Talking with H. Jon Benjamin (Kinda)
Trying to understand the voice behind “Archer” and Bob on “Bob Burgers”
The first time I heard H. Jon Benjamin’s voice it came from a can of vegetables talking to a confused summer camp cook, Gene, who mumbles his true emotions under his breath in “Wet Hot American Summer.”
“Gene, now hold on. Look, I don’t care what you do in your private time, but don’t lie about it,” says the can, voiced by Benjamin, to Gene. “I mean you clearly said ‘smear mud on my ass.’ And I’ll tell you something, if you want to smear mud on your ass, smear mud on your ass, just be honest about it. Look, Gene, I have never told anyone this before, but I can suck my own dick and I do it a lot. There I said it. I was honest, and you know what Gene, being honest makes you feel better.”
Benjamin’s voice is perfect for the can. It rarely peaks or drops. It’s flat like the midwest plains. And it’s how he’s made a career, one that has now become something more than bit parts in movies or smaller parts in animated series. No longer is he the gym teacher dating a student’s mom (“Home Movies) or a psychiatrist’s son (“Dr. Katz”). He’s become the focal point of two of television’s best animated series, the title character for both Fox’s “Bob’s Burgers” and FX’s “Archer.” He’s the voice that makes Bud Light commercials almost make me want to drink their shit beer. He’s become a star on his own in a way that I can’t seem to pinpoint or understand.
Benjamin is known for his “deadpan” delivery and natural sounding approach to voice-over work. He never rushes a joke. Instead, he seems to linger, making the audience wait for the punchline. While Archer and Bob are two different characters on two very different shows—and despite Benjamin not making up a different voice for them—they feel organic and original. You know both are Benjamin, but neither feels like the other.
Benjamin has come a long way. He grew up in Worcester, Massachusetts before moving to Boston, where started doing stand-up before his breakout voice work on “Dr. Katz,” which eventually lead to roles like voicing a sexually charged and encouraging can of vegetables in “Wet Hot American Summer,” multiple characters on “Aqua Teen Hunger Force”— including the live-action Master Shake.
I thought I could understand Benjamin’s sense of humor because I live in the city he grew up in. I looked for hints around it. But only found that Worcester Academy, where he graduated from high school, is about as secure as Fort Knox—comparatively when you look at the neighborhood surrounding it—and that the city is, and probably always will be, looking for an identity, to branch out from under Boston’s immense grip on the region’s imagination. I looked at the places he might have grown-up. I thought maybe his sense of humor originated in the defeatist attitude that breeds in certain sections of the city, fighting against the next great idea in other areas. Worcester is the forgotten stepchild locked in the attic when it comes to cities in Massachusetts, despite being the second largest in all of New England and filled with plenty of things to do and genuinely good people.
In an effort to bring some light to Benjamin’s career and where he grew up, I decided to try and interview him last March while working for a local news organization. I failed miserably. Then in December I was given the ok by someone at Fox. He would indeed speak to me.
A month later we talk over the phone. It’s a disaster. By the time we are connected—the interview was suppose to happen an hour earlier, but layers on layers of small things happened to delay it to a time I couldn’t really talk anymore—I am on my way to work, but decide to go through with the interview anyway. He seems uninterested in talking about his career. My questions are mini, muddled disasters and his answers barely audible. I eventually have to email him to get my answers right and to get better answer so he can let me into his world a bit.
I was lucky enough to talk to Benjamin, twice, once on the phone and then later via email. This is a condensed version of our talks about breaking in, being a voice acotr and growing up in Worcester.
What goes into you deciding to work on a show?
H. Jon Benjamin: I usually just pick it up. I just pick up the show.
Where did your “deadpan” delivery come from? Is there something way back when that got you into this kind of humor?
HJB: I think probably the perception of my character, or the character I often use, was based on doing improvisation for the first show I ever worked on called “Dr. Katz.” That’s where I got my start. It was very free form. Whether you like it or not, that sort of created a tone like I am talking now. I’m talking with a lot of pausing and trying to figure out what to say next, which I don’t think had ever been done before in animation. So they did it first…The parts with myself and Jonathan Katz were just totally improvised for the first couple of seasons. We’d have an outline and makeup a conversation. So I think it was like that and I think people liked the way that sounded and inspired other shows like that.
Is it easy to separate the shows and the work?
HJB: Am I aware that I am in two shows? I am, yeah. I mean it’s not difficult to separate the two because they’re on different days and so forth. It’s not like I fall into Archer while doing Bob’s voice.
Are you surprised that “Archer” and “Bob’s Burgers” have done so well?
HJB: Yeah, I’m always surprised when shows do well. I’ve done a couple shows that haven’t done well with me at the helm—that’s maybe the problem. I feel like it really is reliant on the people who run the show and when the people who run the show are doing a great job usually the show works out well.
Both the creators [of “Archer and “Bob’s Burgers”] are really good at what they do and it pays off that they work hard to make the whole show great not just one element…They’re both very successful because there is an attention to detail that really drives the whole project. so it isn’t about recording the dialogue and the acting, it’s about the editing and animation and all of that together.
Like I said, I think the people that make the shows, both of whom has had shows prior, Loren Bouchard had a few shows before he made “Bob’s Burgers” and Adam Reed had two or three shows before “Archer,” so they learned from their mistakes.
I think they’re talented and skilled people who made mistakes early on with shows. I mean, not that [they were bad], but these two shows feel like the revolve around the people who make them.
What about you has changed since your early days working?
HJB: I’ve evolved as a performer. I am much more confident than I was before and that reflects on my work on these shows. Early on when I did “Dr. Katz,” I was never sure what I was going to say or what I thought. And I’m pretty confident with these shows.
In the beginning, Dr. Katz was all over the place, but, you know, I started with my tone in animation which was a huge break for me and not totally different from live action. But it is heavily edited, and because my first work was heavily improvised you could edit down the best moments of that, which made me look good.
Is it weird to be recognized on street as someone who mostly does voice-acting?
HJB: A little bit. It is weird to be known at all, I guess.
Looking back, you worked in mostly groups as a young comedian and I am wondering why that was? I know you got pushed by Sam Seder when he was doing stand-up to join him, but why stick to the group performances early on? And did it shape you as an actor and voice-over person later because you learned early on how to work with other comedians?
HJB: Early on in comedy I worked with groups because those were the opportunities presented to me. I started in this group in Cambridge (Mass.) that consisted mostly of stand-ups, but also a handful of actors who did not do stand-up. So it was unique in that sense. I had no background in either, so I’m just surprised I stuck with it.
Working in a group like that did really make a huge difference because I got to learn from people quickly who were very committed to doing comedy as a profession.
You don’t talk a lot about growing up in Worcester. What was it like? What was the city like? What was the atmosphere like? Did growing up here in Worcester shape your comedy at all and how you see it?
HJB: When I look back on my childhood in Worcester, it was pretty good overall. My parents are responsible for that. They were successful people and that made things a lot easier for me. When I wanted something, I would usually get it and so forth. But, I grew up with a lot of people who didn’t share that experience in Worcester. But, for most kids, I think the world is pretty contained. I basically grew up doing three things, going to the JCC, to the Dream Machine (an arcade) and Friendly’s in Tatnuck Square. But, my son has grown up in NYC and it’s not like he goes off to the MOMA one night and then off to BAM the next to see Pilobolus. He just seems a lot more tolerant of gays then I recall the people I knew in Worcester were.
Clarifying something about what you said about being “known”: being famous on some sort of scale must be strange for someone mostly known for his voice. Are people who haven’t seen any of your live-action performances and recognize your voice surprised by what you look like? And does it surprise you when people recognize you?
HJB: Well, not so much anymore. I think the world is a lot more transparent now, even for voice actors. Now, kids, as a matter of course can look up information very quickly. If you like “Bob’s Burgers,” you can look up the cast in a nanosecond and in 2 minutes be watching Kristen’s [Schaal] stand-up or John Robert’s Christmas tree video.
When I was a kid, if I liked someone I saw on TV, I would have to wait till I saw that person again on TV or go to the library and look them up on microfiche.
Early on, in my time in sketch comedy, performances were very broad. But, by nature, I am very dry in my day to day and quite reserved, so I think a show like “Dr. Katz” dictated how I performed my character somewhat.
I know you said a lot of your deadpan delivery style hashed out and developed on Dr. Katz, but were you always a fan of a more dry delivery? Were you influenced by comedy that was a bit dryer and subtle? Or did it just happen organically?
HJB: I had never done voice work before and as you know, the atmosphere for that is very quiet. you’re in a soundproof booth with nobody there. It’s a kind of somber. And, I was probably nervous. So a big flamboyant performance style was not in the cards. Also, many of the comedians I was hanging around with, including Jonathan Katz, were all very soft spoken and heavily influenced by Woody Allen I suppose (whose stand up I really loved). So, I guess I gravitated toward that.
One final question because it’s Worcester related: Hot Dog Annie’s or Coney Island?
HJB: I’m gonna say Hot Dog Annie’s, but more for the experience than the dog itself. I used to bike to Hot Dog Annie’s and it took like an hour to bike there from where I lived and it was like behind the airport, if I remember correctly, so there was something very romantic about going to Hot Dog Annie’s for me. plus, it was 6 for a buck, right?
New episodes of “Bob’s Burgers” will begin airing on Sunday, March 9 on Fox. “Archer” is in the middle of its fifth season on FX. It airs on Monday nights.
