This month we catch up with George Takei, the voice of Ohga from Paws of Fury: The Legend of Hank!
Where are you speaking to me from today?
“New York City. A vibrant, dynamic city. I love it. We’re bicoastal because I admire my London actor friends, because they can live in London and work in the theater, in television, in movies, in all areas. Only in America do we separate the two places that hire actors – New York and Los Angeles – with five hours of plane flight between us! I was born in Los Angeles and consider myself an Angeleno. But we live a lot in New York as well, have for quite some time.”
Tell us about you and Paws Of Fury: The Legend Of Hank. What’s your journey on this movie been like?
It started a long time ago. These animated films take a long time. They develop a certain portion of the film, and we actors come in and record our voice. Then months elapse – sometimes a year – and we come in to do the new segment that’s been developed. This has been going on for some time, so I have aged and my voice has changed. You know, when you’re a little boy, your high-pitched voice then becomes a man’s voice. I’ve been living with a man’s voice for a long time, and now I’ve reached the other arc of life, where your regular voice turns raspy and gravelly. My voice has grown with The Legend Of Hank.
Is it true that one of your first ever jobs in this industry was as a voiceover artist?
Yes. That was 1957. I was still just a teenager. And these producers imported a Japanese sci-fi monster film called Rodan, about a prehistoric monster that was in hibernation. For centuries, for eons. And then atomic radiation brought it to life, and it terrorised Tokyo and Osaka. From the vantage point of today, it was corny. But at that time, it was a scary, awe-inspiring monster movie. It was in Japanese, of course, because it’s a Japanese film, but they wanted to tell that story to a large American audience. So they hired English-speaking American actors, Japanese American actors, and we dubbed in the voices. I did a lot of other voice gigs. For a number of films, I got to be the voice of [the legendary] Toshiro Mifune.
Can you tell us a little bit about your character?
Well, yes [laughs], but I’m not playing the classic samurai in this. I’m a big, fat samurai, called Ohga, who is the leader of the army. He works for this teeny-tiny cat [called Ika Chu] that Ricky Gervais plays. [Ika Chu] is very bossy and demanding. As his employee, I may be the top guy he’s employed, but nevertheless I’m still under him. So Ohga, this big military samurai, is kind of obsequious and accommodating. You know, ‘Yes, I’ll do that, my Lord…’ That’s the kind of samurai I play.
What are the themes of this movie?
It’s a tale told by these animated creatures, primarily cats. But the hero, Hank, is a dog. He is a dog in a world of cats. He’s very insecure and timid, and yet he wants to be a samurai. And he has that fierce determination that you need. He apprentices himself to a legendary samurai, called Jimbo, who is voiced by Samuel L. Jackson and who has a commanding, strong, confident voice. Hank learns what he needs to do to become who he wants to be. It’s a hero-dog story. The concept for this film actually was inspired by Akira Kurosawa. Of course, he directed many samurai films, as well as contemporary stories. But I think the film that most inspired this movie is Yojimbo. That and Seven Samurai. That’s the inspiration for this new legend.
As you mentioned, this is a movie is about both Dogs and Cats. Do you have any cats or dogs as pets?
All my life I’ve had dogs. I’m a dog guy. But also, I’m an actor, so I can easily play a cat guy. You know, friends of mine have cats. And they love their cats. So, when I visit them, I love their cats too! But my heart really belongs to dogs.
Tell us about your dogs.
The most recent one was a Papillon. Papillon is the French word for butterfly. And these dogs are tiny, with big butterfly [shaped] ears. Our dog was all white, silky, but with brown eyes. Wow. These dogs are beautiful. They really do look like butterflies. Marie Antoinette, she went to the gallows carrying her Papillon with her. They’re that portable. Ours was a beautiful cat. And she knew it. She was a proud dog, always had her snout up. She was a regal French lady. So, we called her The White Queen – in French – because she was all white and queenly. Translated into French she was La Reine Blanche. La Reine Blanche is a bit of a mouthful to call your dog, so we cut it short to Reine, which then became Ren-Ren. She responded to that. It really captured her cuteness. She was elegant, a true queen.
Do you think you would make for a good samurai, in real life?
Yes, I think I would. I’ve played samurai. In Heroes I demonstrated how to build a Japanese samurai sword in one episode. When I was doing Star Trek, there was one episode where we get infected by a virus, a galactic virus that destroys inhibition. So the crew gets to do what we always passionately wanted to do, but was not societally accepted, so we’ve kept [those desires] contained. My colleague, the navigator, started singing Irish songs. Spock began to feel human emotions and love and started crying. I became a swordsman, but with a fencing foil, not a samurai sword. Give me a challenge and I’ll become an expert at it.
Paws of Fury: The Legend of Hank – BUY OR RENT ON DIGITAL NOVEMBER 9
