TIFFANY GRANT
The Voice of Asuka

Tiffany is one of the longest standing voice actors at ADV Films. She was in their first dub production of GUY. Since then she's been Maki in BURN UP and BURN UP W, Madame President in GOLDENBOY, Chocolate in SORCERER HUNTERS, Dug Fin in DRAGON HALF, and Becky in GUNSMITH CATS. Her most popular role was as Asuka in EVANGELION and she's set to play her in the theatrical release of the series too. Tiffany has also helped out on the scripts of various ADV titles such as MIYUKI-CHAN IN WONDERLAND.


TIFFANY'S CREDITS

Guy-Double Target, Samurai Showdown, Burn-Up, Burn-Up W, Power Dolls, Bubblegum Crisis: 2040, Compiler, Dirty Pair, Dirty Pair Flash, Galaxy Fraulein Yuna, Sorcerer Hunters, New Cutey Honey, Dark Warrior, Dragon Knight, Princess Minerva, Fire Emblem, New Kimagure Orange Road, Street Fighter II V, Goldenboy, Sol Bianca, Gamera, Evangelion, Super Atragon, Sukeban Deka, Gunsmith Cats, Devil Hunter Yohko, Blue Seed, Dragon-Half

Interview taken at Project A-Kon 10, June 1999.

• HOW DID YOU FIRST GET INTO VOICE-ACTING?
  Well, I ended up hearing about some auditions in January of '94 that was the first auditions that they had. So,I just called up and made an appointment and went down there and I got cast in Guy.(Don't watch it if you're under 18.) Anyway, that was the first one I did and I've been in about 90 of them since them. So, I just keep doing it.
  
  
• ASIDE FROM VOICE-ACTING, HOW MUCH ARE YOU INVOLVED IN THE PRODUCTION OF AN ANIME DUB?
  Well, I'm not really at all. Although, I have written several adaptations from Japanese translations after we get the script polished to fit American standards. I've done MIYUKI-CHAN IN WONDERLAND, SUPER ATRAGON, TOKYO MEGALOPOLIS, DARK WARRIOR, etc.
  
  
• WHAT WAS IT LIKE DOING THE VOICE-ACTING FOR GAMERA WHICH WAS LIVE-ACTION AS APPOSED TO DOING ANIMATION?
  I'm so glad you asked! When we did Gamera, I'd been doing voice-acting for over 3 years and I was very daunted by the prospect whether it would lool o.k. or whether it would look like some bad Bruce Lee dubbed film. I didn't want it to look hokey or anything, and a lot of care was taken into so it wouldn't look that way. This was a case where we really match the mouth movements. I was freaked out at first with my voice coming out of another real person's mouth. I'm used to it when there are little animated people. But with real people, it was more difficult. I had to be convincing and sound authentic. Just the slightest little sigh and breath and little lick-smacks, and every single noise because if you don't put that in it sounds dead. It doesn't sound real. So, it was real painstaking to do it. It took twice as long as it normally did were it an animated production. I enjoyed it very much. I think it's some of the best work that we've ever done.
  
  
• WHAT'S IT LIKE PLAYING SOMEONE LIKE CHOCOLATE WHO'S A SWEET NORMAL GIRL ONE MINUTE AND FLY-BY-NIGHT DOMINATRIX THE NEXT?
  Well, she's never sweet and normal! Let's just say that she's a little bossy. Doing Chocolate is alot of fun. So far, I haven't had to do anything that required alot of depth with her. She's either kind of being silly and chasing her darling Carrot or then we have the transformation scene and my voice changes quite a bit, and then I have the S&M outfit. The fun part of that is getting to do the two different personalities in the character. Because when you usually just have one character it can be too much the same whole time.
  
  
• WHAT DO YOU THINK IS THE DEAL WITH ASUKA? IS SHE A STUCK-UP NAZI BITCH, OR IS SHE JUST TRYING TO GET THROUGH HER PERIOD, OR DID SHE HAVE A BAD UPBRINGING, OR WHAT?
  Well, it really is a rough upbringing when your 6 years old and find your mother has hanged herself! That's pretty rough. Her dad didn't care for her and her stepmom wasn't too much better. SO she had a pretty rotten life. Although she already had her college degree when she was 14, so she's a very mature person. So I think she's just misunderstood. By the way, do you think it's more that a coincidental that on the same day she's chosen to be an Eva pilot she finds that her mother is dead? Am I the only one who noticed that? Kind of an Oliver Stone sort of thing, ya know.
  
  
• WHAT'S IT LIKE DOING DIFFERENT ACCENTS LIKE CHARLOTTE IN SAMURAI SHOWDOWN AND ROSA FROM DARK WARRIOR?
  Oh, your so good that you know all these! Well, actually that is alot of fun to do different accents to different characters. Charlotte was French, Rosa had a British accent as did Avatar from SUPER ATRAGON. I did a sort of British girl in RUIN EXPLOERES. Of course, Asuka got to talk in German. So it was fun getting to do all those different accents and things I might not normally get to do and I love the oppurtunity to do this.
  
  
• WHAT KIND OF AN IMPACT DO YOU HOPE TO HAVE MADE ON THE ANIME INDUSTRY?
  Well, I just hope that people really enjoy it and that they're tuning into English versions of things and thinking that its not so bad. And that's all I really hope, that they kinda like it and appreciate it that we're doing our very best to make a good product. We do want it to be good. We don't want to just go in there and phone it in. I just hope they enjoy it.
  
  

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