where the equipment is, and we record safely and I've got a, you know, $900 COVID light that will kill every virus, which we do between clients and stuff. Keep it all. So it's a dangerous life too, because it'll blind you. They say, yeah, no, you can't be in the room with it. And it'll burn your scan in about two minutes. So it's got a 50 foot cable, and you got to be outside, you put the bulb in there, and then the booth, drag this 50 foot cord out there, turn it on for about 10 minutes. And it's Darrell.
Alicyn
That's fantastic. It'd be careful where you put that thing down. Yeah, yeah. No, my kids. You've been my coach for you've helped coach me on a lot of stuff. And you're so great to work with. So people are interested in your coaching services. Should they just contact you through the Tune House website?
Bill Farmer
Yeah, yeah. My son handles that. And the dealing with his schedule is my I'm always here. He's busier than me. So we work around with his schedule and stuff. But as far as coaching, yeah, just contact tune house.com and be glad to help anyone out.
Alicyn
Cool. You won the Annie Award.
Bill Farmer
I was very fortunate for Yeah, actually cartoon on the Mickey Mouse shorts, which are if you haven't seen those, they're a they look a little different. We're in our fifth season of that. Yeah. And they're intense. They are intense. They're totally I noticed when we did a cartoon where Goofy is a zombie. They never would let us do that before. And I Oh, he's gonna be a zombie. This is so cool! And we get to go to places that are a little more adult stuff than we do on say Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, or maybe the Roadster Racers. And I like those kinds of stories. I also play on a series called Amphibia which is on Disney Channel. And I play a character named Hop Pop. And he's the patriarch so everyone around the house now I'm Pop Pop. So, I got a name.
Alicyn
They call you Hop Pop? Yeah, that limited just people in your household or can we just hop on?
Bill Farmer
Well after this, maybe not.
Alicyn
Yeah, I was actually gonna say and also your doc on Seven D so a lot of patriarchs.
Bill Farmer
Oh, yeah. Oh, Seven D was a great one. But once in a while you get a cast. That is just incredible to work with. When I first started doing goofy back in the early 90s, we had a series called Goof Troop. And that was terrifying for me because we had Frank Welker. We had Jim Cummings, we had brought Paulson, Nancy Cartwright. April Winchell. I know Dana Hill who played Goofy’s son Max and that and Jenny McSwain directed that and that was like being thrown into the pit. Because we didn't ever get a rehearsal. We'd get our script at 42 to 43 page script, boom in ensemble in the studio and just go Yeah, that was a little terrifying.
And this one, the Seven D was great because we had, oh, Kelly Harnell, we had Kelly Osborne, believe it or not, was one of the characters. We had Billy West Kevin Michael Richardson. We had Steve Stanton's God, amen. Bill Murray Slomar, LaMarche, we had a D Baker. I mean, we had some of the top people and it was fantastic. A fantastic time to get to work with all of them. That's a power house.
Alicyn
Our house and you guys would just all be in the booth because
Bill Farmer
we did in the beginning, but then they quickly and most all the stuff at Disney now. i It's also we did the first view to get each other's timing and the way that the characters responded and acted. So you can do that without them there. But most things at least a Disney are a solo now.
Alicyn
Oh, do you find that less fun or a little more efficient?
Bill Farmer
It's more efficient, you can get in and out but I miss being with people and riffing and stuff like that. And also, it's easier to respond to a line of dialogue with your line. If you can hear the way that they do it. Right now I have to
Alicyn
For example, stop right there. Yeah, I say it that way. You're gonna react different than
Bill Farmer
Stop right here. Right there. Yeah. You don't know what the characters like if I'm doing a scene with Mickey, and I say what's good alley here? I don't know if the rooms on fire or if it's to go out for a burger and all that stuff comes through. And you got to rely on the director for that now.
Alicyn
Right? Yeah, exactly. Jeff is asking, what's the most important lesson you got from setting with Daws Butler?
Bill Farmer
It was definitely that it's the there were several little tidbits that came in handy summer techniques. And some are more over kind of philosophical things. The philosophical thing is that it's acting. It's no difference whether there's a camera there, or there isn't. It is still acting, there's different techniques with it. And it's a little different than on camera acting, because you have to make up for the fact that no one can see you. And you have to give the animator something to animate. In other words, hype up your energy a little bit to almost where it sounds like you're overacting. Doesn't sound that when it's played back.
Alicyn
Hey, guys, this is Alicyn Packard. Sorry to interrupt, but I just wanted to let you know that if you like the show, please, please, please remember to subscribe to this podcast. And leave us a review on iTunes. It really helps us to get heard by more people. Thanks so much.
Bill Farmer
Did that then when you play it back? So you got to compensate and go overboard a little bit to bring up that energy level? That was important. Yeah. Give the animator something to, to animate. Use your hands, body. Everyone does that. You don't have to stand there, just totally stiff in front of the microphone as long as you in the little area that cardioid in front of the microphone so that they can pick up your voice and you don't hit the mic stand or anything? Yeah, use your hands a little bit. Get into the acting of it.
Alicyn
Yeah. Okay. All right. Can I still use that? Okay, but it's usually when you're really feeling it.
Bill Farmer
Oh, yeah. That's the way it is now, especially with like, with, you know, Mickey and the Roadster Racers and Mickey's funhouse. And all the other ones we're doing is you do like three in a row. Come along, Mickey. Let's go. Come on MC, let's go. One, Mickey, let's go. But you just give it three different intonations. And then they'll say, Oh, I like that third one. Give me a safety on that. And you do the same thing again. And you boom, then onto the next line.
Alicyn
ABC, baby!
Bill Farmer
ABC!
Alicyn
Do you have a favorite character to voice?
Bill Farmer
I'll tell you the stuff I'm doing now. Hop Pop is really up there. Because I got to create the voice myself. Goofy always be my favorite. Because Gosh, that's been my whole career for 30 Some years and I just love him as a character. He was my favorite Disney character. But hot pop I hate is kind of a West Texas kind of frog. And I just had a lot of fun doing it, and imbibe him in him that kind of a voice. So I got to create it, and riff with him and develop this character. So in some ways I feel closer to him than I even do to goofy.
Alicyn
The writing on that show is so strong and that Yeah, it's really great. It's also Yeah, that guy's hop hop is a pretty wild kind of character. He's got a real tortures kind of flavor.
Bill Farmer
Yeah, they just played the Halloween special that I hadn't seen. And I guess that's what happens in this I did. Who am I thinking of Mr. Sulu from Star Trek, George Tocai. Identity. I we were doing a whole cartoon together. I never got to meet him. But sometimes you get also as celebrities will pop in from time to time. This last year we did Mickey and the Roadster Racers. And believe it or not one of the characters was Alice Cooper!
Alicyn
Wow.
Bill Farmer
And so he actually uh, he is a Goofy fan. And he wanted to meet me and so I got to go down to where he was recording and hang out with him a little bit. That was special. So once in a while you get to do some fun things like that.
Alicyn
That's crazy. What was the character who was voicing?
Bill Farmer
Alistair Coupe Deville so it was based on Alice Cooper and it looked like him a little bit so he didn't have to stretch too much but he's a good voice actor actually. Just because you're famous doesn't make you a great voice actor. But he was.
Alicyn
A lot of people asking about Kaitlyn Robrock.
Bill Farmer
Yeah.
Alicyn
As the new voice of Minnie. Do you know anything about that?
Bill Farmer
Yeah. I don't know how much I can say but yeah, she's doing a great job. As a matter of fact here at Toon House we did her her first demo. That's amazing. I take some credit for getting her going. Then I used to work at Disney when she did. So she has always been a big Disney fan. And she's also plays a character named Felicia on Amphibia so I've been working with her on that as well as some of the Disney series.
Alicyn
And let's go back to even Russi Taylor and Wayne online. Yeah, um, Russi, who just passed away. Last year this year has been such a blur…
Bill Farmer
Yeah, she she passed away, I guess it was last year. And she for those of you don't know, she, when I started doing goofy back in 87 Russi Taylor was doing Minnie, Wayne all wine was doing Mickey which He had done off and on since 1977. But then they solidified the voice and he did it until he passed away in 2009. They were married to each other. They weren't in the beginning. They were both in bad marriages. They started working together, fell in love, divorced their respective spouses and got married and they were like -
Alicyn
[inaudible] that party. I want to go back to that holiday party like, “Hey! Oh!”
Bill Farmer
Mickey and Minnie they just embodied those characters so much and they were just great together. And Wayne was an extraordinarily talented guy, very musical had run and won an Emmy for sound editing actually, as well as working in the sound department at Disney with the second Mickey Mouse. The first one was Walt Disney. Second was Jimmy McDonald, who his protege in the sound department was Wayne Allwine picked up learning how to do Mickey from Jimmy took that over in 1977. And then again, full time in 1986. And did until he passed away.
Alicyn
That's amazing. Yeah, you see, you are actually a Disney Legend.
Bill Farmer
Yeah, that was so cool. It's like underwhelming the way it happened. They have an award for people that they feel done something great for Disney over the years. And ours was… I got a letter saying you've been selected to be a Disney Legend. And you'll be at the de 23 Convention on stage live in front of about 4500 People get my award. And I got mine along with Robin Williams and Betty White and some of the Golden Girls and people that did some more technical stuff with Disney.
And ours was the first one in front of the in front of the world. I guess everyone other than the earlier ones were on the lot over at Disney. But they've been doing and doing about 1010 people get the award every couple of years at D 23. And now they gotten much bigger stars like Christina Aguilera, and Stan Lee and Danny Elfman, and all sorts of George Lucas and a lot of… Oprah Winfrey, and more big name celebrities. But I was in that first group of…
Alicyn
There is nobody bigger than Bill.
Bill Farmer
Gawrsh! Thanks!
Alicyn
Did you I mean, it was like, I guess it's just it's like mind blowing to me to think like you have had all these achievements. And you're still so humble. So kind. When I posted that I was going to be doing this interview with you, everybody was just like, feels the sweetest feels the sweetest. So you have this amazing reputation. So we appreciate you coming on the show.
Bill Farmer
Of course.
Alicyn
Gracing us with your good juju, way to flatter the Goofer! Yeah.
Bill Farmer
That's the best thing about voiceover is you don't have to retire. And I thought I'd be out to pasture by now, but not keep hiring me in June Foray worked until just a few weeks before she passed away at 98 or 99. And Mel Blanc until he passed away. You don't have to quit this job. And people will say when are you going to retire? And I say from what and why? It's the best job in the world.
Alicyn
Yeah. Did you? Was this on your vision board? Or were you? Are you surprised at how your careers turned out?
Bill Farmer
Oh, I'm totally because I know how tough it is. There's about 160,000 Screen Actors Guild members in LA, about all of them want to do voiceover. And so if, for someone coming into town to get into voiceover it's like just coming out of high school and joining the NBA. Because you're up against all the celebrities that want to do this too. Tom Hanks and Tim Allen and all of these kinds of stars. They like doing, celebrities, too. But one of the characters on making the Roadster Racers is Jay Leno. I doubt if Jane needs the work, but he loves doing it.
Alicyn
Yeah, I know. It is definitely one of the most fun jobs in the world. Let's see. Let's see what other questions do we have. Billy should go to Singapore. Oh, this is awesome. Here’s a really good question. What would you say inspires you, Bill?
Bill Farmer
Oh my gosh, I just got, I got really inspired when I was doing the dog show, because I course love dogs. And I've always been an animal person, I was going into college originally to get into zoology. But I didn't have that study habit and I partied too much. So my degree is in broadcast journalism, but the… just finding out about these animals that live with us, that share our lives and give unconditional love, just to be petted, and it's like, they're amazing creatures. And we can learn a lot from them, because just unconditional love. And I heard a joke the other day on a show, I think it was on the Comedy Store series that's on HBO.
And it was a great line, someone that said that people say that your wife is your best friend says no dogs are. You put your wife and a dog in the trunk for about an hour open up the trunk. Which ones glad to see you? Oh, I know, oh, I'm inspired by so many people in this industry, and just people that dare to try. It's very difficult to definitely do anything in show business. I know how difficult it is. But to overcome your natural fears, and just go for it. That always inspires me to do better myself, because I'm typically a very shy person. I always have been. It took me 35 years almost to come out to California and get going. And I finally just had to jump off the cliff. And hope there was a net. And it worked out okay.
Alicyn
Miles has a really good question, too. We've talked a lot about luck and success and good fortune. But what about any struggles you might have encountered early on in your voice acting career, anything that was challenging?
Bill Farmer
Oh, people think because I came out here and goofy was my first animated character audition for it, or for a series I should say I've done a few little things, but before, but that was after 12 years of radio stand up, which is one of the toughest things you can do. And go on to $50 a night bars to do comedy and where everyone's drunk. And there are a lot of rough nights that you got to go through to try and. Yeah, you got to pay your dues. You gotta survive that.
Alicyn
I mean, did you have kids at the time you were doing the standard?
Bill Farmer
Oh, no. No, that was all. Yeah, my son. I was born in 89. So he's going to be 31 A few weeks. And there's 32 131. But he was born in so he always thought knew me as doing Goofy. He thought people did this as a real job. People back in Kansas, they don't know they have no idea what goes on in voiceover. They're like, “Do you wear the suit?” I don't wear the suit. I just talk. And they all think it's like Robin Williams and Mrs. Doubtfire. They always think you're looking at a cartoon and you're adding voices to it. That's the biggest misconception or that I wear the suit. But they don't get it. They don't get it. But my son thinks everybody does this when he was young. We're in Florida. And his granddad was going off to work when I got to go off to work. And he said “What voice do you do?” So he thought this was normal?
Alicyn
So funny. He didn't ever want to get into it, though. Hmm.
Bill Farmer
All he did, but he didn't want to. He can actually I guess he does a really good goofy, he won't do it around me. But he went the music route. And he just loves music. And he's a very talented musician and has produced albums and stuff like that. But he actually we finally got him to do a voice demo and he's actually pretty good much better and he's done stand up before to dabbling in that stuff. But I thought I don't want to do the same thing the old man's doing so yeah, straight to find his own way.
Alicyn
Now. This question has actually come up quite a lot. And maybe you can enlighten me. The will the wise old crab make a revival a lot of people asking about the wise old crab.
Bill Farmer
The wise old crab. Yes. Like a video game. You did? I feel I may have that's that's so weird. I have to look at IMDb to even figure out what the heck yeah, you'll do some video game and where I could have been a crab and you'll do 15,20 characters or something. And I don't remember what I did. People do that all the time. Oh, I saw you in this car. I wish I remembered that.
Alicyn
And a lot of people have been asking about that characters. Clearly Wise Old Crab has garnered some fans!
Bill Farmer
Yes to… have someone tell me what, what… where is this from?
Alicyn
[inaudible]
Bill Farmer
Wise old crab.
Alicyn
Did anybody talk to you? I just want to we have about 10 minutes until our stream will actually shut down because we're limited at 60 minutes. Are you good to go for a couple more minutes? Yeah, I'd be glad to Jhansi to spend on a few of these. It's his birthday today. Could you give him a -
Bill Farmer
Happy birthday!
Alicyn
A Goofy howl, please?
Bill Farmer
Happy birthday! Ah-hyuk!
Alicyn
Awesome. Guys, if you do have a couple more questions, go ahead and throw them in the question box down at the bottom. We'll see if we can get to them. If it's your first time tuning in, hey, but what do they say? Like subscribe and share? Hopefully you if you did the show come in tune in next week. We have an Emmy nominated Riggs de who's the voice of spike on Tom and Jerry as well as the millionaires and
Bill Farmer
I've been on the Tom and Jerry as well when they have Irish Butch I did a couple acts. I did Droopy Dog, another dog on on Tom and Jerry couple of times dog.
Alicyn
I've done a number of I know I just actually career total sometime to Jerry with a cat. Jibanyan on Yokai Watch was a cat. So I guess we're like cats and dogs.
Bill Farmer
Yes. The cats and dogs. I do now dogs and frogs.
Alicyn
Dogs and frogs! Hey, that's a nice niche. This is a pretty cool question. What character? Have you never played? Oh God, would you would like to or I feel like character is tough because if a character exists that somebody is already voicing it, but is there a show? Or?
Bill Farmer
Oh gosh, I would have liked I did some background voices in Spongebob movie but SpongeBob it'd be great to do, Tom is so great. I love that character. Of course. I was very fortunately early. One of the first movies I did was some background voices on Roger Rabbit when I first came to town, I laugh at our group. And so you know any of Mel Blanc's I'm very fortunate to have done several of his because he was like the god of all early voice actors. When I was growing up. He was the only one I knew whose voice it was, you couldn't find out because the credits would go by so fast. Who’s this June Foray person who's this, Don Messick and Daws Butler and you couldn't find out about any of this stuff. Now with the internet, you can find exactly what everyone's done.
Alicyn
Although the credits do so like they cut off early.
Bill Farmer
They do or they shrink them down so they can show a commercial for the next slide.
Alicyn
I try to pause it and then they go.
Bill Farmer
Yeah, there's my name. And…
Alicyn
Thanks, IMDB. Yeah, Roger Rabbit was so good. See, oh, this is probably a question that you get, Oh, do you know if the dog show is coming back?
Bill Farmer
Or not as scheduled to right now. But that could be because of COVID. And it's always a possibility. We'll just have to wait and see because we finished up right when COVID was starting. And we shot our last scenes in February in Hawaii. And they were just shutting down the airport with the COVID. We did the Beagle brigade at LAX and the CDC was out there checking about some weird virus that was starting to come in from Chinese planes and stuff. So after the lockdown, it's just static right now there, I think, wait until they get a better handle on all this because we did a lot of traveling. And we're with people and that presents a whole bunch of problems now.
Alicyn
Well, there's a lot of fans that are big fans of that show. What can we do to support that potential? Second season?
Bill Farmer
Is there somebody I guess they do listen to letters, just write to Disney plus and say yeah, give us more dog show.
Alicyn
It's okay, I'm on it. You guys get on it too and right to Disney person. If you want to see more of it's about dogs like Sorry. Then go ahead and check it out. Can you tell us more about the wonderful world of Mickey Mouse coming out later this month?
Bill Farmer
Oh, okay. I don't know. I always wonder because they never have said don't talk about it. But usually until something's announced, obviously someone's announced it coming out. So it's just more fun adventures with Mickey and the gang. It's slightly some new characters. And it's aimed at the younger audience as well. And I love doing those i because the incidental voices are fine like Mickey and Mickey's mixed up adventures and Roadster Racers. I've done about 25 different characters on that series. So those are always fun. So always have me do goofy and Pluto's in it. And then I got a couple other voices. Will you be the mayor? Will you be the bar- not the bartender at my house, but the The ice cream vendor probably more appropriate, or whatever the incent ancillary characters are Yeah. And you get to come up with voices for those.
Alicyn
So we did get confirmation on the crab. And it was a wise old crab a Nickelodeon game with SpongeBob. I could have done yeah, a lot of people asking about why, and why.
Bill Farmer
So credit, I'm gonna have to go look that up and see what I hit because I have. Video games are weird too, because there's so many lines that can be disjointed. When we did Kingdom Hearts, it was like a book this thick. When you'd go to go to page 18, line 162, then go five pages later, and do another line and you don't get a linear story from doing video games generally.
Alicyn
Wow. That's amazing. Before we wrap things that I'm just curious, on the times, when you're not working, what are some things that you like to do for fun?
Bill Farmer
We've been doing a lot of stuff around the house, fixing up things like painting and all of that kind of boring stuff. Just to keep my car from the battery dying is just driving going for driving during COVID There's not a whole lot. I would like to travel a little bit more. But that's out of the question for at least a while. And just say I love photography. That was I did some, you know, news photography when I was so photography has always been a hobby of mine. I used to do headshots for people. That's fun and good.
Alicyn
For fun now, can you shoot a photo in your studio?
Bill Farmer
I certainly have. Yes.
Alicyn
Is there one like over? Don't you have one? Like over there on that side of the wall?
Bill Farmer
Or? Let's see. What do I have? I have a lot of good wacky things. Just a very messy right now. But that's kind of the neat thing. I can show you one thing. Yes or something? Yes, this is the Disney Legend Award. So it's a nice heavy thing. And it's very nice. And they put my name in that. That's my proudest accomplishment right there. That's heavy. It's made out of bronze.
Alicyn
Beautiful and happy. Wow. Bell, it's been so amazing. Getting the chance to catch up with you.
Bill Farmer
Oh, what's my pleasure? You doing? So great. And I love your show. I love your show. Great questions.
Alicyn
It's so much fun. I was feeling really just jaded on social media. I was off for like, over a year. And I was like, I gotta get back on I don't really want to do it. I'm really nervous. And then I was like, oh, reboot my show. This was a podcast and a web series like that started 11 years ago. And but this version, like where I interview you on Instagram TV is like, there's no editing, there's no graphics. It's just like a video person. It's so easy and perfect. It works. Oh, one more quick question. Are will the old VHS sing alongs beyond Disney Plus?
Bill Farmer
Oh, that'd be so cool. Write to ‘em! Tell them that. They need ideas. They need content. Gosh, I've done so many singalong albums over the years, probably 30 to 50. In the last 35 years, maybe they will that'd be great if they would.
Alicyn
Yeah, that would be amazing. Guys, you know where to go to make changes. Write to Disney Plus. Yeah, we're so glad you came on the show Bill. Of course, most of you guys are already following Bill, but if not, it’s @goofybill. And if you want to hear more of these shows, go ahead and follow me. And next week we have Rick Zieff Who is he said a million things Emmy nominated for spike and the new Tom and Jerry show. We have Kaylee coming up on the show. So definitely stay tuned. And thank you so much, Bill. I'll have a lecture and I get away. That's one of these days.
Bill Farmer
Well, thanks for having me. Ah-hyuk! Take care!
Alicyn
Okay, we'll see you guys next week. Bye.
Bill Farmer
Bye.
Alicyn
Thanks for tuning in to Alicyn's Wonderland, where we explore the wild and wonderful world of animation and video games. Please remember to subscribe and leave us a review. For more episodes of Alicyn's Wonderland. Please visit us at www.AlicynPackard.com See you next week.