Other Miscellaneous Superman Stuff

Exclusive Interview with Crispin Freeman

Meet New Superman Crispin Freeman: An Interview with the Actor Voicing the Man of Steel in "Justice League: Heroes".

By Barry Freiman

Superman returns to the video game world later this year in two highly anticipated new games. While "Superman Returns" lead Brandon Routh is lending his voice to the Man of Steel in EA's "Superman Returns", Snowblind Studios' "Justice League: Heroes" brings us another new Man of Tomorrow.

The Man of Steel featured in "Heroes" is brought to life by 34-year old voice actor Crispin Freeman. The Superman Homepage recently spoke with Freeman about the game which is due to be released this Fall by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and Eidos for the Playstation 2, Xbox, and PSP.

The Superman Homepage would like to thank Crispin for agreeing to do this interview, and for fitting it into his busy schedule.

A: Actually, not much. I only saw one character design when I auditioned. I actually saw more of the game once I finally watched the trailer that's now online than I ever saw at the studio.

As far as the voicing goes, what I thought was nice was that each scene with the different characters was really well written and you got to see each of the characters interact with each other in a very personal way. You could really feel the characters' idiosyncrasies bounce off of each other. I especially liked my scenes with Batman and Wonder Woman.

Q: Are you a Superman fan? What was your familiarity with Superman before "Heroes"?

A: You know, I became a HUGE Superman fan when I saw the first movie back in the 70's when I was a little kid. I thought the first Christopher Reeve movie was amazing. My interaction with Superman since then has been more intermittent, but I've stayed very involved in the world of animation and comics. I've actually been doing a lot of research on Superman recently for a book I'm writing about mythological storytelling in animation.

Q: What are your influences in finding a voice for Superman?

A: J'onn J'onnz. I'm serious. I had originally been called back for the voice of Martian Manhunter. I identified with J'onn a lot and so was aiming for his part from the start. When I was at the call back however, they asked me to read for Superman as well as Martian Manhunter. I thought, "What the hell, I'll give them my best Superman just for a lark. But there's no way I'll get cast as Kal-El." Low and behold, I got cast as the Man of Steel. It was completely surreal! I couldn't believe it, even after I booked the recording session. Then they did an interview with me after we finished recording and they asked me, "How does it feel to play Superman?" and I thought to myself, "Did you hear what you just asked me? How does it feel to play Superman? It feels amazing!" But of course, I probably answered with something much more pithy and intellectual.

I tend to play a lot of sincere characters and I think I just went as sincere as possible when I auditioned for Superman. I don't think he has a dissembling bone in his alien body, but that's just my opinion.

Q: Is this based on the animated series or is it a more iconic version of the Justice League?

A: Well, I believe the writers are from the animated series, so it has that flavor, or at least I thought it had that flavor, but it's pretty iconic as far as I could tell. I haven't been watching every episode of the series, so I can't know for sure, but the story sure stood on its own which I think is great.

Q: Are you also voicing Clark Kent?

A: There wasn't any Clark in the game as far as I could tell. It's possible that there is, and they cast someone else to do it, but no, I didn't do a voice for Clark Kent.

Q: What other voice work have you done?

A: I've done a lot of voices for animation and video games. Some of my biggest shows are "Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex" and "Innocence" where I play Togusa. Some of my more popular roles are Alucard in "Hellsing , Duskmon/Koichi in "Digimon", Alan Gabriel in "The Big O", Tsume in "Wolf's Rain", Amon in "Witch Hunter Robin", Rude in "Final Fantasy: Advent Children and Prince Turnip in Miyazaki's "Howl's Moving Castle". I also just worked on Kingdom Hearts II where I got to play both sides of the fence, both Disney and Square. I'm the voice match for Orlando Bloom so I played Will Turner in the Pirates of the Caribbean Section and I also played Setzer from Final Fantasy. One of the other big video game roles I've played is Albedo from the Xenosaga series of games. I've also directed a number of Anime series including "Scrapped Princess". You can find out more on my website: CrispinFreeman.com.

Q: Thanks for answering our questions! Best of luck.

A: Thanks again.