TOPCast 59: Fred Young

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Flash Topcast celebrity voice impersonated.

Tonight on Topcast we have a gentleman that is a voice actor.

That is somebody that does voice recordings for many of the pinball companies.

And situations where a pinball company would need a new voice,

something innovative and different,

or maybe somebody to simulate an actor, a famous actor's voice.

This guy is the man that does that.

And he's done it for about 50 different coin-operated games in his career.

Special guest.

I'd like to welcome Fred Young to Topcast tonight.

He's a voice actor like I was saying.

He's done about 50 different coin-operated games.

All the Alvin G pinball games had Fred Young as the voices.

And many of the Dede East Sega and Stern pinballs also used Fred Young

for many of the voices in their games too.

And these aren't just unique voices, different voices.

They're also voices of famous actors say they went into a recording session

and they forgot a line from the famous actor that they were dealing with.

And they couldn't get them back to do that line over.

They'll call in Fred Young to take over that chore so that they can get the game out

with the voice call that they need.

And we're going to give Fred Young a call right now here on Topcast

and see how he's doing and talk to him about some of the games he's done.

Hello.

Fred?

Yeah, this is me.

Fred, it's Clay. How are you?

Hello Clay. How are you?

Glad to shoot.

Okay, so tell me, like, one thing I read about you is that you had some sort of like

tonsillitis operation and that had some, when you were seven years old or something?

That's right. I've been doing voices since I was seven years old.

That's absolutely true.

And so what happened like when you were seven and you had this tonsillitis thing?

Did that, was that like something that actually changed your vocal cords?

Okay. Shall we go back?

Yeah.

1957. This is what happened.

Now I don't know how it happened with other people.

They'll get me wrong.

But this is what happened to me.

Okay?

I had the worst tonsillitis that the world has ever dealt.

I had poisonous toxic tonsils.

Not only were they toxic, but they were killing me.

And I remember forget this.

I mean, it got to be ridiculous.

I mean, I'm missing school.

You know, it just horrible.

And finally the doctor sent me to a throat surgeon.

And I'll never forget this.

And he says, okay, open your mouth.

And he took one look and he said, oh, brother.

Now, that was scared.

I kept seven years old.

I was going to say, was I doing any voices at that time?

Yeah, I was only doing one.

And that one happened to be Donald Duck.

Believe it or not.

Yeah.

And he said, oh, brother.

And he said, let me just tell you something.

Those tonsils have to go.

And he said, oh, my God, I have to go.

I said, well, he says, let me put it here this way.

I'll never forget this either.

Either they go or you do.

What?

Yeah, it's poisoning your bloodstream.

It's poisoning your blood and everything.

And then just to give you a bigger perspective on that,

you remember the Bixby the actor.

Yes, yes.

And he was made to bend the bane.

And they had a son.

They had a son.

And they're all gone, by the way.

God rest her soul.

Anyway, use literally what I found out that her son had plays

in the toxic tonsils and he died.

Yeah, they gave me a real big perspective.

This is what happened.

They're going to do.

Oh, my God.

Okay.

So now I'm going to go in and have a ton of select to me.

So they did the tonsil.

Now they have lasers and everything.

Even now my, my, you know, is a throat doctor.

He said, well, they got rid of them.

Not with laser, but remember, I had to be able to eat all their ice cream

in the world afterwards.

Right. Right.

So they got it out and they took out my adenoids also.

If there was a two-foot one, say on that day, you know what I mean?

Like, yeah.

And they took out my adenoids.

And then that was the day that changed my life forever.

But I didn't know what was going to happen.

One day I'm watching the old Huckleberry Hound show, Hannah By Bear.

And I started talking with Huckleberry Hound's voice.

And that's starting it all.

Could I do down and duck anymore?

No, they took out my adenoids for some strange reason.

After the operation, I couldn't do, I kept sneezing his voice

and tried to admit, I couldn't even see it anymore in that voice.

But all of a sudden this happened.

And I thought nothing of it.

And then like taking a penny and doubling it every day, all of a sudden,

all of a sudden, other things started to happen.

But it changed my vocal cords.

I don't know, but I'll tell you something.

I don't think I could have, I could do what I do without that happening.

I mean, I was seven years old.

Huh.

Yeah?

Yeah.

Strange.

I mean, all of a sudden.

All of a sudden, you know.

And then it got crazier and crazier.

Right.

Yeah, I mean, at that time, I had mine out probably when I was seven years old.

I was a little younger than you, but it didn't affect my voice that I know of.

But boy, I treated something to me, I'll tell you.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I don't know.

I don't know.

I couldn't talk for a long time.

And I was spearing up, you know.

Now there's a more mild with lasers and things.

And I don't know.

Did you have to eat all the ice cream in the world because I was all swollen?

Yes.

Yes, I do remember that.

Yeah.

And boy, I was a pain.

I was bleeding and all of a sudden.

And then that's exactly what happened.

I'll never forget that because before I couldn't do anything.

And this is before any type of voice changing, you know, as you're growing older, any kind of voice changing

which normal vocal chords happened.

Right.

So this was like a precursor.

You know, and I never thought anything of it.

I said, well, big deal.

At that time, you know.

Right.

But then I started to then things started to do other things and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Well, like what was like the first event changing voice that you did?

Well, I started doing, okay, first we did Huckleberry Hound.

And then all of a sudden I started doing Yogi Beer.

Then I started doing Boo Boo.

Then I started doing Ranger Smith.

Then I started doing, I mean, it started all of a sudden, I'm doing quick, I'm doing quick trauma grime.

I was doing all those buttons, voices all of a sudden.

And then after that happened, then all of a sudden, and this is by the way, this is way before you in the seventh or eighth grade.

So for the time I'm, you know, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, I'm doing all of the Hannah by Boo Boo's voices.

It's basically done, messic, and I was about to run very big fans of it.

Now, then it got crazier and crazier.

So you're saying, what was the next thing?

I started to imitate the teachers.

Huh.

You mean that one over real big, let me tell you something.

Yeah, you mean in your classes?

Oh yeah.

In How Old Were You?

What, Pymie?

How old were you?

Oh God.

Well, that was, then we got into high school.

Then we're in high school already.

And, uh, let's see, fourteen, fifteen.

But one of my cousins remarked, because I was showing these voices, look, at eleven, twelve years old, you can do all these things.

It's amazing.

And I didn't still think anything of it.

But then I started to imitate the teachers.

And the teacher, you know, you know, it's on the website.

But I had that question, they asked me a question, I answered them in their voice.

And they didn't pick up on it, like, with a laugh, you know, all of a sudden.

Hey, you know, but I didn't want, when I was in the eighth grade, this friend of mine, let's just show you.

The jealousy, you know, you're going to lose your identity by doing this.

And I've yet to lose my identity.

Yeah, you're going to lose your identity.

I said, why don't I, because I could do these things.

Why don't I lose my identity and claim it the father's somebody?

You know, you know, and he was just jealous that he couldn't do it.

I said, let's see you do it.

And he couldn't do it.

And I thought, and I thought, I reached a point where I said, well, anybody can do this.

And then years later, when you finally start studying, getting serious about specific things, you find out that's not the case.

And when you graduated high school, did you, I assume you went to college, right?

Yes.

And what did you graduate in?

Okay. I graduated from, well, you're really well in all of this stuff, huh?

Yeah, yeah.

You're readers are interested, huh?

So everyone's got blackmail on me, huh?

Yeah.

I graduated from Bonsdupet High School in Chicago.

And then I was broke, so I went to, uh, white junior college.

And I graduated there.

And then I went to, well, I was accepted to all the universities right in Northern and Southern.

Oh, the Paul, you know, Roosevelt University.

So I decided, I want to scholarship.

And then by the way, this has nothing to do with show business.

This has nothing to do with voices, nothing to do with anything.

Because in high school, I would show them that I could do Jerry Lewis, you know, and all this stuff.

But no, I never did a play in high school, believe you're going to say you're kidding.

Honestly, I never did a play in high school.

They said they didn't want me.

I don't talent.

Oh, my God.

And I kept the kind of, kind of low-key.

I don't want people to think I was weird.

Right.

But I mean, but I could imitate the assistant principal one time.

Somebody called up there.

They have these intercom systems in the school.

You know what I mean?

Yeah.

And I ended up imitating the assistant principal.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Of course, they pulled me downstairs.

You know, they couldn't prove anything.

You know, because I wouldn't doubt, how can anyone do that?

You know, I think in ignorance.

But once I write you in your college, I want a scholarship.

I finished up at Roosevelt University.

So I got my general certificate.

I got my AA.

And I got my BSBA.

And at that time, I was so overqualified.

If I went from a master's degree, I'd be aware of a qualified.

So all these degrees were in just general business degrees, right?

Well, as a business management, and I'm mitered of math.

Sure.

Okay.

Okay.

So nothing to do with voices.

No.

Absolutely nothing.

Nothing to do with voices whatsoever.

I was the furthest, because you see, I want to be a normal, everyday person.

And I just didn't work out.

And just didn't, you know how you're saying, there's a higher calling for everyone,

but you don't know where that calling is and how it's going to happen, everything.

Well, I tried to be an ordinary schmo, and it just didn't work out.

And, oh my god.

No.

Let's get a couple of facts straight here.

First of all, no.

Just want you to know, and for all the listeners and everybody, no.

I don't drink.

I don't smoke.

I don't do drugs.

I'm not gay.

I know that would make a lot of interesting situations.

No.

They'll have to make something up about me in the National Aquire.

I don't know.

Whatever.

So I get bad.

I don't even get bad, either way.

But no.

This had absolutely nothing to do with any of this stuff.

Nothing.

And I was also working.

I was the manager of a watch store.

Watch repair, and I was handling a lot of accounts and everything.

But one time, I started to imitate the owner of the store.

And they actually bought it with me.

And that went over very big.

But that was pretty funny.

Okay.

So after that, after a while, I actually believe it or not.

I know you're going to start.

This is going to start.

I actually want to work for an insurance company.

Doing what?

Yeah, I know what you're thinking.

Doing what?

What?

Well, this was 1978.

And I wanted to be a ordinary person.

You know, you're trying to...

And I said, okay, no more voice.

I'm a ordinary person.

So I was...

There were no longer any existence.

I was...

I was interviewing.

It took me about a month to get it.

It's called a watch communicator.

It's a wide area telephone service.

When you get the incoming calls and everything.

Right.

That is for the Montgomery Words Insurance Company.

So I got a job with the Montgomery Words Insurance Company.

But before...

Remember, I said, don't know a voice.

But before I could get the job, I was trying to take it a physical.

I didn't love this.

You ready, Clay?

Yeah.

They wanted to hear how I sounded over the phone.

Oh, brother.

I say, here we go again.

So then, I know you're loving this.

I'm sure you're loving this whole thing.

What did you do?

Like, 14?

Exactly.

I'm over the interviewing and he wanted to hear.

And I'm there.

Now, you know, I've got my degrees.

You know, I'm not a stupid person.

You know, I could...

Because I'd have to know these policies.

You know, the actual debt.

This member in policy, all these writers and term lives and all of life.

And there's all this stuff and people would be calling up.

They ask in question because that's how they got people.

To go on this, they had a hot, a real-come thing.

And it worked on them.

It was going to reach credit card.

And you wanted to know how I sounded over the phone.

So what I did was, are you ready?

Over there, I'm on a phone and he's on a phone.

And I turned on one of my announcer voices.

So, this is the voice I normally talk with, okay?

Now, you can imagine.

He said, let me hear how you sound.

So all of a sudden, he started hearing this voice.

Well, this is how I'm actually talking right now.

And I want you to know that it's a pleasure to be here working for your company.

So that's fine, Fred. That's a box.

So he didn't get it.

You know, that it's wonderful to be here.

Now, he gets off the phone.

He says, in the next slide, I had a bite my lip to keep them laughing.

I'm ready with the guy said.

Wait, so he wasn't getting it then.

Oh, yeah, he was, he was, he was, wait.

I'm talking like this.

And all of a sudden, I'm doing one of my announcer voices, all right?

So all of a sudden, he says, you know, Fred, you have a different voice when you talk on the phone.

Yeah, I said, oh, isn't that interesting?

Isn't that amazing?

You have a different voice when you talk on the phone.

I said, hey, how about that?

So he liked the announcer voice.

Bravo, bra, bra.

And then, then, remember, I'm going to be an honorary person.

Remember that? Yeah, I'm going to be an honorary person, sure.

All of a sudden, you see, at that time, they really didn't have like,

where we have the digital stuff today or they have the voice mail.

When they shut off the phones, they'll be like, recording.

So, before, before I went to them, I also really suggested that I tried to do it.

I suggested that I try going into radio.

So what I did with that took a course, which is the school's long-winded existence for a mega-state institute,

where I would train to pass the FCC license.

So I had my FCC license, first class.

First class, I had that.

So I had that in my arsenal, personal portfolio, and I was like, pass the classes and everything.

So now I'm working at this place.

So they found that I had an FCC license.

So right away, well, since you've got an FCC license, you can record the outgoing message for the company.

Oh, I said, I looked up in the sky and said, I wanted to get an order,

I'm going to start with the honorary person, I wanted to get away, I wanted to get away from this,

and I'm back doing the same thing all over again.

You see how things shift back into the focus?

Yeah, you can't escape it.

No, you can't. You can't escape.

So now I said, well, you know, this is like a little dictophone thing.

And you have to flip the switch to record.

So that's what I did, I flipped the switch to record.

Now the vice president of this insurance company, Absorbed me, he says, that's 23 seconds.

How did you happen to do that so perfectly?

I said, 25 years experience. Now, I'm back the way.

You were 25 years old?

That on the outgoing message, on the outgoing, when they close down, they call up an 800 number,

and they use that on the outgoing message.

So then I was working there from whatever, and then I'd go upstairs, and I'd be coding policies,

which is how insurance companies code their policies out.

So they thought they were going to groom me for one of the executive positions.

But literally that I know was about to happen.

Needless to say, somebody knew somebody at this radio show called Audio Jam.

It was a very fine person, Steve Hart.

And I called him up, and he was an eventualer crystal.

He had this show every Sunday on National Public Radio and WBZ here, locally.

And he said, I'd like to talk to you and blah, blah, blah.

And they all found out, and I was kind of frustrated this time.

I don't know what I'm supposed to do, I don't know what the situation is.

So he basically ran and met him.

And he said, how would you like to be on my show?

And at the front of the night, I tried to interview with this radio state.

Then we didn't give him the time to do it, and then he met me.

And then the stationer says, well, he can do that, and he's got a job here, whatever.

Which wasn't really just every single Sunday.

And it was a lot of fun, and I did voice calls, and I had a characterizations on the show with the federal individual.

And it was just fun, but I still was working at the insurance company.

Then I was talking to somebody else, because maybe I'm crazy that I had this ability, and they said, where you do, and why are you working for an insurance company?

The world is your playground.

I said, you know, yeah, the world's my playground, but I stopped to pay the radio.

I got to make money here.

So you know, it was survival, you know.

So, from that point, so now I'm on idol drama and everything, okay, fine.

And I am really, really frustrated.

For some reason, I'm frustrated with that, well, the girl I was going with time, she made a couple of bad statements.

I got very angry.

I suppose you want to know what that is.

Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely.

Now, this is terrible.

You never ever let somebody tear you apart for no reason because you have tell.

But I want you to know, let me back up back in 1975.

I called up one of my other friends.

I've known in high school, and she's crying, and this is all true.

And she said, and I said, what's the matter?

And she's got to do this massacres degree thesis, and she doesn't know what she's going to do.

And she said, what happened to say?

Well, I don't know.

I just called up and said, hey, what about Pradin or something?

I said, well, how would you like the head of the Sesame Street characters to teach the kids in the class on a little cassette?

And she said, hey, that's a great idea.

I said, yeah, where am I going to get the voices?

And then I said, well, I have a secret to tell you.

I can do those voices.

I was dead silence on the phone.

So I said, you don't believe me, do you?

So you turn, I got a party, said, yeah.

And people try to do voices.

I said, yeah, they don't sound any different.

I said, would you like a little demonstration?

So then I showed her, and I said, wow, this is fantastic.

But the time in 1975, I was standing up at a wedding.

And I didn't have time for this nonsense.

And then from there, when I got the job of the insurance company,

and then from there, with this radio thing on the weekend,

so basically, what happened was it was like a transition.

But I, all of a sudden, now I'm doing stuff.

And she's writing scripts for the kids.

And the kids are all going crazy.

And I became part of her master's degree thesis.

So I am part of this individual's master's degree thesis.

And we call it psychological behavior

is for external stimulation to teach children.

And it worked fine.

I actually came up with the talking story,

but to that I should have, I should have copyrighted her something.

Yeah, you should have.

Yeah, I should have.

But okay, okay.

Well, we know.

Yeah, well, wait, wait, wait, wait.

What happened to her?

Did she, you know,

I know her very well.

I talked to her.

I know her over 40 years since 1968.

And I met in the type in class.

What happened to her?

She's still, I talked to everybody.

Unfortunately, she's having some trauma right now.

I'm not going to go into that.

We talked to everybody.

And I've been at her wedding.

Or weddings, as we say.

Yeah.

And we talk.

We talk a lot.

And it did come up at one time.

And some little boys out can't be trusted.

No, I said, ask her.

Is everything is true?

Let me tell you, everything is true.

And she said,

which was getting her masters in psychology.

And I read her thesis.

And she said, if it wasn't for you,

I wouldn't have gotten this masters.

And I would have wanted to drag you up on the stages

and receiving my degree with you.

I thought that was kind of nice.

Yeah.

And getting back.

Okay.

So now I'm in this radio show.

Okay, fine.

But the world, though.

So now I'm talking to a few people.

And now I'm in this radio show.

And I'm frustrated.

Boy, I got a good idea.

You got a good idea.

What is it?

Why don't you have your own radio show?

So I wrote, produced, and stared in my own radio show.

Because I know that you've been through.

If you're producing and writing a new radio show,

if a lot of hard work isn't it?

Yeah.

Yeah.

And here you're doing it.

But you were doing a lot more than I'm doing.

Well, I'll tell you what the name of the show was.

It was called, and I was trying to find a word.

Because I wanted to do science fiction, science fact,

or infranously, because I really enjoyed it.

I really enjoyed that.

And I said, well, if I enjoyed, other people enjoyed it too.

And I was right.

Well, better than I was.

So I came up with a call that I finally found the answer.

It's called, fantasy world.

I did fantasy world with Fred Young.

And we did that.

I ran for 13 weeks.

And we had a lot of fun.

And we taught me a lot of things.

The boy was at rough.

I mean, it was tough to write a show every week.

It was just one day a week.

So what these guys go through on the year, writing like the

tonight's where I was in the land, or what they go through my

God.

I mean, so much hard work.

But it taught me a lot of things.

And then I decided, you know, hey, I'm going to tell my

mom about that.

I think maybe I should study acting.

And instead of saying forget it or no, even my friends, instead of

saying forget it or no, they said, well, it's about time.

Oh, my God.

There's a lot of time.

Because they saw all this stuff coming out.

And you know what I mean?

Right.

And I said, aren't you saying no, forget about it?

No!

No!

No, not at all.

Not at all.

Anyway, at the time, I wanted to sort of take a leave of that

from the insurance company.

I was seeing this girl and there was a couple of bad comments.

And I'm going to tell the comment that was made.

I swear to you, this is the truth.

All of a sudden, out of the blue, this individual who I was seeing for about a year,

said to me, and I quote, you're not going to like this.

Never let anyone tell you about it.

I don't like your voices.

And this was 1978, and I happened to be with it.

And I happened to see a commercial on me and I said, you know,

I can do that just as good as this person.

And she made a nice kind of, quick fantasizing.

You're never going to do anything.

Isn't that nice?

Yeah, yeah.

It's a sweetheart of a comment.

A sweetheart, yeah.

And then, I'm on the phone with her for whatever reason.

And I don't like your voices.

I said, why not?

Because it's too unique of a talent.

Unquote, which is redundant statement.

And then she had to mention because I've been paid a piano.

I don't like your piano play.

I said, why not?

Because anybody can pay the piano.

Hey, so what do you do that's so great besides telling me?

You're putting me down.

Oh my God.

And oh, whether we're getting married,

or you have beautiful dreamer, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, right.

Everything was negative.

Everything was, how much money you got in the bank?

I mentioned her amount.

I never had that amount before in your life.

All right, then finally, then this is terrible.

I know you could, I know you could try this away.

And this is just terrible.

All right, tell me when you're going to call me again.

So I can get you off the phone.

Yeah, so we did the Mickey Mouse routine with that.

Now it's time to say goodbye.

Right, right.

So the thing is,

12, and then I can't understand why I haven't heard from friends

such a long time.

Yeah, you run, you get your car run to another country.

Oh, wow.

Yeah, terrible, terrible.

But nobody else said they did that.

Well, what happened with the acting classes?

What did you say?

What happened with the acting classes?

I'm going to go into that.

I'm getting to that right now.

Okay.

Anyway, I saw an ad in the audition news one day.

And I'm frustrated.

I don't know what, you know, I'm frustrated.

So I called up, and I had my radio show on the air.

This is now 19.

It's got to be 1979.

And I had my radio show on here,

and I called up a TV actor studio here.

And I said, listen, this is Fred Young,

and I have a radio show.

And I have a radio show.

Yes, we heard you radio show here on Evanston, WPN.

I said, yeah.

Yeah.

I see here you teach on camera classes, acting, you know.

Have you ever been in a business before?

I said, no, I know his radio.

I know his voice is a radio.

And I did have a terrible demo tape at that time, but whatever.

So we'll come on, listen, come on down town.

We want to talk to you.

So I came to us and said, all right, what do I do?

I read about what happened there in Manalo.

He was, should he go to Juliet,

should he go to business school?

Either I did the business school, and you're starting

to go to Juliet, so I forgot to have one.

I got to lose.

I went downtown, and nobody was there.

This person wanted to talk to me alone.

And I said, where's everybody?

Are there people there that I want to specifically talk to you?

Have you ever been on camera before?

No.

So you got your radio show on the air, huh?

Yeah, and you're frustrated, huh?

Yeah.

And you're like, I'm going to have a voice, sit down.

Yeah.

Well, I understand.

You need that experience.

But we're not going to let you in if you can't talk.

And you ever been on camera before?

I said, no, we're going to be on camera today.

And they put me on camera in an audition in front of everybody

for the school, you know, in this room.

And everybody else gets up there, and I get up there,

and I start doing this.

I have a commercial in front of me.

And then they stop taking.

The guy says, the guy's running the camera.

So are you sure you've never been this before?

I said, no.

I've only known about radios.

Everyone says, will it show us?

And then he announced, now just a minute,

and maybe if they may have a little more experience here,

but he's not any different than anybody else here.

Okay.

And then they're all sat down and listened to my demo tape.

They were like, wow, amazing.

How do you do that?

Wonderful.

So I attended TV actor studio,

and I was the best in the class.

And I met Paul Krook, who was a fine actor,

who was in many, many movies, including somewhere in time

and all this other stuff.

And I learned, and I learned.

And learning was very, very important to me

because I needed that information.

And then from there,

as we say, my picture composite together,

I have my demo.

And six months later,

through talking with some agents and things,

I had, I was on television.

I was actually, yeah,

it took me six months to get my first on camera as we say, gig.

And the other agent in town said,

well, forget about the voices,

but actually I met somebody.

It was very, very important to me.

And he said, forget about what they're saying.

Keep on doing it, because not everyone can do this.

And he turned out to be a writer and producer.

And he had some ideas.

And then we started to record with him.

I mean, I started to record with him.

Then, somebody mentioned that you need other things

at your disposal,

take some classes at the second city here.

Now, you've read about second city in Provocation or everything.

And it's called the Players Workshop of Second City.

So I read them and I took the classes.

And I learned about that.

And all of a sudden now, I'm in the Children's Theater,

a edition, but you have to add,

and I'm in the Children's Theater of Second City.

And this is 1984.

And I have a pivoted world in this thing.

I'm on the main stage,

and I'm playing the Frankenstein Monster,

narrating Beauty and the Beast.

And then I got a nice review in the newspaper.

Isn't that nice?

Yeah.

And I got a nice review in the newspaper.

And because I was using a different voice for the monster.

Now, what now?

I put one of those Frankenstein headpieces on.

So I'm 64, and it made me look like with 8 feet tall.

So now I have three directors,

and they said, you know, for you really,

and you have your lines,

you know, I had to do a musical number.

The monster, I sang the monster blues.

Yeah.

We were cute a little bit.

And it was so awesome as part of it.

I said, my God,

you know, because I met some kids,

and they're going to be scripted,

if I said no, the monster or the creature.

He was a sympathetic character.

So I'm going to play him like that.

Instead of bouncing around with a scary one,

I won't.

The voice is enough to carry everything.

And I would wear glasses on the monster

just to tone things down a little bit.

So when I came, when we had Mark Twain,

I had some of those that was Mark Twain,

and we had Wilhelm Grimm,

and then there was the Frankenstein Monster.

And this was all the first time this was ever done.

So they're all looking at the stage,

and they don't know where I am.

And I said, and I said, I'll wait a minute.

And then they start playing the Adam's family.

And then he says, I think,

isn't that the monster Dr. Frankenstein made?

And the kids, you know, they're not scared.

They're just, they're seniors.

Kind of love everything.

So there's a lot of fun.

We did that for about 13 weeks,

and then we got to the second city.

And the person that did the master's degree,

she came, my mom came, you know,

we're on the main stage, and kids want to...

I even run casting as you went to this thing.

I'll never forget this.

And she said, I've never seen a children show like this,

or standing in the middle of the league.

I mean, I think that I want to see you.

I said, no, no, it's all a group effort.

And in the newspaper, I got a nice review saying,

I taught my, I said,

first played by Fred Young,

and then I was on Rift.

They said I was so non-risk,

mischievous and forwarded.

I'm a voice monster because it felt like an FM DJ,

because I was doing, I was doing the FM DJ voice.

And I would narrated it and,

and it was wonderful.

And in between all this,

I was still doing commercials on the internet and everything.

Now, are you enjoying it so far?

Yeah, it's interesting how we're getting there.

Now, now we're coming to something that I knew nothing about.

Remember, I was still doing industrial films.

I was doing commercials.

And auditioning.

And I did a number of Empire Cup commercials

and television, local things.

And then finally, we had to join the unit that comes up.

But now we're getting to another crucial, crucial situation.

All of a sudden, this is what happened.

We love it.

I was recording for all state insurance.

And, as I usually do,

when I'm at another studio,

I need to production studios in town,

even today, unless they know me,

which they do,

I would leave a cassette tape.

Now, on this particular cassette tape,

this was my second character tape.

My first character tape was the old Ed Sullivan show.

Now, you're showing all different characters, whatever.

On these tapes, you're like three minutes, that's all.

On this particular one,

it was PB Herman's Playhouse.

And I was PB Herman.

I was everybody on it.

I still have.

I still give out the tape sometimes.

And I'm everybody on it.

So I'm recording this stuff from all state insurance.

And I left my cassette there.

Little did I know what was about to happen.

That continues to this day.

Little did I even know.

Because I just won an audition to be on NBC.

This DJ in town, which I will not mention,

he was having this show.

And on the show,

well, I was just sent in and do voices.

And no one else could do anything that I could actually do voices.

So I'm going to be on the show.

And I thought, well, this would be a nice big break for me.

It really broke my neck.

I got basically hurt.

I got actually hurt on national television.

But that's another story as to why.

Because they were very, they were,

it was not going away.

And the show never went anywhere.

And we were asked for a couple of weeks,

and that was the end of it.

People couldn't stand it.

And he wasn't good on camera.

And even when he tried to do an interview with show,

and he was not good at the audition, his name,

he felt fat in his face.

It was no good.

But it nearly killed me.

It nearly killed me.

It was not good.

Anyway, letting back what happened at the studio.

So I left the cassette tape.

Little I know was about to happen.

All of a sudden, I get a phone call.

Now, before I got this phone call,

I'm sure you read about this.

One of my friends,

this father died.

And I moved him for many, many years.

So I'm going to go to the funeral,

and I'm going to go to the house,

and console and everything.

I got a phone call from this production house.

It turns out a company was in there.

I said, yeah.

And they want you to do Star Trek for a pinball machine.

I said, what?

Yeah.

They heard your cassette.

Because I didn't hear the rest of the strings for later.

They want you to do Star Trek for a pinball machine.

I did put Star Trek on there.

I mean, the classic Star Trek stuff.

There was no next generation at that time anyway.

And I said, well, I don't know how to record for a pinball machine.

I never knew what he think about it.

And I said, I know about, you know,

industrial films and commercials.

And there's slide films and animation.

And all of a sudden, I said, I said,

a pinball machine.

So I said something that, well,

luckily, I said, well, can you get me out of it?

It's true.

I said it.

Everything in place is actually the truth.

I know it sounds crazy and strange,

but this is what makes everything fun.

I said, well, can I get out of it?

We don't know who the people were that came in here.

I said, well, I don't know.

Well, you left the cassette.

I said, well, I always wanted to cassette.

Yeah.

Well, call me back tomorrow.

So I call up my friend, you know, his dead pest.

And I said, well, listen.

I don't think I'm going to be able to come to see what.

Well, they want me to record for some gain, some pinball machine.

I was talking about what you're not sure are you, Crane.

I said, no, you're not going to start your Star Trek.

I said, wait, I'll let you know.

Let me call you back later.

All right.

They call me up again.

And we don't know who the people are.

We can't catch out of it.

Will you do it?

I said, I want to be in Crane Star Trek.

So I said, never forget this.

I said, sounds like fun.

I said, sounds like fun.

Okay.

I said, all right.

I go, I call my friend.

I said, I'm not going to be able to come to Fure Barbie either that night.

I'll be there every single night for you.

I'm definitely.

But they want me to record this thing Star Trek.

I don't know.

It's like, we can't turn it down.

I said, oh, yes, I could.

But I don't know who they are.

They don't know why they are.

They are.

They are.

Okay.

I get over to the studio.

Here it comes.

And I meet the great Joe Kamikaw.

I meet Brian Schmidt.

And I'm sure you're familiar with Joe Kamikaw.

I'm the leader of UN.

Yeah.

And I met Brian Schmidt.

I'm sure you know him too.

Yeah.

No, you don't?

Yes, you do.

Okay.

I'm Brian Schmidt.

And this is the story that I heard after was because Brian had a time at the start.

First of all, I get in there.

I'm going to pay the story that was told to me like six, seven months later.

They were really.

They had this contract or whatever to do Star Trek.

They're the one with the transporter.

Right.

That thing.

Yeah.

Okay.

You got that?

Yeah.

And I need a.

You know the characters, they're the people.

So they happen to be over at the studio.

And so they pull all the audition tapes, all the demo tapes from everyone in town here.

So for two must be two, two and a half hours.

They're listening to the truth to try and find someone to do this.

Nothing.

I mean, those characters like you're the husband, you're the employee, you're the cost of the

job, you know, but no voice voices.

You know what I mean?

Right.

Okay.

I mean, he's doing it on man, he's doing the magician, he's doing this, you know, whatever.

But nothing you can actually say no.

So two and a half hours and Joe was bombed and Brian was bombed.

So the engineer was also bombed and he said, we are not, there was a guy in here.

He was doing some equating for all state.

We left this and he was doing a lot of voices in here.

Would you like to listen to this?

And we've been listening to stuff for two and a half hours.

We are now at the end of the day.

I had just been listening to the show.

How did you know?

So they lifted the PV Herman's play house.

What is this over?

So they popped it in the minute they heard the first couple of minutes of PV.

They were in throttles.

And I was doing, yeah, I was doing probably here.

Oh yeah, I was listening to PV Herman.

And by the way, I can do the voices.

I'm not, I'm not PV Herman.

I'm just showing them, I just do a demo tape and a demonstration of your, of what you can do, you know what I mean?

Right.

I don't really think we heard it.

It must be very quick.

It's a matter of fact.

I don't know what you're talking about.

So we would do...

So on that.

So then all of a sudden,

I'm a specific part of it.

I thought I'd be kind of interesting

on the Star Trek,

with the trans...

You know, with the...

with the...

with the...

with the...

with the engines going and all of that.

So I put that...

we recorded that on there.

All of a sudden,

when my Star Trek set...

they said,

that's it!

That's the guy!

That's him!

So,

when you do the Star Trek,

what did you do like?

Did you do the Kirk and the Spock and the...

and the...

Yeah.

Yeah.

And that's what they heard,

and that was the,

of course, immediate trust.

That's when they made the decision.

That's him!

That's after two and a half hours of listening.

After two and a half hours of reading,

I'm like,

you know, you can hear all these tips all over the time.

Nothing!

You know what I mean?

So now, what year was this?

This is about 1990?

1889.

89.

That's right.

And that's it!

That's the guy!

So I can now come in,

I'm meeting everybody.

And they're showing me...

It's a whole new difference.

I might say,

to do this stuff,

it's a whole different recording.

It's not...

like you do a commercial.

A commercial is a commercial.

This...

it's a whole different...

ballgame.

To tell the truth.

It is.

And I learned that very quickly.

But anyway, I walk in there,

and I don't know who I am.

And I knew one of the girls

that had recording over there.

And she wanted to wake

to hear me do stuff,

but she had a go.

And I was such a goodie,

so I heard other...

other venues.

And by the way,

when...

interestingly,

when I started to do this,

like freelancing,

everything,

I was so...

it was...

like...

I'm now, you know,

people respining,

and they're very happy to be with me.

You know,

they're...

I see it...

not finding a nice,

nice, nice work instead of...

they're at auditions,

and...

and a nice deal,

you know,

performing, you know,

blah, blah, blah.

So I thought, you know,

I said, hey, you know,

come a lot of me here.

Hey, nice.

So all of a sudden,

I get there,

and I'm not saying anything.

I'm saying,

oh, are you sure you can...

you know,

you heard your demo,

a very impressed...

I'm sure you can...

yeah, I can do this, yeah.

Because they didn't hear me.

Are you sure you'll be alright?

You know, you're not going to be like that.

Frog,

and one frog you do,

you know, hollow,

and the baby,

hollow, and the dog,

and then nothing,

and then the frog goes,

bruv, and nothing.

And that day,

well, all of a sudden,

as they're doing the Star Trek,

and they're plodding,

and the booth,

and they're plodding,

and they're, my guy,

a blah, blah, blah, blah.

Then they're going crazy.

John is going crazy,

but I'm going crazy.

And that day,

you don't do this anymore.

You know how many twins

I recorded that day?

Like, four or five?

Four or five.

He's four or five.

I remember it most vividly.

Yeah, you did the...

You did the...

You did like King Kong,

and...

King Kong, right?

That's right.

King Kong,

check point.

Right?

Batman.

Star Trek,

and another one.

It was like a marathon,

like, eight, nine hours.

But they went crazy,

and then they wanted to show me,

the King Kong poster,

and all the artwork,

which is beautiful stuff.

You know, I've never seen any of this stuff before.

I don't know.

I play on games, you know,

in high school hangout,

you play the baseball games.

You know, you remember those baseball games and things.

Sure.

But I didn't know anything about this.

And...

And...

This is interesting.

And you said,

do the whole movie,

Vocalty of King Kong.

And I just happened to see it the other night,

so I had everything memorized.

So I knew all the lines and everything.

Fed it all to churches,

and whatever went in,

went in,

because that's a long time ago.

That's where only specific things

would go in there.

Now,

there can throw anything in there,

you know what I mean?

The database is so large.

The memory is so large,

you control almost anything in there, you know?

Well, you know,

back in the day,

when you did this,

the four or five games,

I mean, did you have any prep time for any of this?

No.

No.

No.

No.

You prep time?

I was hit with King Kong.

Checkpoint,

King Kong,

and it was say,

I said, well, I can do all this.

I didn't have any preparation.

No.

No.

I knew all this stuff already.

So right away they say,

my God, you know,

you know,

you know, you know,

you have a line,

you know, the whole thing,

the whole movie would vocally.

So that's what happened.

Now, I didn't prep time new.

The prep time I had was when I got there,

because I didn't have a script in my hand.

It was better and more spontaneous,

because you can over-practice anyway,

but I found that out later.

But no one, there's no preparation time.

I just went and I just did it.

Now, were you still working for the insurance company?

No.

When did the insurance stop?

Right, I ended in

seventy,

thirty, seventy-nine.

I took a leave of absence,

and then all of a sudden,

everything else started to happen.

All of a sudden,

God on the River Show,

I had my own,

had my own,

River Show on the River,

seventy-nine,

eighty.

And then I decided to make the decision.

You have to make the decision,

because you see,

you can't get away from it.

You know what I mean?

I'm trying to get away from

the almost-time recording tapes for the,

I mean, the Dictafone tapes

for the insurance company.

And I don't know how to work,

but so I don't really

federal figure it out,

which I did.

And then,

and then I'm doing a number of different things.

Then, the TV after studio,

training them,

and then,

then,

a post-work shop,

a second city.

You know.

And then,

an eighty-nine,

all of a sudden,

all of a blue,

this happened.

Well,

that's a true story.

Well, of all of these,

of these voice gigs that you do,

what, you know what I mean?

What is pinball machine

in the big picture?

Is doing pinball machines?

Is that a very good,

from my behind?

Well, I'll be up,

but I mean, was it a-

About games?

But was it a very good,

paying gig?

Did I just say?

Was it a very good,

paying gig?

I guess, at the time, yeah.

I thought it was very, very good.

Yeah.

Yeah.

But remember,

that was back in 89.

Not so far from ballgame,

you know, with situations and things.

But yes, it was a good,

paying gig.

Yeah.

Besides, I've never done anything like this,

and when I asked,

where's this thing going?

Where's these things going?

All over the world.

I said, what?

All over the world.

I said, what?

All over the world.

All over the world.

So you mean to tell me that this is going, yeah.

Well, now, the other stuff came in

because you see,

unfortunately, but,

as we say, the powers that be,

it turned out that,

uh, Mr. Schattener,

one of the certain amount of money,

for me to do his stuff on the game,

and they had to pick all my stuff off the game.

So I'm not really,

I'm only on one part of that particular star trick game,

believe it or not,

because you have to professional.

They say, you know what I mean.

Right.

But they say, uh,

they really request that, you know,

even recorded,

all the recording was done, everything.

But,

we have to take your stuff off.

So they did go to the forest Kelly,

and they went to Jimmy DeWayne,

God rest their souls,

and the forest Kelly recorded for that game,

for, uh,

for scale.

And Jimmy DeWayne,

because his wife,

Ness Pinball,

said, well, what do you want?

And he just wanted a game?

Wow.

I didn't give him a game.

Right.

If then people far was actually me on there,

and no,

it wasn't.

And I said, I'm only on one part of that game.

Have you ever played a net game?

Yes. Yes.

Okay. Remember at the end,

you hear the person say,

live long and prosper?

Yes.

Yeah, that's me.

Huh.

Uh-huh.

I couldn't sound like,

Spock.

I couldn't do it like,

live long and prosper.

No.

I think it went with long and prosper.

Now, interestingly enough,

when that happened,

interestingly enough,

and I said, okay, okay.

I met Junior Edinburgh in 1981

at North Park College.

They had a sci-fi,

there was a sci-fi,

um, convention going on

that weekend at North Park College.

And they invited Dave Prouse,

who plays Darth Vader,

and then he invited Gene Rodbury.

And I had a chance to meet him.

And he was just terrific.

And I met him in 1981.

Now, time passes.

1989.

Now, in 1990,

they decided to take this over

to come out,

studies were the filming,

the next generation.

And it turns out,

unfortunately, I was very sad to hear

that Gene Rodbury passed away,

he died.

So they dedicated it to

good over there,

and people are crying,

and you got the Patrick Stewart coming out

to see this thing,

and everyone from another film,

the next generation.

And, you know,

and they dedicated a plaque

to this game

to the memory engineers,

Mr. Gene Rodbury.

And I said, very right and proper.

Very right and proper.

So that was that.

And then,

Joe calls me up and says,

there's a thing called the Pinball Expo.

And I said,

what is that?

Well, I was a person at Rodbury,

and I think it would be a kick

if he'd go to the,

go to the Expo,

maybe do a little talk.

I think they really have a lot of fun.

I said,

you need me?

He says, yeah.

I said, all right, you got me.

So then I called Rodbury up,

and you know, everyone around me,

I just want you to know quite.

Everyone around me tries to do voices.

You understand?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Oh, Rodbury.

So all of a sudden,

I said,

what's the work, how do you do?

I'm Fred.

And he started doing Yoda.

The rest, I mean,

he's a wonderful person,

but I tell him,

you practice everyone does this.

You know, come on.

I have an animal trick.

I said, okay, I said that's my,

and then he,

I met him at that time as a remodel here,

and went away here,

and we had breakfast,

and we talked,

and he even spelled my moon wrong

on the list of people

that were going to be speaking.

Now this is 1990,

and there's video tape for me, all right?

Wait, wait, wait.

How can you misspell, Fred Young?

Yeah, I did.

All right, so they did.

How can you misspell?

I don't know, but they did.

All right, so what?

So I took a couple of the peony hermita

and I had about maybe 20 of the tapes there.

All right, you know, all right.

Maybe people have some fun with it.

And the other side of that's my narration tape.

It's called narration.

It's narrating your teaching.

So I get over here,

and then this blue auditorium, you know,

and Rob announces me,

he does a yogi bear,

and you know, that puts mine to shame.

Here he is, Fred Young.

And like you see on those,

you know, you see on those other things,

where you hear the cricket's chirp,

you get all your ears like this.

Okay, you're not see.

And here he is, Fred Young,

and I get up on this pony.

And all of a sudden you think it out.

You know, one of these things, right?

Right.

Yep.

And the cricket's chirp, you know what I mean?

Yeah, is that because...

That may be 50, 30 to 50 people.

There's a big thing, it's a big thing, right?

Okay. Right? Right?

Yeah.

Okay.

And somebody reminding me about this last year

because they were there.

And I forgot about this.

So this is what happened.

Are you ready?

Ready?

Yep.

I started, thank you everybody.

And by the way,

I subsequently got called in to do other games.

Okay?

Which I didn't want to talk about because, you know.

Yeah, you can't talk about new stuff.

Yeah, I can't because, you know,

I don't know if I was supposed to because you see what,

in 1989 when I got the toy of the place,

the game that was coming out

was called Phantom of the Opera.

But they used some kind of DJing.

He wasn't an actor.

He wasn't acting.

He couldn't really act, act, act, act, act.

Okay?

But that was the one that was as we say on the line

that we're making and everything.

And my other stuff was coming up later.

So I started, you know,

I showed them the announcement boys

and then I started showing other things.

So this is what happened.

Are you ready?

Yep.

And somebody had a reminder about this.

The cricket's a champion.

I was going to say,

oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay.

And the video taken, you know.

All of a sudden,

because I started doing other things.

And I said, well, I have some questions.

All of a sudden,

from 30 to 50 people,

the place starts loading up.

Somebody said something out there.

They said, hey, there's this guy.

He's doing some stuff.

Well, well, well.

And by this is before the Simpsons

and Famigain, all of a sudden.

And all of a sudden,

there's more people coming in.

Now, you've got the Waders

and the Wafers back from out there.

They're coming in.

Now, the whole place,

I started doing other,

just to show,

I started getting a prize.

The whole place goes bananas.

The whole place.

Were you doing like,

like, bulls?

I was showing them,

Hannah Biber.

I was showing them,

Warner Brothers,

the Bugs Bunny,

and a few,

and I was showing them other things,

you know, whatever.

And the whole place is going nuts.

Now they're asking me questions,

and very nice questions,

and I'm responding.

And then I'm only there for an hour.

I thought, okay,

the whole place is going crazy.

But 20 cassettes I brought.

Well, you couldn't find them.

They took them boom.

There they are.

I don't know.

Yeah, they're gone.

But they're gone.

They are gone.

They went crazy.

They just,

I was doing a regular beer,

and I was doing all this stuff.

And I was showing them a Martian voice,

which almost sounds like Elmo,

and I was showing them all this stuff.

And they're going nuts.

My God, it looks like a right now.

I mean, from 30 to 30,

the other place is going to be one of the big rooms

over the remote at that time.

My God.

Okay.

So, every other one of them,

the bank,

the bank, the bank,

was going to be there.

So crazy was that.

And at the bank when I was Saturday night,

you've been there.

You've been at the expo.

Yep.

Well, I get home tired.

Even Joe's asking, you know,

it's about quarter to four in the morning,

and Joe wants me to do voices.

I get tired.

You know, it's, I get home

four o'clock in the morning.

The phone rings.

Are you ready?

You love the stonchia.

Yeah.

You're going to work on the phone rings.

It's Rob Book and what are you doing?

You're doing Yoda.

Bad Yoda, you mean?

Yeah, bad, yeah, bad, yeah, yeah.

It's not up to my standards, okay?

Yeah.

Yeah.

So, you weren't used to.

But it's testing.

He wanted to invite me out to breakfast.

I'm telling you, it's four o'clock.

I thought God forbid we died, you know?

Right.

But he was so thrilled with me.

I said, every single year,

are you saying that you're not used to

any of this sort of response to your work?

I wasn't used to any of this as we say,

as you're saying,

mainly because what I do,

I say, okay, fine, because it's just one aspect.

I know it's going to get crazy and crazy with me.

But I've only one aspect of it, you see.

I only see it in one aspect.

I didn't know, I mean,

1990 there was more than one tin ball company out.

At the time, I was just doing a staph of data east.

And after that's finished, after that's finished,

one of my agents called me up.

You see, things start to snowball, you know what I mean?

Right.

Yeah.

One of my agents called me up on a Saturday.

And there was another company

which was Williams looking for a wife.

She called me up.

And I said, yes, yes.

And it was for the T2 machine over at Williams.

And can you call it over there and do an urinal?

I said, that kind of thing is the tin ball.

And he said, oh, here we go again.

I said, here we go again.

What the hell?

So I called up, I basically won the audition.

And Arnold wasn't going to do it, but Mr. Shen,

I got paid everything, but Arnold,

he heard me and he did it.

And then somebody told me a little while later,

you couldn't tell who you might take and his tape for the thing.

But he did it and I didn't, so I'm not on the game.

But am I used to the adulation?

No, not really.

Not really.

I see, it's a business.

You can get crazy.

You know, when I see these other people,

we get everything handed to them.

I'm so glad I didn't appreciate anything.

You know what I mean?

And I'm sure you've experienced some of that stuff where you talk with people.

And they're having that added to the joker,

blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and all.

Look at me and blah, blah, blah.

Well, that's awful nice, but you're still a human being.

So when I see these people like a Lindsay Lohan

or the Spurs or something, going crazy.

They've got millions and millions and millions of dollars.

And they're taking their account and their abilities

and throwing them at the garbage can.

It doesn't go well because here you're given something

and you've given a lot of opportunities.

A lot of people would die for.

You know what I mean?

Right.

So I'm not really used to that.

Even though I don't mind it, I think it's kind of crazy.

You know, I know it's news and everything.

I've had a joke one time.

I said, you know I've made it in the industry, how?

You'll read that I'm sleeping with somebody on the national inquiry.

Right.

Which is true.

Which unfortunately it's true.

It's a bad response to the way things are.

But people get a little, you know, they get a little

a little ride.

You get in town here.

And I'm sure you've experienced some of that too.

They get a little bit of a ride.

He goes right to their heads and right away they think

that they're better than sliced bread for everybody.

But the problem is, unfortunately, you're still a human being.

And you've got to respond like a human being,

instead of being a, you know, whatever.