Why aren't foreigners "allowed" to be voice actors?

[tokusatsufan]

Originally Posted by RealJames

One of them thought the reason foreigners aren't voice acting the foreign roles is cuz it's a shit job apparently except for the very few who make it to the top

Oh that makes sense. I suppose a considerable amount of the English speakers are Americans,and they don't think "Oh yeah blood,I'll be a voice actor! That's really exciting that is!" Not to say none of them want to do it,but in Britain we have more of a media course culture thing.

[tazzy]

meh, it happens in the west too. Look to Heroes, apparently Japanese people found Ando's Japanese quite hilariously bad (Korean-American actor).
Anime is made for Japanese who don't know the difference so they get whats easiest available.

[tokusatsufan]

You think Japanese people can't tell a Japanese person?

[tazzy]

Originally Posted by tokusatsufan

You think Japanese people can't tell a Japanese person?

Yes.
If its just their voice a Japanese can well play a foreigner and be convincing to monolingual Japanese.

[tokusatsufan]

The point I am making is,just because it happens in American stuff[and to a lesser extent usually] does not mean it should carry on. I highly doubt they don't know the difference.

And don't make some noob comment like "HEY MAN THEIR JUST CARTOONS"! There are even western cartoons with an ongoing plot,there just aren't as much.

[evanny]

well. it shouldn't be a problem to get someone who speaks english to do a small part. some probably would do it for free in an OVA or something like that.
if i was offered i would do it - well couple of lines for believability. for those small parts all you need is a decent voice. a full time character is another story.

i will be honest and say that some of the english voice work by japanese can take me out of the movie like in rainbow six (the boxer guy). still it is nothing to make a big fuss about. best one so far was in black lagoon where that kind translated from Japanese to Russian and vice versa, but the episode was dubbed by americans. on the other hand my russian isn't so good so it might have simply seemed like it.

but it certainly isn't the case of "foreigners can't". most of the americans don't speak any other languages much less japanese. and if they do they are probably among more educated crowd where plenty of other options are available.

[Ryzorian]

It probably will depend on how popular anime becomes in other countries...If it becomes a huge section of thier market they will probably look for more "local" voice actors to portray anglo types in the series. Though it's problomatice because there is a set of voice actors who do the dubbing allready.