Changing the Game Eliza Schneider's Impact on Animation and Video Games

Eliza Schneider is one of the most prolific voice actors working today. In fact, chances are likely you’ve heard her voice before — even if her name doesn’t automatically ring a bell. Billed as “The Woman of a Thousand Voices,” Schneider’s influence on the entertainment industry cannot be overstated, and her impact on the animation and video game world is being felt year after year.

A modern-day “Renaissance Woman”

Schneider has been entertaining and creating since she was very young, beginning with playing violin and performing on stage from the age of seven. Her foray into voices and dialects began at a young age as well.

“My dad was a drama teacher at my high school, the School of Arts in Rochester, New York. He would always do different accents and dialects with me,” Schneider told The Western Front.

Schneider had an ear for voices, especially the intricacies of dialects and accents. Her interest in the world at large, how it sounds, and communication “translated” to a degree from UCLA as a World Arts and Cultures major — an education that would, in some ways, inform her future career and advocacy trajectory. Her college thesis was a deep dive into accents throughout the English-speaking world.

As an ear-trained violinist from a young age, Schneider clearly had a natural inclination toward picking up tone and inflection. “I was a Suzuki violin kid from age seven, and that’s an ear training method. It’s about immersion,” she told the VO Boss podcast. “Dialects, accents, language, music — it’s all sounds to me. And that study of sounds is just a huge part of my identity. It’s how I interact with the world, and it’s just kind of who I am. It’s not really a choice.”

Schneider’s particular interest (and growing expertise) in dialects and the intricate sounds of different English-speaking accents would make her invaluable in the world of animation and video game production.

A thousand voices

Schneider started auditioning while still in college, and eventually landed roles on the shows “The Amazing Live Sea-Monkeys” and the 90’s staple “Beakman’s World.” Her foray into television and her ability to do a litany of voices led to cartoon work in the mid-1990s, creating the voices for characters on shows such as “Johnny Bravo” and “King of the Hill,” shows that were ingrained in the pop culture of the moment.

Schneider’s time on the beloved game-changing animated series “South Park” solidified her cult-hero status in the animation industry. During her time on the show, she voiced the majority of the female characters, from Mrs. Cartman to Wendy Testaburger.

Video game work came naturally to Schneider, falling in line with her cartoon jobs and allowing her to explore characters with varying sounds, from “The Bard’s Tale” to “Kingdom Hearts” and “Everquest.” She has become a video game staple over the years, providing voices in varying dialects for games such as “Assassin's Creed,” “Call of Duty,” and “Harry Potter: Magic Awakened.”

Putting the work in

What sets Schneider apart from the rest of the voice world, and what has made her a sought-after coach and collaborator, is the massive amount of work she has put into researching and mastering sounds of dialects and voices and how that intersects with music. “To me, music, voice, voices of the people, playwriting, dialect, language, violin — it all springs from the same well of fascination with sound,” Schneider explained in a 2013 interview.

This fascination with sound pushed her to travel around the world studying, immersing herself, and collecting different dialects from English-speaking countries. From Singapore to Iceland and back to the States, Schneider completed over 7000 interviews. Not only did she collect the different sounds of speakers, but she also collected stories and commonalities — finding we are more alike than different.

Schneider’s willingness to put in the work and her naturally talented ear allowed her to branch out into teaching and dialect coaching, with some of her clients even going on to win Oscars. She has also taught dialects at UCLA, AFTRA, and the SAG Conservatory at AFI Hollywood. The collection of dialects that she amassed in her world travels contributed to the Internet Dialect Database that she created.

Expanding passions

Through her boundless passion for sound, Schneider has brought a new level of expertise to the voiceover world — creating a highly trained craft that goes far beyond “knowing a few silly voices” or being able to mimic someone well-known.

Her one-woman play “Freedom of Speech” was born out of her collection of voices and is now growing into a podcast. Schneider is looking to help people elevate their own voices. Schneider is essentially asking “What’s going on?” with the play (and now the podcast) serving as an archive of the answers to that one important question — each answer unique with a distinctive sound. The podcast is done in the spirit of inclusion and anthropological interest in the human experience — and their voices. “There is no ‘Us’ and ‘Them,’” she says, “‘We’ are ‘Them.’”

Eliza Schneider has made a storied career out of giving animated characters voices. Now, her passion and drive have expanded her ability to give a “voice to the voiceless.” There is no one better to do this work than the “Woman of a Thousand Voices” herself.