Kevin McNally

How you doing out there? It's me Tiggert. I am Duc Wayne Duck.
It's me Bunkers Deep Bobcat. All right, y'all? Did is it
rate your favorite fire fly you desire? Hold the old knock gud. My
name is Jim Cummings and welcome to tuned In. All right, welcome back
to another episode of Tuned In with Jim Cummings. Today, our guest is
Kevin McNally. Thank you very much for joining us. It's my pleasure,
did well, thank you for being here. This is wonderful. Yeah,
you were just in the neighborhood and uh, I know it's one of it
and we've you know, we've met a few times recently at comic cons and
so thank you for inviting me. It's really nice. Well, I'm glad
you can make it. Yeah, it's a beautiful thing. Nothing else to
do, that's right, that's right. Well you you kind of like me.
We're con men these days, aren't we? As in conventions and con
men bye and the other and the other and all the applications apply. But
yeah, but it's it's it's fun stuff. It's a fascinating world. And
you know, I've I've got to meet some amazing people. But you of
course, I remember once sitting an opposite me were a tinker Belt, Thumper
and Bambi from the original movie, and I thought, who else gets to
meet these people? You know? And I have to say the very young
incarnations of tinker Bell, Bambian and Thumb nowadays. But yes, yes,
I've met some people. And you know that it's a nice group of people
that you keep on re meeting, and you meet in different places, and
the travels great and the friendship's great, and I love it. Yeah,
I do too. There's a there's a certain camaraderie there is. Camaraderie is
a very good word, I feel, and it's you know, you if
someone has too many people, like if William Shatner shows up and eats the
show, You're going, well, he's a really nice guy, that bastard.
I know. I fortunately never managed to have my blood sucked by William
Shatner. So but I'm sure having said that, I've opened up a whole
bag of worms. Yes, well, I hope so. And you heard
it here first. Well, of course, the thing that often happens to
me that really blows me out is that you know, I've been in a
couple of episodes of Doctor Who, both the classic back in the eighties and
Flux last year. Of course I get invited along to a lot of those,
but if there's a recent Doctor Who there, I've sort of had it.
Yeah, I'm sitting there twiddling my thumbs while they have lines around the
block, you know, right, quite rightly so, but yeah, little
things like that can happen. Yeah, that's that franchise has been going sixties
sixty years. Yeah it is. I remember because I was just turned seven
when I accidentally saw the first episode of it accidentally, like yeah, well
I tell you what happened, because it was on the radio, so that
was no TV black and white. Yes, my mum used to take me
out shopping on a Saturday afternoon. We get back in time for me to
see my favorite show, the Telegoons at six fifteen, and we got back,
and of course I was seven years old, so I didn't pay much
attention each week, and he said, and now a new new program,
Doctor Who, And according to my mum, I went running crying into the
kitchen saying the Telegoons, stupid doctor. She said, well go doctor,
go and watch it and see if you like. You never know, it
could be a near franchise, it could be good, and you know,
and then I was hooked for the next thirty years. You know, wow,
until today in a minute. Now, it's extraordinary. I can't believe
you were never one of the Doctor Who's Well, I share your disbelief.
Jim and I have slightly more acrimony in my I would mix. But it's
a funny thing actually about those parts, because I would love to have been
Doctor Who. But I remember once there's a very famous TV procedural that's quite
popular over here on Acorn and brit Box and stuff, and I've been in
it a couple of times. And the leading sort of the leading detective decided
to retire. So I got a phone call from my agent saying John's going
and I'd like you to know Kevin is on the short list as his replacement.
Well, I really don't enjoy procedurals very much, so I said,
to imagine, can you phone him back and in the same term of voice,
ask them kindly to take my name off that list because I couldn't.
I couldn't imagine spending six years going around saying so where were you on the
night of the fourteenth, And in what position did you find the body?
You know, I mean, I just I mean lovely. People enjoy it,
but I wouldn't enjoy being it, right, Yeah, a little too
cookie cutter? Yeah yeah, yeah, got a particularly good phrase. Well,
you probably enjoyed the challenge of the stretch the list of that. I
do enjoy that, and so I'm much more interested in playing more colorful characters.
Yes, I think, yes, And I'm sure that's the case for
you as well, with your extraordinary range of voices. I must tell you
something about the voices, actually, because I'm quite recent, quite recent to
voice acting. The way it happened was quite extraordinary. Just before lockdown,
Oh, I thought to myself, why is nobody taking full advantage of this
beautiful, mallifluous voice that I have? So I went out and I spent
I was just gonna ask that I spent a lot of money on recording equipment.
Then lockdown happened and all of the agents were being phoned up. Can
anybody record from home? And my smug little hand went up in the air.
Oh and I became a voice actor, which i'd never really, I
mean, i'd done bits and pieces. Sure, but I just did my
first cartoon. I'm on the second series of that, so really really interesting
development to have happened later in life. I know that is wonderful. And
and if I'm not mistaken, Let's see, what is the name of this
famous cartoon, the wing Feather Saga, This Wing Feather Saga. It hasn't
got huge distribution, but the people who like it love it. I'm just
hoping one day I get to replace somebody in an iconic character. I'd love
to play one of those iconic characters. Oh yeah, I agree. Do
you have a specific one in mind. Well, I'm very very keen on
all of the Looney tunes, so you know that's good. I'm not many
of them, so have had it. Well you're you're Taz the Tasmanian Devil.
Yeah, and oh yeah yeah, see see that you have to practice,
Yes, I can see that. Yeah, a lot of memorization.
Yeah, of course, the go first No, no, you got it,
that's not even the right sound. Okay, don't ever do that again,
thank you. All right, Well that's about it. Yeah. Yeah,
oh that's good. That's good stuff. Hopefully, Well we'll see.
I'm interested what recording you purchased. Oh yeah, I oh god. It's
called a pro Max. It's a little into midiory box and you can either
record on a onto a USB or you can direct it through one of those
applications on your computer. But it just stops you using crap stuff like your
phone, your phone, yeah, and putting your head under pillows and stuff.
I got a nice wrap around, right right. I mean the amount
of times I've crouched in the airing cupboard of hotel rooms, yes, surrounded
by cushions to do an audition. It's really quite undignified. The bath towels
are yeah, the bank exactly. Yeah, well I know those towels and
cushions, yeah yeah. But it's it's a lot of fun. Well.
The good thing about voiceover is you don't have to be on set. You
don't have to look good. I just to say that I did it.
This is a long time ago I used to do. Boy, should I
tell this? Sure? Why not? Go on? I did for TBS.
I was the guy Turner Broadcasting System and I was coming up next on
TBS. I was one of those guys, you know, and I just
treated it like another character because nobody really talks like this, that's true.
So I just did that, and I said, okay, I'm gonna do
it. I got naked, went into the thing and recorded a slew of
promos or whatever. I don't even remember the show, but I remember hearing
it on to mes and I go, do I sound naked? You know?
And apparently I snuck one by. Nobody knows, really, no one
knows you were naked. Well you did that, No nobody knows. It's
funny about that voice, because one of the first voice gigs I ever got
in America was announcing I can't remember what the network was, maybe c W
Donner, was it, TBS, No, it was Once upon a Time?
Oh and I so I was like, and now on CBS, it's
once upon a Time. And I listened to loads of people and that was
a very American delivery. Well, no, I want to I always try
to play American here, oh, because I don't want to just play Romans
and Nazis. So you know, I try to be American if I possibly
can. And most of the TV work I've done here, I've played Americans.
So that's good. That's good. I enjoy it as well, because
you know, you're adopting a whole new nationality, a whole new personality,
whole new voice. I love it. Oh that's great. Yeah, that's
really good. Well I've been pigeonholed. It's in any number of cartoons and
movie Princess and the Frog. I was a Cajun because when I was a
kid, I was a deckhand. I'm born in Yarxtann, Ohio, but
I moved to New Orleans at an early age, right out of high school.
And the only job I could get that I could eat that day.
I think I've said this before a few times, but was when you get
a deckhand on the river broak because they have a galley there, there's a
kitchen. You can eat food all day. So I said, well,
I'm out there, and then I discovered that I was. Even though everybody
was born in America, most of them were from Louisiana. And they dogged
like this, that's the way that they target you know it. I'm too
boy. You go there, you get that boundary bread tea and get on
back here. And I said, what the hell did you just say?
Yeah, so I picked that up, and you know, you picked those
things up and put them in the bank. And you never know, you
never know. So that guys, I must say, being in Tupelo,
Mississippi recently, which i'd never been to, I it was the first time
in my life in America and I've been coming here and working here for twenty
five years now that there were people who speaking to me. I didn't understand
what they were saying to me. It's such a strong accent. But I
was trying to get it in there and think, well, one day somebody
might ask me to be from Missisis you know, so I've got a little
voice print now. Yeah, that accident one of my favorite things. And
it was Tennessee Williams wrote it. Oh gosh, which one was it?
It was Orson Wells was in it? Michael Kine and it was my favorite
thing. Oh what is the name of it? It's very famous movie.
Anyway he was was it Orson Wells or anyway? It was Michael Kaine?
And he said, well, I don't know about yowl, but look at
here, yoell oh, I got it down and offhead. Enough of this
yowl. And it was it was just major mad enough to smack your grandma.
I know. I wanted to see that you've got to remember that for
the end of that. Well it was a Tennessee Williams. I have never
ever seen Michael Kine attempt any accents other than his ingrained Cockney accent, which
is fantastic. Yeah, but the idea of Michael kind of going, you
know what they say down there, yo, not a lot of people know
that. It might be quite interesting to watch. Yes, it is,
it is. I wonder if Orson was trying to do a Southern accent too,
I know, was he just trying to sell my wine? Yes?
Probably, So it was either Orson or or oh gosh, I can't think
of that. He weren't on air. I would be looking it up now.
Yeah, we're in a bar. I'd be like this. Yeah,
well shit, yeah, I can actually watch it on Aline. It's great.
Ye. Well we'll be in a bar soon, so yeah, exactly.
Well yeah, well the mystery will be closed for too long. So
this is one of my favorite things. We were talking about it earlier when
Chris Farley from Saturday Night I met Paul McCartney. He said, I can't
remember the exact intes, so he goes, so, anyway, you're Paul
McCartney and everything right, Paul goes, yeah, that that's that's what they're
telling me. He goes, you are a beetle. Oh yeah, yeah
it was, it was that was a beetle. What was that like?
He goes, that was good and that was it. He goes, Wow,
so brilliant. It's very good. Paul McCartney by the way, Oh
yeah, we don't know. I like Paul's was this great? Oh yeah
yeah yeah, well every every American has. That was our first introduction to
to the end. Yeah yeah, not to England or Cockney or any Cockney
everybody. I mean, I've been doing Coartney since I was a month old.
Really, but Liverpool, I hear. I've never seen it because it's
probably white. Now. The first time the Beatles appeared in the America,
they were introducers and now Cockney rock band the Beatles. Oh really, John
was furious, I would think, because it's the exact opposite of that.
There's a great story about the rivalry between the Beatles and the Kinks. Actually
they did it. They did it. The Kinks supported the Beatles in the
sixties and they got Ray Davis got on the lift and John Lennon was there
and they're all messed with John No, and John said are you Ray Davis
from the Kinks? And he said, yeah, yeah, I am,
and he went a word that we don't use here and got out years later
rhymes with runt. Yeah yeah. Years later, Ray Davis is going to
rent an apartment in the Dakota Building and he gets in the lift and John
Lennon gets in and John looks at him and says, are you Ray Davis?
And he goes yeah, and John says sorry about the other night,
the other nights like forty years. Yeah, that's a good one. Yeah,
Cracker, that is a good one. Is there any Have you ever
met any of those four lads? No, sadly not. And what happened
to me, it's a personal te is when we did the fourth Pirates of
the Caribbean film, Paul McCartney was in it, and they didn't tell anybody,
and so I just found out the next I was talking to Johnny Depp
and he said, guess who I was working with yesterday? I said who?
I said, Paul McCartney. I said, didn't you tell me come
down and send a note to Paul McCartney. Yes, I know. No,
I never got a chance to meet anything maybe this time for Paul and
Ringo. Yeah, yeah, oh god, well, you know, I
do have while we're on the subject, I do have a little story.
I used to be a musician still there, I guess in New Orleans,
and uh, we we were fairly popular. Band name was Fusion. Nobody
cares. But we would go on Saturday mornings or Friday mornings whatever and hang
around at the local rock and roll music store where they sold the guitars and
drums, symbols and everything, because we're waiting for people to recognize us and
know, you never know. And so we're hanging around the office of the
fella there and uh, and he's sitting there fiddling with the bass, you
know, and he's and I noticed that he's playing it upside down because he
was right handed. And I said, uh, and that's that's a left
handed bass that you're playing is Oh, yeah, well, Paul's left handed.
And there was a fellow that worked there named Paul Williams and I said,
no, he's not. And he plays a rickenbacker. And he was
in this horrible show band called the New South or something, and they all
wore vests and had big wide mutton chops and you know, very dated.
And I said, no, no, he doesn't. He goes, oh,
he's been playing playing bass all his life. He's you know, he's
and he's recording. Actually, what do you mean he's recording what tia yellow
ribbon around the old oak tree. I think it's been done And he said,
no, no, no, over at Saints Studios. He's recording a
new album, a new album. Oh so he's recording a new album.
How about his first album? No, no, he's had many, many
albums. And I go, okay, well that's ridiculous. I gotta go.
You're you're on crack or whatever, you know. And he picks up
this this case and boom puts it down. And it's got LaGuardia insured insured,
New Orleans International Insured insured and he's putting it. I said, what
the hell? Why did he buy this overseas? He said, oh,
I'm sorry, this is Paul McCartney's base. We're fixing, fixing the intonation,
I said, And I grabbed it from it, and I swear to
you, I turned it around like this and rubbed my head on the forehead
from top to bottom on the strings, just because I said, I'm going
to steal some magic. Yeah, it didn't work. Didn't do a damn
thing. To choose another comper except defaced pause. Yeah, pauls probably watching.
Yeah, of course he is a great fan of mine. And yeah,
yeah, so sorry Paul wherever you are. Sorry, Okay, I'm
done. That's spent. That's once I got my Yeah, and that that
will be that. Ye lovely, So what's the The next thing? Is
you're on the road again? No, I finished being on the road now,
And what I'm hoping to do is I made a wonderful feature film with
the brilliant Diane West and she played my wife, and it's a prequel to
Rosemary's Baby, and we're gonna I'm gonna go back to England and launch it
there. It's really you know, I get to play the old Satanist from
the film and it's really really enjoyable. Apart from that, I don't know
what the next project is, but it will be my favorite. I'm sure
yes it will. Yeah, well, this one's going to be my favorite.
Are you going to know? All I can remember is it was the
first time that I ever saw a man with a pierced ear on film.
And is that the fellow, you're playing that you have a yeah, and
and somebody noticed it. And during Rosemary's Baby, because it was so very
long ago, that was a rarity. You never saw that. Yeah,
and I forget it was a mea faroh summity, John, I don't think
it was my character. I hopefully we would have picked up on that.
But if we have, I'm going back and saying, you go to c
G I PSD. Yeah, I should investigate that. What else I'm on
to looking up? Oh yeah, Michael Kaine doing a Southern accident. Michael
Kaite. Yeah, your cat on a Hutton roof. Oh well there you
go there. Yeah, i'd had to come to me. Thank you for
the jar. Yeah, the smack to the back of my head. Never
know that works every time. Yeah, exactly right, Brandon, exactly.
You know, Kevin, I'd love to hear your story. You told me
four about you should tell you our listeners, the An Eastwood story, the
one that's not for kids. Oh yes, yeah. I was working with
a very dear friend of mine, Toby Toby Stevens, who is Dave Maggie
Smith's son, really nice chap, known him for years and I was doing
a job with him, and I'd just seen him in a film called Space
Cowboys playing a young Clint Eastwood because he physically looked quite like him, but
they chose him even though he was British. So I said, oh great.
You know, did you get any tips from Clint about how to be
a young Clint Eastwood? He said. I braved it up and I went
at the reads and I said, Clint, can you give me any tips
on how to play the young you? And Clint said, yeah, sure
kid, He said, whatever you say, whatever you do, just be
thinking fuck you. That's how you play me. And you look at him
and you go, that's absolutely right. Yeah, because he can say,
Hi there, how are you doings across? Oh good, Yeah, it's
a lovely story. Yeah, that'd make a good tattoo. Yeah, whatever
you do and whatever you think, whatever you do and whatever you say,
just think fuck you. Yeah. You developed the US accent? Was it
an easy one to pick out? What is the most challenging accent to try
and pick up? The interesting thing is I started out in theater doing New
American plays and it was at one point that a friend, an American friend
of mine, came up to me and said he said, listen, Kevin,
you're doing these plays from all over America, and you always use a
New York accent. He said, You've got to You've got to find another
accent. So it was that point that I was then about to do Glengarry
Glenn Ross playing Ricky Roma in the West End. So I purposely tried to
learn a Chicago accent. And I found out that learning a Midwest accent is
a great starting place. But the advantage we as English actors had was that
we grew up totally immersed in American movies, which isn't the case the opposite
way around. So I grew up just with the movies. Those are the
accents I heard, and when we played in the playground, we played in
you know, varying degrees of competent American accents. But so it's been with
me all my life, really, and I certainly I tell you what I
did find challenging. I played a role a few years back of a guy
from Boston, and I had to work really hard on that because I found
it immensely difficult to earn a Northeast Coast accent that wasn't New York yet.
Yeah, you're right, about that. That's a it's a mish marsh.
It's really tricky. Yeah, I agree, there's very strange ours in it
as well. Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, trying to conjure it ver
well. I'm fascinated by ac since. In fact, I was appalled by
our Prime Minister in England the other day, who is, as you probably
know, a very wealthy, posh millionaire. He's always claiming that he came
from a sort of a poor background, and so somebody said to him,
so, why do you talk so partial? He said, well, my
parents told me if I wanted to get along, I shouldn't have an accent.
And I thought the very idea that you think you don't have an accent
when you talk like this is just ludicrous and shows a real ignorance about culture.
You know, Yeah, it sure does, really does. He thinks
he is the neutral start for all cultures. Arrogant to say the very least.
He should have went straight to Cartney. He should have done and then
said you're all at the end. Hello, I'm governing you all, and
I'm doing it very badly. Jim, what's your favorite British accent? My
favorite British as probably Liverpool Yeah, who's that little old man? Then?
Yeah, they're very clean, isn't he? Yeah, it's very clean,
very clean. Yeah, And I always tried to figure around why are they
saying then when? Because you know, who's that little old man? Then
when? Then? You know, I mean what does that mean? Yeah,
no, it's a weird one. It's weird. You get a lot
of that though in the Liverpool accent. I grew up in a place called
Birmingham, so I do a perfect Birmingham accent as well. And my family
is Irish, so my Irish is pretty perfect. In fact, the greatest
compliment I ever gone was I went over to Ireland to play an irishman.
I was very glad that they cast me as that that happens less and less,
but the lighting cameraman I thought, well, I'll keep the accent the
whole time because I really I've got to be perfect. I'm with a lot
of Irish actors and I know them very well and I don't want to,
you know, pop out and they're thinking, why is this brick playing an
Irishman. So about a year later, I'm back in England doing a British
film and I lighting cameraman comes over and is watching me, and he comes
up to me at one point and says, Kevin, I've got to tell
you, your English accent is fucking terrible. That's better than a compliment.
It's better than a compliment, isn't it. That really is Yeah, fucking
terrible English accent. Well I got it from my parents. Yeah, blame
them and where I grew up. Yeah, that's good stuff. It's good
stuff. Yeah, you can't beat that. You can't. Wow, Well,
your parents are responsible for your Gibbs voice, right, yes, absolutely,
because I mixed well, there are four people responsible for my Gibbs voice.
My dad's Irish accents, my mother's Bristol accent, and Dublin and Bristol
were the two major pirate ports in the eighteenth century. But also my favorite
comedian is a guy called Tony Hancock, and he used to do an impression
of Robert Newton in Treasure Island, and he would do it really over the
top like that. So I sort of mixed all four together and came up
with and slap me thrice and hand me to me, Mama, it's Jack.
That's what I came up with. Wow, I almost knew what you
said. That's really good. You've done this before, oh man. I
remember the first time I was ever over to Great Britain, did a tour
of all the countries and you know, and you sit there and from America
you know everything. I mean, you go to Texas and it takes you
three days to just drive across the damn thing. And I remember hearing that
David Niven say, well, you know, it's impossible to get two hundred
miles away from the ocean when you're in England. Wow, that's because England
has such a Britain has such a giant footprint on the earth, and I
suspect it's because of their location. If you had to go anywhere, I
mean, it's the gateway to Europe, and you used to do it by
water. So if you own that gateway, you own everything. And here
they are, and there's four countries there, there's Whales or Scotland, there's
you know, and I've got wait a minute, yeah, and I'm going
in Ireland obviously. Yeah. And it's just but it's very funny because growing
up, you know, since I've lived here a lot, and particularly at
the conventions, people say I just drove six hours to get down here just
to get your autograph. And I think that's really nice if you think you
very much. But the idea that you're hop in your car and drive for
six hours. When I was a kid we used to go on a holiday.
It took about one hour and forty five minutes. My dad either would
be food in the car, there would be water, he would he would
have he'd been under the hood for an hour. Yeah, you know,
no stopping. It was like that was a major journey. It was to
get to the coast. Sure, sure, yeah, wow, that's so
true. Now did you go down where? Was it not? Not?
Where'd everybody go at the south of England for the for the ocean? It
was, well, it depends Brighton. Brighton, that's right, is the
major go to coastal town for London. Certainly. I started my career filming
a TV show called Poldoc in the seventies and we filmed that in Cornwall that
I've never been to. And that's a beautiful place to go. Well,
it's a beautiful place. It's described as a very boring picture in a beautiful
frame. That's because it's fantastic coast and then it's just more Michael York was
from there, I believe, right, I think he was. Yeah.
I worked with him once. He went on and on about it, and
I just had my first trip to England. So he was very, very
excited and did you go to store on the Wall And I said, yes,
I did, and he goes, okay, then you were there.
Yeah, so I got credit. Well, the other way around for me
is that English people are very ignorant about the United States, and you know,
they'll say, oh, what's weird because Americans are too well, well
there is some truth in that, but they you know, they'll say,
they'll say, so, what's America like? And I said, well,
it's like asking what Europe's like. So you know, yeah, many different
places I've been to America and I always go, let me guess Orlando.
Yeah, that's where I went. Yeah. Yeah, so it's the main
place people go. Yeah. Yeah, so it sounds like cartoon characters,
Yeah, very much. Yeah. Well I have a question for you,
Kevin. Yeah, going back to mister Gibbs, I heard a story that
you initially weren't even going to go to the audition for that role. Is
true, that's absolutely right? Yeah, can you tell that story? I
had been going up for roles in America movies for ten years and I never
got them, and I just it was a waste of time. And it
was my birthday and I was sitting in the back garden sunny day with some
friends, getting drunk basically, and one of them said, aren't you supposed
to be going to an audition for a film today? And I said,
yeah, but it's an American film. I'll never get it. You know,
it's no good. They said, well you should try. You know,
it's a ticket in the lottery. And I said, well, it
doesn't mean I'm drunk now, and the other friend said, as far as
I remember, it wasn't it for a pirate? I said yes. He
said, what, it doesn't matter how bloody drunk you are, drive you
come on, I'll drive you. So I went along and got off of
the park the next day. So, wow, I'm really glad that they
made me that they made me go, that's not bad now. The thing
that had really pissed me off before was that I was on a bus going
to an audition for Spider Man to play the Green Goblin, right, And
I actually got off the bus and came home because I thought this is adiiculous.
And I actually said to a friend, whoever the guy who played it
was, I said, I bet they get that guy to do it,
And sure enough, a week later it was Willem Dafoe gone role. You
know, I mean, I I know that, you know I'm going to
choose William Dafoe to play the Green Goblin over me, But they weren't going
to choose William Dafoe to play mister Gibbs over me. So that's right,
glad, I went, Yeah, that was a career, right, Oh
completely. I mean I had I had done what young actors should do about
three times in my life, which is a reset. And I was in
the theater in about ninety seven and I was looking in the mirror playing my
makeup, and I thought, I guess I'll never be on the back lot
of Hollywood Studio now. And I got to me all night, and I
phoned my agent the next morning. He said, I haven't done a film
in eight years. I'm not accepting any roles, but I'll do anything in
the film. And it got round and some friends. Guy put me in
Spice World, and a guy put me in a film called Entrapman, and
another guy put me in a small role in mister Bean film that he was
doing, so I was back on the list. Yeah, and that's when.
And that's when I did the Irish film with Joan Allen, so I
was working with more international people and so I started to get better parts,
and then I was on the list when mister Gibbs came up. So you
have to help yourself as well. I think you can't just drift on and
I hope things will happen. You have to see where the little holes are
or where the floors are, and how can you make that better? You
know, how can you make yourself more employable? Yeah, well that's good
advice for Yeah the folks come up. Yeah, no, absolutely, And
I liked that because more and more as I've got older over the last ten
years, I teach a lot more now. And I work with a particularly
good company called Real Scene, where I direct their final films because they come
out of it with a show, real professional photographs and a short film that
they're staring. So it's a really nice little package that they get and I
love that. They just give me a crew and a cast and a script
and they say, oh wow, shoot that, and I have absolutely comp's
lovely. It's really good time. Yeah, and last year it was great
because it was quite a big group. So we did four related sci fi
shorts, and sci fi is my genre love so much. In fact,
if I mentioned my book yet, I know tell us more. I have
written a sci fi book called Sons of Soul. Get it on Amazon,
that's all, No, Sol sol Son. Oh okay, so getting on
Amazon very cheap, very cheap. If you ever bring it to a convention,
I'll sign it for you. That won't be very cheap. But yeah,
right, I'd love to see you all. Let me see y'all.
That's right, that's right, boy. That was weird. It was as
if Michael Kaine was in the room. I have one more question for you
about Pirates of the Caribbean. Okay. I heard that during the filming of
the last Pirates of the Caribbean, the fifth one, that Johnny Depp was
kind of out of his element and had to be fed his lines through an
ear piece under his wig. Can you verify of that's true? It isn't
true. Johnny always has an earpiece under his wig because he has a man
in his trailer feeding him music all the time in between takes and the it's
really interest because if you if you go up and talk to Johnny, he'll
give a little tap, says. You get the guy to turn the music
down and talk to you, and then he's back on it again listening to
the music because he's an absolute he's an absolute whale for music. He just
eats it like fucking Plankton. You know, he's a hell of a guitar
player. Oh, he's wonderful. Yeah, he's amazing. I was very
disappointed. I got tickets to go and see him at the Hollywood the Hollywood
Vampires at the O two Arena, and I was filming and we ran over
like I couldn't get there. So I missed seeing him. But I will
get to see those people one day. I did. I did meet Alice
Cooper at a convention. He was a heck of a nice guy. I
golfed with him once, did you really? Yeah? Yeah, he golfs
out in more Park. Yeah. And he was talking a lot about golfing,
big golfing. Yeah, I know he's I remember I met him a
few times and he goes, well, people think I'm you know, and
of course he's saying this with the vampire eyes on the makeup and he goes.
People think I'm you know, Vincent Price, but I'm really more like
Fred McMurray. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm so fascinated by this
concept though, that he listens to music between takes. Is that for his
enjoyment or does he somehow use that to get into characters? I think probably
not so much getting to character, but I think he doesn't necessarily want You
can on set very often be distracted by small talk and chats, and you
will notice I notice it that when I'm on set, being an older man
now, I tend to keep to myself and I've got my iPad and I've
got stuff and I can carry them through the day. And a lot of
the younger people are busy telling stories and having a great time, and they're
exhausted by the end of the day. They don't have the energy for that
final scene. And so I think that's part of his reasoning too, that
he doesn't want to get too much involved in chit chatting, you know,
so he keeps concentrated as he keeps keeps himself distracted by the music and not
by you know, a myriad of things that people are throwing at him.
That's fascinating to me. Wow. I heard the George C. Scott was
speaking to that angle. He he would sit around smoking cigars with the crew,
playing cards non stop, nod stop right up or two and action.
Then he would take a star out and then walk on and then just be
absolutely in the scene, you know. And I was like, wow,
I mean it's like turns off a on and off a light switch. Which,
yeah, well, I remember once having the great honor of working with
Robert Duval and we had this little singing in a corridor together and it was
quite intense. And I said to it and said, I hope you don't
mind me saying, but I really thought you might be a bit more method
than this might be a more difficult day. But you seem to turn it
on and off like many other actors. And he said, tell you one
thing, kid, if you haven't got in your pocket, you can't pull
it out. And I thought, what a great piece of advice for an
actor. It's got to be there ready, yeah, you know, so
that you can just haven't got it in your pocket, you can't pull it
out. Wow. Really good, really good advice. It's very much like
a voice acting, isn't it, Jim. You can just snap into the
voices whenever you feel like it. You don't need a method, really,
do you. Yeah. Yeah, Well we're schizophrenic and we are too,
so it's it helps, you know. I've never even thought about it.
People have told me that before, and I don't. Yeah, I think
it's I think it comes from my childhood, you know. I thought mel
Blank was amazing and all these different things, and I did impressions of my
family. And one of the first things I did when I came to LA
was to go to see Meil Blank's tombstone. Oh yeah, how about that?
But talking about yeah, that's all folks, But talking to that thing
about you know, preparational being ready. I was talking to a fellow actor
about this, who works on an American show with a rather methody American actor,
and he said something very insightful to me. He said, the problem
is because his preparation is the same and very intense. His performance is completely
the same all the time. There's no variety. Can't surprise himself because he's
he's stuck there in this method. I mean, just whatever his method is.
I don't know whether it's method, but you know he's he's stuck there
and he can't do it unless he does that. So I think you should
be able to surprise yourself. That's a good way to put it. It's
a really good way to put it. Yeah, I think so. Have
you ever surprised yourself with a voice. It's not so much surprising yourself with
a voice which you look prepared, but surprise yourself with the journey through the
scene. You know that you might not have guessed that something that the other
person says makes you angry, and so you do the rest of the scene
angry with him. You might not have even thought of that until it happens.
Because what people who often get a mussed in a method do is that
it doesn't take any account into what the other people are doing, because they're
just deciding on what they're going to do in advance that they come in and
you go, well, that's true, I might as well not be here.
You know, you've just got your ship worked down. Yeah, well,
acting is a lot. A lot of acting is reacting. I think
most of me is reacting. Yeah, absolutely, yeah. Yeah. You
got to stay nimble. You gotta stay nimble. You gotta stay trim well.
I think that's what it's impact because you can't react to people in the
same room, you know. That's I think that's what's But that's where your
imagination comes in, I imagine. I think a lot of what you're saying
comes from your hit your background in theater, because you've done a performance on
stage so many times. It's kind of I don't know, at least to
me. It's the fun part where you get to play those little games within
the performance, you know, but also what the theater teaches you is to
turn up really, really well prepared. Yeah. So I always say to
my students, be well prepared and then flexible on the day. But because
those foundation that foundation work you've done, even the director doesn't like it,
once you do something totally different, that foundation work still is there for you.
You'll just go off it another way, that's all. So it's it's
yeah, that's definitely the two months awards I have for my students. Yeah,
that's that's great. And how often do you do classes? As often
as I can? I have a friend I teach it will see maybe I
direct three times a year there and in between whenever i'm free this guy who
does these classes for anybody who wants to come, very inexpensively. He'll just
phone me up and say can you do one on Tuesday, and I say,
yeah, i'll be They just tell me the venue and it's really nice.
I've got very friendly with those bunch of people, and all of them
are very much for people who work and make a living and have to try
to fit the classes in around that. So the real scene for instances only
at the weekends, and Paul will do his things at nighttime. So it's
for people who are you know, are out there. They're grown ups,
they're in the world and they want to or in some cases people who may
be retired ten years ago and think, hit, I want to go back
into it again. I'll go and take some refreshers, you know. Yeah.
Yeah, oh absolutely, well you're never You're never too old, No
exactly, Yeah, why why resire? I'll take the money. Yeah yeah,
yeah, I mean I'm not stupid, yeah, but but yeah,
no, you know, I'm still in granddads. I'm fully prepared to go
to great great granddads. I don't mind. If I live long enough,
it'll be great, no kidding. Wow, did you learn anything from Johnny
Depp working with him over across the various films. Yeah, I did both.
He and Tom Cruise I worked with in the early two thousands, and
I had always been the sort of English actor who if I made a mistake,
I stopped and started again, and I learned keep going, keep going.
There is such a thing as editing, you know, just keep going,
pick it up, pick it up a sentence back, go with it,
go with it, don't lose the energy, don't start again, and
then don't stop building up going. Oh I'm going to fuck up. I'm
going to fuck up. Just keep it flowing and going and keep reacting to
the people because the camera's picking it all up and it's all going to be
useful in the edit. Hm. That's good. I look from those two,
that's good advice right there. Yeah, yeah, well he would know.
Tom Cruisers. I think he's underrated actor. Actually, yeah, well
he's a judged actor, isn't he. Yeah he's a pigeonhole. Yeah,
he's a little he's a little too successful for people to think he's good.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's just no. He was a pleasure to
work with, absolute pleasure. What did you work with him on a film
called Valkyrie. Okay, yeah about the attempt to Yes, yeah, nice
film, Yeah, yeah, I thought so. Yeah. We were just
talking about his performance in Tropic Thunder. Oh yeah, yeah, brilliant.
Yeah, he's not a character actor. We don't get any more character than
that, No, that is for sure. Yeah, brilliant. Another underrated
movie. Just on a little tangent about tom Cruise that I thought he was
so underrated and was the Edge of Tomorrow. Did you ever see that movie?
Sci fi movie? It's one of my favorite movies all time. I
know Angela Riseberg very well. She played my daughter on stage a couple of
times, I think, and I thought that was a great film, and
you know, just a two hander. I mean it was just amazing,
absolutely amazing. Yeah. Yeah, well it's my genre sci fi as well.
So yeah, I was told you about my book. You can pick
up very cheap on Amazon. Now, what's the name of it again,
Sons of Soul. Oh, well, there you have it. Yeah,
it's almost like as a link for in the description of this podcast. Yes,
they might be. They better, Ben, Oh, that's good stuff.
What are some of his favorite sci fi films growing up? Well,
the greatest one two thousand and one of Space Odyssey, of course, A
Planet of the Apes. I'm really into hard science fiction, you know,
and my book is very much an homage to the to the golden age of
science fiction, Robert Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clark, you
know, good world building, proper science, no fantasy. So those those
are the films that I love. But I even love going back. I
suppose I got suckered into it when they were repeating all those fifties George Powell
films on un British television in the sixties, so you know, Destination Moon
and things like that was wonderfu well people. It's been put forth that Isaac
Asimov basically designed the lunar landing module when they did land on the Moon.
Yeah, in I don't remember the book, but they said, well,
you know, they had to make it as a tripod and it had to
have shock absorbing to it, just because I mean, and then people with
I don't know, twenty years later, twenty years later there was a tripod.
There was one. You know, it's landing and it's going like that
because uneven terrain, uneven terrain, you don't know what the trend is going
to be like, well, they say that science fiction always precedes science fact.
Yeah, absolutely so. I think the other great thing about science fiction
wasn't And Stephen Fry, if you know who he is, was very kind
enough to write a little bit of blurb on my book and he said,
like all great science fiction futuristic stories tell us more about today, about heroism,
love, adventure, and the world we live in today, but it
does it in a very ornate way. I think that's a really nice description
of what science fiction is. Yes, well, I'm a sci fi guy.
That was one of my Yeah. Do you know the most wonderful thing
happened when I finally got my book published and I sent it this guy and
he was a designer, And the designer came back to me and said,
I've just found out that the image of the spaceman running on the front of
the original Have Spacesuit Will Travel has just come into the public domain. Would
you like it on the front of your book? And I said, damn
straight, I would like it on the book. So that's like a link
right back to the Golden age, you know, having that image, and
it's an image you'll instantly recognize if you yes, with the rounded helmet,
Yeah, that's right, and the tanks and he's running like that, he's
running. Yes, Oh wow, that's awesome. Yeah. I don't even
use that word awesome, so yeah, because it's everyone uses it, so
I don't. Well, it's it's it's gone into the background with placement words.
Nowadays, if I sit in another restaurant with somebody saying, like every
four seconds, I'm going to thump somebody out, yeah, thank you,
I like don't like that either. I like don't like it, like like
you know, when you don't like something. Yeah, I'm like that.
Oh that's one of my pet peeves too. I can't tell you how get
a lot of that out here? Oh yeah you do. Yeah, unbelievable.
West Coast, I think is thinking yeah, exactly and your choice and
thoughts and yeah, I also am a little bit annoyed, annoyed by the
output inflection and everything. Doesn't that drive you crazy? I don't know what
you're talking about? No, do you know what I'm saying? Though not
really really, Like I'm seeing that people go up at the end of everything,
as if they're not quite sure it's a statement, but think they want
to make it a question like you know, oh yeah, somebody is going
to get their face filled. Oh yeah, god, one of my pet
peeks. That's like the Valley accent, rightly pretty much value. It is
the value, I guess, and it just drives. It's meaningless. It's
just it might as well be like saying that I'm stupid. Yeah, because
you sounded I like how whenever anybody does that accent too, you always have
to put on a female voice. You always just slightly shift into a field.
Yeah that's true, that's true. But have you ever been interviewed by
somebody who was using or speaking that way and it just distracts you to the
point where you don't even realize what they've been saying anymore if you get diferent
answered the question, have you ever had interviewers that it is so distracting with
the way they speak. Yes, yeah, I got interviewed by one guy
who, after everything I said, he'd go, oh, fair enough,
fair enough anything. Can you think of another thing to say when I've given
you answer to your question? Yes, yeah, I know it's sort of
a begrudging yeah, well that'll do sort of yeah, yeah, fair enough
boy, Yeah, that's what It's really downputting, isn't it. Yeah?
Fair enough? Are you sure? Yeah? You know what. I'm gonna
give you a minute, think about it. Yeah, get back to me.
Yeah, and then we can see, yeah, where people are just
giving us the finger on mass or what about my mother tox? Exactly like
that. Yeah, and yeah, we just last about a half our audience.
Well, you know what. Fair enough, fair enough, fair dudes,
I don't want him anywhere. You mentioned thumping people in a bar earlier,
if they speak that way. If you found any good pubs in the
in the US, well no, is the simple answer that because I don't
particularly like pubs anyway. I like a really classy bar. And whenever I
go past the bar and there's no seats at the bar, I always say
what I put my head in and I say, what a waste of a
bar, and then I straight off before they can get me. So I
really like a classy lowlit joint, but preferably playing you know, some Sinatra
piano, nice wine and then and that's the way I like to Chidren,
that's I like that. I like that. I can't There is a British
pub in Santa Monica and there's one thousand oaks, and it's one of thousand
oaks. The one what I like is next door to the British pub in
Santa Monica, and it's on Santa Monica Piano. No, not here the
main Broadway boulevards, thank you. The boulevard is not that and bad.
They've they've got a shop to it next all that sells English products that you
can't get. But of course, the one English product you can't get here
is a beef extract called bovrel. And even they're not allowed to import it
because you can import beef products between England and America. I don't know,
but we did not know that. It's true. Wow, So you're not
even allowed to import a beef extract spread. Oh wow, I didn't know
that. Learned something new that mad. I think it was probably inspired by
Yeah, when we had the mad cow disease, what twenty eight years ago,
whatever it was. It's what my wife, she's British, she still
not allowed to donate blood and a strya because she was in the country at
that point in time. Is that right? Yeah? Yeah, I've heard
that. Wow, it's extraordinary. That's not fair. Getting back to Pirates
though, Yes, has Jeffrey Rush ever forgiven you for stealing his voice?
I started it. I was first. I was first, and he turned
to me and he said, God, damn it, that's the voice I
was going to use. And so we decided. I said to him,
well, look, if anybody notices, we'll try not to speak next to
each other. And I think there was a time when we spoke and then
they gave up and just said, yeah, i've scenes together for fakes.
But I said, I always say my accent comes from the fact that my
dad's Irish and mother from Bristol, So you just say your dad's from Bristol
and your mother from Ireland, and it's a completely different accident, and that's
what he tells people. You got a down pat Yeah, very good.
Well you also played Gibbs in the games. Did you have to take a
different approach to the character when you're doing for video games because you didn't have
actors that had sort of bounce off or no. I'll tell you a funny
story about that though, because the first game came out and I had nothing
to do with it, and I thought even asked me to do the voice,
and I was speaking to a friend of mine who's a voice actor,
And I said, do you know do you know the name of the voice
actor who's done mister Gibbs in the game. He said, yeah, yeah,
he's a friend of mine. I said, have you got his number?
I said yeah. I said, will you dial it for me?
And he died it. I got the phone and I said, in my
best Liam Nissen, I said, if you do mister Gibbs again, I
will find you and your family and I will kill you all. Anyway,
the next game. The next game, they've phoned me and asked me to
do the voice. Oh that's good stuff. Oh man, okay, so
that's the key. Yeah. Violence is always the key. Yes, yeah,
violence and threats. They were threatening to replace me eons ago for Winnie
the Pooh and I said, no, I wish you would try, Thank
you. I was, I was going to ask you to do that.
It's not going to be pretty if you've never been bounced like you're getting ready
to be bounced. Don't make me light my butt. Wait, that's Ray
from Princess and yeah, right, fantastic. Well something that used to get
me kicked out of class? Was it crazy? Crazy? Crazy? Yeah?
I mean, just for the record, I had a teacher throw me
up against the locker and because I was in speech tournaments and I would do
pretty well. Yeah, you know and uh a teacher who used to date
a cousin. Mind so they lived across the streets, so she you know,
I knew him from his relationship with her. And I'm sure I was
annoying as a seven year old, and there I was as a fifteen year
old, and he goes, let me tell you something. Comings you're going
to work in the steel mail for sixty five years, then you're going to
retire and lose money on the Cleveland Browns and the Pittsburgh Steelers. Okay,
so I got you, you and your little voices. He can get out
of here. So I sort of ended up giving him the finger in a
spiritual and mental way. They said so similar amount. I had this digit
biology teacher. Yeah, and don't you find that that people down playing you
telling you to shut up and sit in the corner. Oh, you're going
to pay for that. We're going to brag. You know me, I'm
a bit of a chatterboo because you may notice us check And I remember once
you said to me McNally. McNally, you're never going to amount to anything,
now, shut up. And I remember thinking, yeah, yeah,
see that that amounts to inspiration. Absolutely, I didn't respond to you know
what if you put your head into it, if you put your shoulder to
the wheel, your nostril on the grindstone or whatever, all those cliches,
and like, no, I'll just have a sore nose. Yeah that's all.
Yeah. Yeah's blood everywhere? Yeah, the blood exactly right. Yeah,
so yeah, yeah, well you know, revenge is supposedly the best.
Yeah, it's the best. Best revenge is the best success of the
best revenge? Yeah? Absolutely? Is that what happened to you? Brenda
always? But I'm actually sitting here, you poob be follen, I'm thinking,
what would a conversation between Gibbs and Pooh sound like? That's I was
trying to vision in my head. Right now, we can find out.
Do you have a smackle of honey about you? We don't tend to keep
honey on the ship, mister Pooh, But if you behave of yourself,
I might let you have a mackerel. Later, a smackerel, you'll get
a smack. Get rude to me? Again, mister pooh, now get
back to scrubbing that deck. Ay, ay, sir, he's a good
lad Winnie. We could really take that down into a terrible, terrible place.
We really could. Yeah. I was about to go there, but
yeah, no terrible to you later in me? Can yeah? All right?
Can everybody right? That's it? All right? Oh? Good stuff?
Sort of. We on this podcast we usually do a voice swap since
we kind of just just did it here, And how it works is Jim
will do a voice or a line of one of his characters, and then
would you mind doing that same line as mister Gibbs of course, and then
we can do vice versa. Yes, I think we should start with dark
Wing. What do you think about that? Okay, sure, dark Wing
duck You might know him, you might not, but he is yeah,
he's uh, he's coming back. So I hope I didn't let the cat
out of the bag too late. Anyway. I am the terror that flaps
in the night. I am the terror that flaps in the night. Wow.
Yes, okay, So I will do one now for you, and
you've got to do it as a duck wing. Yeah, dark Wing or
dark Wing Okay, dark Wing. It is. It's my favorite line.
Slap me thrice and hand me to me mama. It's jack. Slap me
thrice and hand me to my mama. It's quack jack. Sorry, sorry,
excellence. That's good stuff. Yeah great, oh man, who has
more fun than us? Yeah? And we get paid for this, by
the way, Yeah no we don't really, but but man, this is
the stuff that used to get you kick out of class too, right Oh
yeah, yeah, absolutely, absolutely, to make people laugh. Yeah,
life is good. Yeah, the pearls of my jacket were always the first
to go get out there. Now. Oh yeah, that's true. Now
you you had uniforms and all that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I
went to what we call a grammar school, so it was old boys and
we were all in uniform and it was pretty rotten place to be really yeah
yeah yeah, especially without girls, especially without girls. Yeah that didn't help.
Yeah. Oh man, I went to one of those in fifth and
sixth grade, and I actually really liked the fact that there were no girls.
So really it was like, you're young, you know, it's like
a distraction. Yeah, you know, we could all rough house with each
other. It's just later on you think, actually we were all the girls
you know, yeah later on, Yeah, by eighth grade, you go,
you know, yeah, exactly, we could do with a girl or
too in this class. I didn't mean that to sound like Christopher Walker.
You know, you have got to understand what I'm saying to you, and
it's not misogynistic. Oh so, so what do we think are we?
What's happening in Brandon? I think I think we're pretty good Supernatural just later,
yeah, but a bit bit bit supernatural. Yeah. I was thinking,
well, I'd heard that the boys were big pranksters, and so I
thought i'd get in first. And I had a scene early on where one
of the boys was up in this you know crane off the top of a
off the top of a van, quite a small van, quite a big
crane, and he was up there and he's not very good with heights,
so I just took to booting the side of the car so he would wobble
up there and he'd be going, please stop. I'm saying, okay,
but no pranks from you guys, or this is going over. So I
thought i'd get in there first with them. But lovely guys, lovely guys.
That was on Supernatural. Yeah, yeah, And that was shot in
Vancouver, right, Yes, it was in Vancouver. Yeah, yeah,
Yeah, It's got a lot of terrain around that can be any part of
the States, so it's a really good place. Yeah, tons up there.
I actually heard a story. I worked on the crew of Arrow actually
shot up in Vancouver, and I heard a story that for pirates of the
Caribbean, they have the BC Ferries, Right, are you familiar with those,
the big fairies that shuttle you between all the islands and the Pacific Northwest,
And they had one that was out of commission. So the production bought
that ship and then they were converting it and they spent something like five or
six million dollars converting into a pirate ship up there in Horseshoe Bay, And
then they were going to do some reshoots on it, decided to not even
use it and just scrapped it was And then it was really weird because on
those reshoots they then just built the deck on land and we did it that
way. Interesting. Yeah, interesting, I'd heard that story before. But
what a waste. I mean, it blew my mind that you could go
through with that much time and effort. And yeah, it was built,
sat for two weeks and struck all within five weeks. They just incredible.
But you know, probably for a good reason. I don't know, safety,
maybe even I don't know. Yeah, it wasn't for money, No,
who knows. It could have been a tax right off. You see
how these days they're little writing off the entire movies. Entire moviesdays, you
know. Yeah, speaking of Looney Tunes, they just scrapped the Wiley Coyote.
There was a Wily Coyote live live action movie that guy in the works,
and they just completely scrapped the entire movie. Oh no, I'm sorry
to hear that. I know. It's wild to me. I was looking
forward to that. Yeah, me too. I would have been had I
heard of it. Yeah, now I miss it. Yeah. Oh well
yeah, do we get to shake hands on camera at the end. I
think we do. Well. Thank you so much, God speed and thank
you, Jim. Thanks so it's amazing. Kevin McNally, everybody, thanks
guys, you love guys. Thank you very much. Do y'all give him
the clap. It's been done, all right, Thank you everybody for watching.
That was another episode of Tuned In with Jim Cummings. Today we had
Kevin McNally Thank you so much for joining us. Please don't forget to follow
us on all social media and you can get bonus content by twosome and you
can get bonus content by subscribing to us on Patreon. Please drop a like
and a subscribe and we'll see you in the next one. Thank you very
much. Excellent work, excellent work. Notice how he didn't stop and go
back to the start. He just kept powering through because I know I took
that advice right there, he's lessens. Yeah, yeah, that's right.