Canada has many talented actors, writers, directors, and other content creators. To help our industry grow, we would like to introduce you to some of those talented folks that have managed to capture that magic on screen.
This week we spoke with Vancouver voice-over artist and actor Brian Doe Chua.
You may be familiar with Brian Doe Chua’s voice as Timber Spruce in My Little Pony or Osamu Mikumo in World Trigger and many more films and TV shows.
HNMAG: Were you born in Vancouver?
Brian Doe Chua: Yeah, One of the few that stuck around. I’ve lived here my entire life.
HNMAG: When did you first get interested in television?
Brian Doe Chua: I watched a lot of cartoons as a kid. That was my thing, Saturday morning and Friday night cartoons. On YTV, they had a lot of really cool shows airing on Friday nights. When I was fourteen, I was thinking about a future career and I found out that voicing cartoons was a legitimate career path. That opened an array of possibilities when it came to theatre, on-camera work, and voice-over acting for commercials. While I primarily work in animation and video games, I do a fair bit of things outside of that as well.
HNMAG: Your primary interest before working on stage was voice-over?
Brian Doe Chua: I had a crappy desk-top microphone and some free-recording software, and I would wait for my parents to leave the house and I would just practice. I would record, I would imitate, listen to cartoons and commercials, and play around with sounds. That’s how I started down the path.
HNMAG: What kind of high school theatre performances did you do as well?
Brian Doe Chua: It was both drama and musicals. I was also in band and choir. My teachers were really helpful and supportive. At Saint Thomas Moore high school in Burnaby, my theatre teacher helped me craft my resume to get my first agent.
HNMAG: How did you decide to submit?
Brian Doe Chua: An agent came to my high school to talk about what it would take for a young person to start out in on-camera acting. I pulled her aside afterward and I asked her, “do you rep voice actors?”, because that’s what I want to do. She said she didn’t but she had a friend that did and I should send her my stuff. As soon as she left, I panicked because I had no stuff. I created my own voice sample, and sent that with a resume that my theatre teacher helped me write. A month later, I got a response.
HNMAG: What type of sample did you create?
Brian Doe Chua: It was a bit of animation, commercial, and narration. I self-produced all of my demos, and nowadays people don’t recommend that you create your own demos from scratch. This was twelve years ago and the industry was very different back then. There are even more people looking to break in today.
HNMAG: Since it was so different twelve years ago, did you submit auditions online or go into the studio?
Brian Doe Chua: It was a combination of both. I loved going into the studios to record auditions because you get to collaborate and that’s a big part of why I wanted to break into the industry. I love the creative collaboration – that is really important to me. When I was starting out, there were more self-tapes because casting only had so much time and they would bring in actors they already knew. That being said, my booking ratio was a lot better in person than through self-tape.
HNMAG: How long did it take before your first booking?
Brian Doe Chua: I started working on my craft when I was fourteen, I got my first agent when I was seventeen and I got my first job when I was eighteen. It was a lot of work and practice before I even got an agent. That prepared me for the opportunities down the road.
HNMAG: Are you a full union member now?
Brian Doe Chua: Yes, I joined UBCP (Union of British Columbia Performers) in 2013. I became a full member in 2013.
HNMAG: Was it a difficult decision to join?
Brian Doe Chua: Not at all. My first booking was for three episodes of The Little Prince. I asked for my agent’s advice. She told me that most voice-over work in animation is union. If you want to work in animation, it makes sense to join the union. It really paid off. I didn’t come up in the world of non-union commercials.
HNMAG: Did that mean you would have less opportunity to book commercials as a union member?
Brian Doe Chua: I didn’t start booking commercials until I joined the union.
HNMAG: Does union commercial voice-over work pay residuals?
Brian Doe Chua: Yes, I just spoke to a rep today about that. I’m really grateful that I am able to call up the commercial department at the union and look into ads that are airing after the date of the contract, and because of that I am able to get paid after usage which is really nice. I recently found out that my voice got cloned through AI. They were selling it online. You can make that model say whatever you want. Union staff wrote up a cease and desist template that I sent for free, without a lawyer, to the website and they immediately took it down.
HNMAG: Your first stage name was Brian Doe. Now you’re Brian Doe Chua.
Brian Doe Chua: Chua is my Mom’s last name. I grew up as Brian Doe. For the first twenty-five years of my life I thought my Mom’s maiden name was pronounced “Chewa” During the pandemic my Mother told me it’s actually pronounced “Chwa”. When I first slated as Brian Doe Chua, I felt really good about it. I booked that role and I took that as a sign. It seemed right that I keep doing it. It made me feel a lot more like myself.
HNMAG: How long did you stick with doing only voice-overs?
Brian Doe Chua: I didn’t look into on-camera until I finished school and then I decided to pursue another path in addition.
HNMAG: Do you still sing?
Brian Doe Chua: I do sing. I used to be part of a choir. I loved that growing up and I was part of an adult choir until Covid. I’d love to go back now but I haven’t had the time.
HNMAG: How has the cultural landscape changed in the industry since you started working?
Brian Doe Chua: From an animation and voice perspective, things are opening up. There are a lot more opportunities for Black, Indigenous, People of Color (BIPOC) performers of Global majority, and one of the cool things that I have been able to work on is to acquire a number of dialects from where my family is from. I have seen an increase in my opportunities and I’m grateful that we’re having the conversation.
Brian is currently working on Lego Friends which is on YouTube.