Interview with Tristan MacAvery

Interview with Tristan MacAvery
The voice of Danbei Hayami

Tristan is best known for his role as Gendo Ikari from Neon Genesis Evangelion. In addition to being a voice actor, he has also written and directed several English language dubs for ADV Films, including Princess Minerva and Galaxy Fraulein Yuna. Since parting with ADV in 1999, Tristan has pursued many creative endeavors, including publishing his own horror novel Divine Intervention.

Conducted 5/7/2000

Your comments on your character Danbei...

Danbei isn't complicated in the same sense as, say, Gendo Ikari from NGE, but Danbei does have his complications. On the one hand, he's an Elder (very old, in fact -- kept alive all these decades by the cyborg implants), and as an Elder and sensei, he's supposed to be wise, calm, bold, and unafraid. On the other hand, he's a NUT! Which is the part I like most, and so I tended to play him with more comedy than not. I would like to think that he is one of the "Laughing Buddha" types, who would teach more through humor than through pain. He's the sort of guy who'd start telling bawdy stories if you got a little saki into him at the right moment. Ya just gotta love him!

What did you enjoy the most about playing Danbei?

Perhaps I'm being repetitious, but the humor quality was very important to me. That gravelly voice was very hard on my throat, so the compensation was to give "all" to the character and make him as boistrous as the director (Matt Greenfield) would allow. Danbei is the sort of character who actually improves by going just a little "over the top," and that's always fun to play. You know how outrageous "Who's Line Is It Anyway?" can get? Improvisation is crazy because of just how far off the diving board actors will jump. When you can get a character who has that quality as well, it's a joy to portray. (You can't ad lib as much as you'd like, due to the restrictions of the scene already being animated and plotted, but it's still great fun to go a litle crazy.)

Which is your favorite scene in the entire series?

I'll probably be branded as a "Totally Tasteless Jokes" reader, but the lines that I particularly enjoyed (at least that springs right to mind) came in the first episode. Danbei tells Chokkei to pull the string on his backpack. "Like pulling your finger?" Chokkei asks. "No," I reply, "this will do even more damage." The deadpan delivery was what made the joke work, and the animation "cooperated", since Danbei has an intensely serious look on his face. I must credit the inspiration for this line to director Matt Greenfield. I confess I thought it a little tasteless at first, but it just plain worked so well...

My favorite scene with Danbei is in volume 2 when he catches Akakabu peeking at Honey in the shower, competes with him for peeks, then both are confronted by Daiko. Your comments on that scene...

My initial response is, "Hey, I'd peek too!!!" Then again, I don't get out much... What makes the scene work is not just that everyone wants to peek, and that everyone is talking over everyone else, but that at the end of it, Daiko jumps in and strips-off herself, wreaking havoc and pandemonium that just won't quit. (Poor Daiko -- c'mon, fellahs, she's cute too!) I wish this scene had been performed with all of the actors present; this would have given us the chance to talk over each other in truth rather than piecemeal. For example, at the end of "Galaxy Fraulien Yuna," I managed to have the "catfight" scene, with Yuna and Yuri yelling at each other, with both actresses present, and they were able to play off of each other and call each other names in response to each other. Made a lot of difference. In the "Daiko scene," it would have added a very important level, I think. (sigh) You can't go home again...

Were there any difficulties in writing the ADR script?

Confession time: My name is in the credits as the ADR writer, but that isn't quite true. Director Matt Greenfield reminded me almost daily that this work was by Go Nagai, who is held in such reverence by ADV that one would think that the original script would have been written upon golden tablets. ADV no longer had computer files (documents) of the subtitled scripts, so I sat at a computer and literally copied what was on the screen in order to have a starting place. However, as Greenfield kept harping on the sanctity of the original, I became fearful of changing a single word. As a result, I ended up simply giving to him an exact copy of the subtitled script. This means that any changes, ad libs, references, or whatever came almost exclusively from him as he directed the roles. So in truth, I suppose, I didn't really write the thing at all. Sorry, folks. I wrote a lot of other stuff, but this ain't one of 'em.

Your comments on the Cutey Honey series overall...

Creative, entertaining, and fodder for any number of modern or "classical" humor references. What I really wanted to do with that script, I was afraid to do. At that point, I had written few scripts, and as I said, I got a little paranoid about changing too much. That's the biggest point about this series: There's a lot of ways that it can be "adapted" to the American audience without losing the brilliance of the original work. I get the feeling that Nagai's work has that aspect throughout.

Thank you for your time Tristan.

Anytime, your dudeship! I enjoyed it.

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