Yeah, Simon; it IS pretty crazy when you get a chance to sit back and think about it.
I've actually taken some voice-acting classes with some teachers in my area, and one of them happens to be Scott McNeil himself!
If things work out, I may be slated to take another workshop with him next month (I don't really know yet, depending on finances), plus I've met a bunch of other VAs as well, including Garry Chalk, Trevor DeVall, David Kaye, Gregg Berger, etc.
Then there's this funny story that I mentioned in my BotCon '05 report, when I was with Sapphire and a bunch of others Thursday night, waiting for our shuttle to drive us to our hotel from the convention center. As we were waiting, I noticed Michael, Brian and Paul Dobson coming in the center, and having met Michael and Brian before in my own area, we recognized each other when I called them out. When I introduced them to Sapph and the others, Sapph thought they were fans from another TF board, seeing how casually I was talking with them (she didn't realize they were the Dobsons at that time). You should have seen her reaction when I told her they were the voice actors.
And at the end of BotCon, I was lucky that I had Scott's cell number with me (and no, peeps, I can't give it out); I got us a chance to talk with Scott for a few minutes, each of us taking turns and passing the phone around.
It's one of those things where, while watching the cartoons and reading the comic while growing up, we could only dream of meeting the people who were responsible for creating this fandom diversion that became such a big part of our young lives. And all of a sudden, boom, here we are, having lunch with Michael McConnohie, chatting casually with Simon Furman, hanging out with Vince DiCola and hugging his little daughter, joking around with Bob Budiansky, sitting beside Scott McNeil on a plane ride back home (I'm serious!), and so on and so forth. But what a lot of people often forget, still having that psychological barrier between the "fan" and the "celeb", is that, no matter how famous or how much they're in the public eye, they're still normal human beings like everyone else. That's probably what made it easy for me to talk with them normally, instead of going over-the-top like a crazed fanboy. *shudders disgustedly*
>
Oh... does being on a Transformers DVD as a 30 minute bonus featurette count as being into Beast Wars too much?!
Looks like we both qualify for that one, chico.
Outtsyder
"We can't ignore the danger. We must conquer it."
- G1 Optimus Prime
"Power flows to the one who knows how. Desire alone is not enough."
- G1 Megatron
