Futurama Voices Could Be Recast 260
Svippy writes "According to reports surfacing on the Internet, Futurama may be recast. The animated series is due to return next year on Comedy Central, but may not be the same as we once knew it. 'As part of the announcement, the show's producers said stars including West, Sagal and DiMaggio had all signed on to return. Turns out that wasn't true. The stars had all expressed interest in returning. But with the budget for Futurama dramatically slashed, the salary offers came in well below what the thesps were asking.' Phil LaMarr posted 20th Century Fox's request for auditions on his Facebook page. However, some are skeptical about whether it's a real casting call or purely a stunt to reduce the salaries of the voice actors."
Other articles worthy of reading (Score:5, Informative)
I want to point people to the following articles as well:
Both making very compelling cases.
Comentary (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Comentary (Score:5, Informative)
Not to mention that Billy West - especially - and John DiMaggio have mentioned in numerous interviews how much they care for that show. Billy West once stated it was "the best gig he ever had [tv.com]".
Would they really risk the entire show for some money, when they care so much for it? Of course not. I am personally beginning to suspect this is not a trade negotiation issue, but a publicity stunt to get Futurama on everyone's lips again.
It also puts a lot more real to Comic-Con 2009's Futurama description [comic-con.org]:
1:00-1:45 Futurama: Life or Death?!" Be a part of sci-fi history! Join executive producers Matt Groening and David X. Cohen, and stars Billy West, Katey Sagal, John DiMaggio, and Maurice LaMarche for high-stakes thrills as a top-ranking FOX executive decides live, on stage, whether Futurama will make yet another triumphant return or whether it is gone forever! The very fate of Futurama hangs in the balance! Paramedics will be standing by in case the intense excitement causes any panelists to collapse. Raucous celebration or abject despair to follow the news. Ballroom 20
Re:Idea (Score:5, Informative)
Casting notice (Score:5, Informative)
I work in the business and I saw a casting notice for this go out yesterday. Right now (if you're a member) you can see the notice on a site called Actor's Access here [actorsaccess.com] and the sides are up on Showfax [showfax.com].
Casting notices for shows like this almost never appear on a site like that (it's a step above Craigslist), so my best guess this is a negotiation tactic to convince the cast to accept contracts that pay less, in line with the reduced budget for the show.
Re:Comentary (Score:5, Informative)
With very rare exception, television shows are renewed in public and cancelled in private. Since this is a VERY public thing at Comic-Con, the conclusion is foregone. If the cast were fired live on stage, agents would be filing lawsuits on behalf of their humiliated clients within seconds and the executive would be lynched in the hallway. The audience, who would obviously be ticked off, would resent FOX. Why send an executive on a PR mission to intentionally piss off your viewers and draw the ire of the SAG?
So, here's the result: Everyone makes nice, and the show is renewed with the original cast. There might even be a movie deal to up the ante. If there was any doubt about this, there would be no Comic-Con thing at all.
Nothing to see here. Publicity Stunt. Move along.
Re:ob (Score:5, Informative)
I love how the 'goodnewseveryone' tag is being negated - and replaced by 'badnewseveryone' - by people who obviously don't understand that the phrase is supposed to be ironic and prescient of bad news.
Hand your nerd cards in at the door, please. You know who you are.
Re:if someone knows the amount (Score:5, Informative)
20th Century Fox Television claims the voice actors wanted 75,000 dollars per episode. Which is apparently close to ten times as much as usual.
According to whom? The Simpsons actors reportedly earn $400,000 per episode. [telegraph.co.uk] Sure, $75,000 might be ten times what a voice actor earns for an episode of an afternoon kids' cartoon, but we're talking about a prime time show.
Re:Speech-to-text (Score:3, Informative)
At this point it's still cheaper to pay high quality voice actors than it is to replace them with software. We have the technology (heck we have software now that can decompile individual strings on a guitar (inside a chord, no less), voices and other instruments and retune the individual notes, remove, add or modify guitar riffs, choruses, bridges etc - google Melodyne or "direct note access" or just watch this video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFCjv4_jqAY [youtube.com]), we just need a person and time to write the program. It doesn't have to be perfect, it just has to be convincing. Eventually it'll be cheaper to use software like that than it is to pay real voice actors - eventually 3rd rate cartoon shows will use/buy voice/vocabulary libraries for entirely new series, just the same way sitcoms have been using the Red Skeleton Laugh tracks for decades [wikipedia.org].
Re:Idea (Score:1, Informative)
*Matt Groening comes up with Futurama. After a series of battle that he describes as "by far the worst experience of my grown-up life," Fox runs it for a while.
*Fox cancels it.
*Adult Swim picks up reruns at low cost, following the same formula they did with Family Guy. They don't fund anything new.
*Comedy Central helps produce four new movies, and airs them.
*The movies do well enough that they decide to pick it up for another season. However, this season is on a basic cable budget, rather than a network or movie one.
There was no "swap."
katey segal doing just fine. (Score:1, Informative)
She's in "Son's of Anarchy", plus she's married to a producer, and the MWC royalties come in. Trust me, she isn't hurting for spending money or worrying if she'll miss the next slashdot dupe because the IP bill is overdue.
Re:Speech-to-text (Score:3, Informative)
Re:ob (Score:3, Informative)
Are you sure that wasn't "Bad news, nobody"? Why even say anything and risk your nerd card?
Re:So how are they going to explain the new voices (Score:4, Informative)
Bewitched switched "Darrin Stephens" from Dick York (1964-1969) to Dick Sargent (1969-1972) and did well. Even spun off a few shows and cartoons.
Man, am I dating myself.
Re:Speech-to-text (Score:4, Informative)
I believe it is Season 10, Episode 1 (The Return of Chef). http://www.southparkstudios.com/guide/1001/ [southparkstudios.com]
This was after Isaac Hayes quit in a huff over SP's treatment of Scientology. The SP boys made a fairly nice "send-off" episode, but since Hayes had already quit, they used the library of his voice clips to do this episode. It is hilarious!
Re:voices (Score:4, Informative)
Anyway, although it does seem that [Joss Whedon's] involvement, while not lowering quality imho, does seem to doom some shows. Why is that?
If you listen to what fans are saying about Dollhouse, a lot of people think the first few episodes were pretty mediocre - one fan said the first five episodes were like five different pilots. But then things started to improve, and by the end of the season the show was absolutely great. Alan Tudyk's performance in the last two episodes was brilliant.
Now look at the ratings. The first few episodes did pretty well, but then the numbers start going downhill, and the final episode got the worst ratings of the season.
If Joss' involvement dooms a show, it's not because he lowers the quality. It's because the majority of the audience would rather be watching Friends reruns.
Re:ob (Score:2, Informative)
Didn't he say: "Bad news, nobody, the super collider super exploded...". You had also better hand it over.
IT Guy (Score:1, Informative)
I've started a petition for anyone interested in signing! http://www.petitionspot.com/petitions/futuramarecast/