Promoting an event at Florida State University, Adult Swim writer/producer/show creator/voice actor Dave Willis discusses with Talahassee.com his work on Aqua Teen Hunger Force and Squidbillies. Here’s an excerpt:
“[Meatwad is] the voice I always used when I encountered a little baby or a little kitten,” Willis said and then dropped into a bit of hilarious Meatwad-speak. “It was also a voice I would do late at nights when I was in the weeds (animating the early ‘Aqua Teen’ cartoons) and it made Matt (‘Aqua Teen’ co-creator Matt Maiellaro) laugh. So it just worked its way into the material.”
And on casting performer Unknown Hinson as Early Cuyler on Squidbillies:
We must have auditioned 300 actors to read for Early. Most of them were from L.A. and they were doing these bad Southern accents like Forrest Gump or Colonel Sanders or Foghorn Leghorn. Southern accents are surprisingly hard to fake. … (Unknown Hinson) had a very distinctive quality to his voice. If you’re doing a cartoon, you have to have one voice that can be funny reading the menu. And he’s that guy.”
Despite Unknown Hinson’s crazed onstage persona — think trailer-park vampire crossed with a scary, hairy Porter Wagoner — he’s really a pussycat, according to Willis.
“He’s surprisingly soft-spoken and very accommodating,” Willis said.