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Charles Martinet
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Charles Martinet
Charles Andre Martinet (born September 17, 1955) is an American actor. From 1991 to 2023, Martinet was the voice of Mario in the Mario franchise. He also voiced other characters in the series such as Luigi, Wario, Waluigi, and the baby equivalents of Mario and Luigi, prior to retiring as voice actor to become an official brand ambassador for the series.
Martinet is also known for his portrayal of Paarthurnax in 2011's The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, as well as Magenta in the Dragon Ball franchise since 2022.
Charles Andre Martinet was born on September 17, 1955, in San Jose or Cupertino, California to father Jacques René Pierre Martinet. The younger of two children, he has an older brother, John, though he was taller than him despite being the younger sibling, and while his brother was extroverted, Martinet was shy and more anxiety-driven than him in his youth. His mother's family had been in the country since the Mayflower voyages, while his father grew up in Paris, France, and Martinet's paternal grandfather served in World War I under General Pershing in order to get eligibility for American citizenship; they then came to the US when Martinet was a child. This makes him French-American.
His family moved to Barcelona, Spain when he was 12 years old, where he attended an American middle school. In 1969, after three years in Spain, they moved to Paris. He attended the American School of Paris and graduated in 1974.
As a young adult, Martinet became interested in international law. He attended the University of California, Berkeley, where he majored in history or politics. In his senior year, he decided to discontinue his studies after a tutor told him to "regurgitate information he'd written in his book, chapter-by-chapter". When he was about 20 years old, a friend persuaded him to take acting classes to combat his fear of public speaking. His first role was a monologue from the Spoon River Anthology.
Martinet auditioned for and won an apprenticeship at the Berkeley Repertory Theatre. After training with the Berkeley Rep for several years, Martinet went to London to attend the Drama Studio London, where among other skills, he discovered his talent for accents and dialects. Upon returning to California he joined the Berkeley Repertory Theatre. He went on to become a founding member of the San Jose Repertory Theatre for four years.
Martinet earned the job as Mario's voice at Nintendo when, in 1991, he was on the beach and received a call from a friend who told him that there was going to be an audition at a trade show in which auditioners "talk to people as a plumber". He went to the audition at the last minute as the casting directors were already putting away their equipment. Charles Martinet walked in and asked, "Can I please read for this?". The directors let him and gave the description of "an Italian plumber from Brooklyn". At first Martinet planned to talk like a stereotypical Italian American with a deep, raspy voice. He then thought to himself that it would be too harsh for children to hear, so he made it more soft-hearted and friendly, resulting in what Mario's voice is today. Martinet has also stated that he kept on talking with his Mario voice until the audition tape ran out.[citation needed] He says that Gremio from William Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew was an inspiration for his portrayal of Mario.[citation needed]
Working for Nintendo since 1991, Martinet started voicing Mario at video game trade shows in which attendees would walk up to a television screen displaying a 3D Mario head, which was designed to move around the screen and hold full conversations with them. This system was called Mario in Real-Time or MIRT and was developed by Pasadena based SimGraphics. Martinet could see the attendees by means of a hidden camera setup, and a facial motion capture rig recorded his mouth movements to synchronize Martinet's mouth movement with the on-screen Mario mouth movement. This digital puppetry, with Martinet's comic performance, was a novelty at the time.
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Charles Martinet
Charles Andre Martinet (born September 17, 1955) is an American actor. From 1991 to 2023, Martinet was the voice of Mario in the Mario franchise. He also voiced other characters in the series such as Luigi, Wario, Waluigi, and the baby equivalents of Mario and Luigi, prior to retiring as voice actor to become an official brand ambassador for the series.
Martinet is also known for his portrayal of Paarthurnax in 2011's The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, as well as Magenta in the Dragon Ball franchise since 2022.
Charles Andre Martinet was born on September 17, 1955, in San Jose or Cupertino, California to father Jacques René Pierre Martinet. The younger of two children, he has an older brother, John, though he was taller than him despite being the younger sibling, and while his brother was extroverted, Martinet was shy and more anxiety-driven than him in his youth. His mother's family had been in the country since the Mayflower voyages, while his father grew up in Paris, France, and Martinet's paternal grandfather served in World War I under General Pershing in order to get eligibility for American citizenship; they then came to the US when Martinet was a child. This makes him French-American.
His family moved to Barcelona, Spain when he was 12 years old, where he attended an American middle school. In 1969, after three years in Spain, they moved to Paris. He attended the American School of Paris and graduated in 1974.
As a young adult, Martinet became interested in international law. He attended the University of California, Berkeley, where he majored in history or politics. In his senior year, he decided to discontinue his studies after a tutor told him to "regurgitate information he'd written in his book, chapter-by-chapter". When he was about 20 years old, a friend persuaded him to take acting classes to combat his fear of public speaking. His first role was a monologue from the Spoon River Anthology.
Martinet auditioned for and won an apprenticeship at the Berkeley Repertory Theatre. After training with the Berkeley Rep for several years, Martinet went to London to attend the Drama Studio London, where among other skills, he discovered his talent for accents and dialects. Upon returning to California he joined the Berkeley Repertory Theatre. He went on to become a founding member of the San Jose Repertory Theatre for four years.
Martinet earned the job as Mario's voice at Nintendo when, in 1991, he was on the beach and received a call from a friend who told him that there was going to be an audition at a trade show in which auditioners "talk to people as a plumber". He went to the audition at the last minute as the casting directors were already putting away their equipment. Charles Martinet walked in and asked, "Can I please read for this?". The directors let him and gave the description of "an Italian plumber from Brooklyn". At first Martinet planned to talk like a stereotypical Italian American with a deep, raspy voice. He then thought to himself that it would be too harsh for children to hear, so he made it more soft-hearted and friendly, resulting in what Mario's voice is today. Martinet has also stated that he kept on talking with his Mario voice until the audition tape ran out.[citation needed] He says that Gremio from William Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew was an inspiration for his portrayal of Mario.[citation needed]
Working for Nintendo since 1991, Martinet started voicing Mario at video game trade shows in which attendees would walk up to a television screen displaying a 3D Mario head, which was designed to move around the screen and hold full conversations with them. This system was called Mario in Real-Time or MIRT and was developed by Pasadena based SimGraphics. Martinet could see the attendees by means of a hidden camera setup, and a facial motion capture rig recorded his mouth movements to synchronize Martinet's mouth movement with the on-screen Mario mouth movement. This digital puppetry, with Martinet's comic performance, was a novelty at the time.
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