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The Mexican Goofy who spent years misled: Mario Filio discovers the secret behind the character's voice

From El Universal · () Spanish

Translated from Spanish and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

In-depth Named sources Context piece
  • Mexican voice actor Mario Filio has voiced Disney's Goofy since 2001 and performs the character's laughs and cries himself.
  • Filio said Bill Farmer, Goofy's English voice actor, told him that the English version uses stock recordings for those sounds.
  • Filio also voices characters in Madagascar, Star Wars, The Muppets and Shrek, and appears in the Mexican animated film Gungo y los juegos cavernรญcolas.

Mario Filio has voiced Disney's Goofy in Spanish since 2001, but he does something his American counterpart does not: he performs the character's distinctive cries of joy and fright in the recording studio.

Filio said the effort took a toll because he assumed the sounds were part of the job. That changed when he met Bill Farmer, who has voiced Goofy in English for nearly 40 years.

He has almost 40 years doing it, and I asked him how he managed not to hurt himself making the 'iujujuju' sound and things like that. Then he told me he doesn't do it, but that it is a stock scream, with many recordings of the character that they use, and he only does the dialogue. I heard that and said: I'm going to charge more to do it.

· Mario FilioFilio recounted learning from Bill Farmer that Goofy's English cries come from stock recordings.

"He has almost 40 years doing it, and I asked him how he managed not to hurt himself making the 'iujujuju' sound and things like that. Then he told me he doesn't do it, but that it is a stock scream, with many recordings of the character that they use, and he only does the dialogue," Filio said. "I heard that and said: I'm going to charge more to do it."

Every week, I'm not lying, I record for the franchise all kinds of things for children. There is always a lot of work.

· Mario FilioHe described the continuing demand for his Spanish-language Goofy work.

Filio described Goofy's voice as guttural and said it requires resonance at the back of the neck. He records material for the franchise every week, much of it for children. He also voices King Julien from Madagascar, Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars, Miss Piggy from The Muppets and the Magic Mirror in Shrek.

This week, audiences can hear him as Trompo, a villain in the Mexican animated film Gungo y los juegos cavernรญcolas. The film follows a young man expelled from his tribe who must win violent games against stronger cavemen to be accepted back. Filio said the role was both tough and tender, and that working on a Mexican production brought particular responsibility because most of his work involves dubbing foreign productions. He also said his voice will soon appear in Marvel's VisionQuest and an upcoming film starring Will Smith.

Trompo is a big kid, wild but tender. Many of us actors do foreign productions 99% of the time, so when they call you for a Mexican one, it is a responsibility and it makes you nervous.

· Mario FilioFilio discussed his character in the Mexican animated film Gungo y los juegos cavernรญcolas.
About this summary

Originally published by El Universal in Spanish. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.