My Extraordinary Achievements - Chapter 256: One Person, Seven Roles
“Wooo, it’s coming!”
If you asked whose performance Professor Di was anticipating the most during the annual show tonight, it would undoubtedly have to be Meng Fan’s.
Not to say that the other actors were weak, but more because Meng Fan’s performance had been full of surprises; he was also very talented.
Based on the voice acting category solely, she couldn’t think of anyone else who could rival this young adult. Regardless if it was based on skill or emotion, he had been spotless. Most importantly, he had a versatile voice as well.
She’d been in the voice acting field for decades and had seen the golden age of production in progress. She’d seen all the kinds of strange and whimsical voice actors in the industry since she began producing, but she’d never seen someone so versatile and as well rounded as Meng Fan; he could even do a female voice!
His female voice didn’t just specialize in one range either; he did all types, too!
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And naturally, his voice was persuasive.
To Professor Di, Meng Fan was definitely the shining star of the annual performance. His performance would even take attention away from the heavily promoted celebrity guests who were attending.
To be honest, amid her anticipation, she was also wiping away sweat for the previous champion. She prayed that the TV crew would be merciful during post editing; otherwise, the audience will easily think the last champion was a poser. Even if everyone knew Meng Fan was a guest contender, it’d be hard not to make comparisons.
At this time, a scene had been projected at the main stage. The screen was split in two: one side being a clip of Meng Fan in the dubbing room, and the other showing the clip from “The Message.”
“This was a password intercepted by Huang Jun this afternoon.”
In the movie clip, the character played by Wang Zhiwen appeared with a cigarette in his mouth as he spoke. At the same time, the audience could hear a super textured voice that was incompatible with the character. It was very similar to Wang Zhiwen’s normal voice.
Following this were two more phrases. They weren’t very powerful, but even then, it demonstrated his skill.
They had played this scene because the original segment was too long and had to be clipped. Immediately afterwards, the role played by Alec Su came on, the voice dark but soft. “That’s funny. Aside from Captain Li, none of these people are professional telegraphers. What are you doing here? Getting screen time in a hot movie?”
The camera finally pointed at Alec Su after Meng Fan uttered the sentence. To the audience, this counted as them matching the voice to the person. It also made their eyes light up.
One person playing two roles?
This was something that everyone was eager to see.
During the peak of their anticipation, Wang Zhiwen and Alec Su’s dialogue ended, and the two voices immediately transitioned to a third voice.
Suddenly, Zhang Hanyu’s charming and magnetic voice was heard. “Does our military know about this?”
The audience didn’t have time to react before the camera panned back to Alec Su. The complete opposite of Zhang Hanyu’s voice came on again, gentle but dark. Then, it switched again to another voice that reflected Ying Da’s tone.
Every time he transitioned, he would leave no clue. And the final result wasn’t just a voice that matched the role: the script was exactly what the characters would feel, with his emotional performance also on point.
People didn’t have to guess whose voice it was. As soon as you hear a voice, you’d know which role it belonged to. There was no need to guess; you didn’t even have to separate them into categories to differentiate them. He was basically imitating the original soundtrack to perfection.
The male roles bounced back and forth, facilitating the fast pace exchange of most spy movies. Suddenly, he transitioned to Li Bingbing’s character’s part. Once the icy and clear voice came on, several members of the audience stood up.
They stared at the screen on the left. Meng Fan’s mouth was moving indeed!
Li Bingbing’s lines for this segment were plentiful. Even those with a slow reaction rate could tell that Meng Fan was dubbing her!
Does the Iron Hero fit the female role?
Several people among the audience knew of Meng Fan, but they’d only known him because of the incident with the K-pop idol. Not everyone understood Meng Fan, or had bothered to check for his female voice dubbing clips when they found out he would be a guest on this show.
As for the celebrities on the external stage… Most of them were also dumbfounded.
It was easy for women to dub men’s voices, but it was way too hard if it’s the other way around! He’d nailed each character so precisely, and it sounded natural, too!
“I want to go home!”
When Zhou Xun’s slightly drunken, caustic, and bright voice came on, the audience went wild.
Two female voices! And he’d managed to separate them, too!
When Takeda — played by Huang Jiaozhu — appeared, Zhou Xun pointed in confusion: “Who’s that?”
Her drunken demeanor could be heard clearly through these two short words!
“Long time no see. No wonder you’re a professional. This is the original copy, can we begin now?”
For Takeda’s part, he first mimicked the character speaking Chinese with a Japanese accent, then bellowed out in authentic Japanese.
The scene ended here, and Meng Fan concluded his performance.
Meng Fan took off his headphones and let out a deep breath. He was a nervous wreck! His voice had been a bit shaky in the beginning, but thankfully he was able to control it.
He opened a bottle of iced cola. The other voice actors at least tried to protect their throats and would drink mineral water no matter what, but Meng Fan was not like them. In one breath, he downed half the bottle and happily burped. Only then did he feel relieved.
The audience and guests — who were surprised by Meng Fan’s voice acting — laughed, intrigued by Meng Fan’s actions.
Meng Fan was only thinking about calming his nerves and didn’t realize he was still being filmed. He wasn’t trying to get attention or be arrogant. This was quite embarrassing.
“Isn’t he incredible?”
On the main stage, Uncle Kai had an exaggerated expression of astonishment on his face as he asked his audience: “Just now, I asked everyone to pay attention. Did you notice how many roles Meng Fan was dubbing?”
“Seven!”
“Yeah, he dubbed seven roles!”
Uncle Kai gestured a ‘seven’ with his fingers and returned to his boastful expression. “He voiced seven roles in one take, and it included two female roles and two languages as well! He matched each voice to its character; this is a difficult feat indeed! It would make people inevitably think of Han Xiaoxue’s reenactment from ‘Inside Out,’ where she voiced eight roles, male and female. But in my opinion, Meng Fan’s version was no less difficult than Han Xiaoxue’s performance.”
He then paused. “Han Xiaoxue’s clip had a faster rhythm and more characters, but Meng Fan’s clip was much more complicated. However, most importantly, we are all very familiar with the seven actors in this segment, how they sound like, and what their unique characteristics are. But Meng Fan was able to make it feel unobtrusive! This is talent, ah!”
The audience nodded in agreement with Uncle Kai’s objective and rational analysis. The contestants backstage agreed as well.
“Have you not heard enough from him?”
Uncle Kai asked once again, “Do you want to hear this clip again? Then please log in…”
Suddenly, an advertisement popped up.
Then, Uncle Kai announced: “Next, please welcome Meng Fan and his ‘Classic Voice’ segment, a scene from ‘Da Zhai Men.’”
He didn’t announce it was Meng Fan’s second clip, nor did he emphasize the redundancy. This was because once they aired the episode, it would be easier to edit and trim the clips.
Uncle Kai was particularly looking forward to the next segment. State Strategist Zhang*, the annual show’s big shot director sitting with the audience, was also looking forward to Meng Fan’s performance. He also did a cameo on “Da Zhai Men.”
*’State Strategist’ refers to the famous Chinese director, Zhang Yimou
