Notes: Hank Azaria AMA on Reddit Part 2

The man of a 1000 voices returns to lay down some more jazz about what its like working on The Simpsons. More info after the jump.

Once wasn’t enough for Hank Azaria (The Simpsons  ) so he decided to return to Reddit to continue hosting his AMA chat on Reddit that he started in on a couple of weeks ago. Among the interesting questions that were asked was when someone had asked about his attendance (or lack thereof) at the San Diego Comic Con held every year. His answer was pretty simple…he’s busy! Plus he offered up his inspirations for all of his Simpsons voices:

i’m dying to go to comic con; i’ve just literally been busy every year that it’s been on. i’m hoping to go this year.

moe = bad al pacino. wiggum = bad edward g. robinson. lou the cop = bad stallone. comic book guy = guy who lived next door to me freshman year. snake = another guy from college who was stoned a lot mixed with jeff spicoli (from fast times). professor frink = jerry lewis / nutty professor. apu = peter sellers from “the party.”

And of course for the thousandth time Hank was asked about how to get into voice-acting. I, personally, can’t tell you how many emails I have had to send to people telling them that I am not an agent for any of the networks we cover, I am just a journalist so I’m glad Hank said something:

what you just described is exactly how i got into doing voiceovers. i loved cartoons, mimicked them, found out they were all 2 or 3 guys…mel blanc, dawes butler, etc and they became my heroes. i did truly fall into it by accident and get lucky. that said, the only thing i know that you can do is to find a great voiceover teacher, study with them, and create a bunch of character voices with them. in many ways voiceover acting is more competitive than on camera acting because fewer people are doing more of the jobs because their voices are so versatile. here’s what i believe about making it in showbusiness of any kind: if you have talent and you work hard at it, you will get opportunities. the business will let you know whether you have what it takes or not. so all you can do is put yourself out there as best you can for as long as you can and see what happens.

BOOM! From the man himself! You can check out a whole bunch more of additional questions and answers by clicking here, but those were the tidbits that stood out to me. The Simpsons is all new this Sunday Night on FOX for one full hour starting @ 8pm EST, check your local listings.