INTERVIEW: The ‘Strong’ voice behind Twilight Sparkle on ‘My Little Pony’
Image: My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic returns Saturday, March 24 to Discovery Family. Image courtesy of Discovery Family / Used with permission.
The cultural phenomenon known as My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic has been attracting audiences, both young and old, for many years, and now the eighth season is set to premiere with even more adventures for Twilight Sparkle and the Mane 6 in Equestria. New episodes begin 11:30 a.m. Saturday, March 24 on Discovery Family.
The events of the new season take place after the plot of My Little Pony: The Movie, the fall 2017 film that brought the franchise to an even larger audience. This time around, fans can expect the introduction of Starlight Glimmer’s parents and Princess Celestia’s acting debut.
At the center of the series is Twilight Sparkle, voiced by Tara Strong, one of the most accomplished voice actors of all time. When she received the call to contribute her talents to the eighth season, there was no hesitation.
“Voice actors very rarely say no,” Strong said in a recent phone interview. “This is our eighth season. This show transcends all ages, genders, all over the world. It’s just a beautiful show with great writing, songs, colors, story, and it’s really this worldwide phenomenon that speaks to people everywhere and is very strong in anti-bullying and friends standing up for each other. It’s quite an extraordinary, unique opportunity.”
When Strong was a little girl, she loved the My Little Pony franchise, which is celebrating its 35th anniversary. She used to play with the pony toys, and now she has come full circle by voicing the main character on the TV series.
“This show is completely different,” she said. “It’s all new characters. It’s a whole new world that was envisioned by Lauren Faust, who I worked with on The Powerpuff Girls, and this is the world that she created as a little girl. I didn’t really need to learn much of the history of it. I just needed to learn everything about her version. She actually came to my house when she had conceptualized it, had drawings of Equestria, the characters, and asked if I wouldn’t mind laying down a few different characters in my home studio, which, of course, I said yes to. She famously said as soon as she heard me do Twilight, she knew that I was going to play her, Twilight, so that was very special.”
Strong’s voice acting credits are numerous. She voiced Dil on Rugrats, Bubbles on The Powerpuff Girls and Timmy Turner on The Fairly Odd Parents. Each of the projects she has worked on came with specific directions on what the voice should be.
“You get a drawing of the character and a show bible, and then you kind of have to think how those creators would want that character to sound,” she said. “Then you give it your best, and often it’s [the first voice] that you go with it. But a lot of times you have to be prepared to play around and change the voice, even age up by a year or two. Sometimes it’s like, ‘Now we want it to be a boy. Now we want the boy to be from England, and now we want it to be a girl with no teeth.’ So as a voice actor, you kind of have to be prepared to be their Silly Putty.”
Strong is a common presence on the convention circuit, and My Little Pony fans certainly show up in throngs to greet her and spend time with other like-minded devotees. Many of the fans are adults, including men called Bronies, and Strong welcomes them all.
“It’s always nice when you hear people say, ‘This show brings my family together,'” Strong said. “It’s so nice to watch it with the family. I love meeting the families at conventions. They are all different ages, super sweet. A lot of them say, ‘This show helped me get through hard times, through a divorce or through illness.’ There’s all these really cute Army guys that paint Pinkie Pie on their tanks and sing the songs to get through hard times. It’s just an amazing thing to be a part of.”
When actually recording the episodes, Strong is generally able to work fast. Normally she takes care of four to seven episodes per day, and she records her voice without the other actors in the room.
“I prefer to work with the other actors because the way they read things is going to dictate how you answer, and it’s always fun to hear how a certain actor is going to do something,” she said. “And then you get to play off them. It’s always way more fun besides from the fact that most voice actors are just fun people in general. … If you’re not hearing them, it’s a little bit more challenging. With that said, if you’ve been doing a show a long time, you can sort of guess how someone’s going to do it.”
As far as keeping the many characters in her head all sorted out, that’s not a problem.
“Once you create a character, they sort of live up in your brain,” Strong said, “and they come down to play whenever it’s their turn.”
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic returns with new episodes 11:30 a.m. Saturday, March 24 on Discovery Family. Click here for more information.
