INTERVIEW WITH YURI LOWENTHAL

Interview with Yuri Lowenthal
Conducted by Sandra Scholes 

This interview was conducted by me back in 2009 when I worked for Active Anime and got the chance of interviewing voice actor Yuri Lowenthal who is most famous for his work on Bleach as Keigo Asano and on Naruto as Uchiha legend, Sasuke. This interview was done for the upcoming movie Afro Samurai  - Resurrection.

Active Anime had the greatest of pleasure to Interview Yuri Lowenthal Of Afro Samurai - Resurrection, who plays Jinnosuke the latest in the series which has its all star cast of voice Actors.

-Active Anime: How does it feel to be standing alongside Samuel L. Jackson, Ron Perlman and Kelly Hu? It must have felt like you had reached the very pinnacle of your voice Acting career?

Yeah, it’s kind of crazy. I’ve been fans of some of these guys for years. It’s an honor and a great pleasure.

-Active Anime: What was it that encouraged you to take on a role in Afro Samurai and play such a strong character as Jinno in the first place?

The fact that they asked me to play him. I’m only partially joking. We rarely, as actors, get to choose what roles we’d like to play. But I’m so glad I was chosen for this. Not that it hasn’t been daunting at times, facing off against all that darkness, and not to mention Sam Jackson.  But what thrilled me about getting to play him was his amazing arc as a character. He starts off as one guy and ends up in a very different, very, very dark place. Plus I got to kick Sam Jackson’s ass. And they keep bringing him back from the dead for me to play again. And he’s a twin-sword-wielding insane cyborg death machine with a giant teddy bear head. What’s not to like?

-Active Anime: Is this Afro Samurai one of the biggest challenges since doing the voice of Sasuke in Naruto, or have there been much more challenging roles the readers would like to know about?

Jinno’s been one of my biggest, but Sasuke helped me prepare to step into that kind of darkness and pain.

-Active Anime: It being originally a manga, did you get a chance to read the graphic novel versions of Afro Samurai before working on the series?

Not really. It wasn’t provided to us when we began work on the series, and I didn’t know about it then. But I have become very good friends with Bob Okazaki, the creator of the manga. He’s a great guy, and strangely enough, very goofy.

-Active Anime: How has Jinno's character developed over the course of the series for you?

Well, you have only to watch the series to have that answer, but it’s an interesting arc. He goes from protector to killer to protector again, finally finding some peace in the end. Of course, since they keep bringing him back from the dead for me to play again, who’s to say that it’s the end?

-Active Anime: Would you see this role as one of your favourites to date, or would you see there being more opportunity for you appearing in Afro Samurai in the future?

Yes to both. I hope they bring him back from the dead over and over again. I’d play him forever.


About Yuri Lowenthal:

Voice actor is just one of his occupations for Yuri, mostly known as the voice of Sasuke in Naruto, as he is also a keen author, martial artist and painter, though he has voiced many of the popular anime around including young Renji Abarai in Bleach, Pip in Hellsing: Ultimate, Joshua Lundgren in GunxSword, Daedalus Yumeno from Ergo Proxy name but a few of his characters he uses his superb voice talent to bring them to life in such a way as to make them unforgettable for the viewer.

Born in Alliance, Ohio. Graduating from the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia with honours he set out to make a life for himself in the voice acting, an industry that is fast growing and becoming more of a vocation for those wanting an acting career than first imagined.

He is co-founder of Monkey Kingdom Productions along with wife and business partner Tara Platt, a voice actress in her own right. Once they have their own production company underway they are producing Tumbling After, one of their first independent movies.
Together they provided the voices for Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 and Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 4. Yuri has voiced many of the more popular anime and video game series around.

His most popular roles aside, he finds he has made it big in the industry now that has been able to work alongside some of the best acting talent in the industry including his good self, Afro Samurai: Resurrection will be set to be a sure fire winner in the UK and with stars like him it is obvious he will continue the series as he has enjoyed his time working on it so much, this anime being one of the most interesting and comical around.