New year, same old puns in the title….
This post is a rather contrite follow up to my “Favourite Voice Over Performances” post I wrote a few weeks ago, which upon reading, the Other Half pointed out that I’d missed one of the most iconic and distinctive Voiceovers EVAH – Richard Burton’s portentous and charismatic narration on Jeff Wayne’s “War Of The Worlds” musical concept album, based on the HG Wells novel.
Whoops. So it’s now belatedly included in a post all of its own, plus bonus shock horror ending.
Burton died long before Wayne created the touring stage show of the album in 2006, so a visual representation of the actor was built using CGI – well, his head was anyway. A floating, talking, moderately creepy MASSIVE HEAD. Not ideal obviously, but pretty effective; with That Voice attached to it, you could pretty much get away with anything. I was somewhat distracted by the CGI Burton during the 2010 touring show that I saw, as in my opinion he bore an uncanny resemblance to Seth Macfarlane. (Another great voice for a number of reasons, but I’ll save him for another post and another day.)
It was impressive stuff. However technology moves on and an eleven foot high CGI face is, well, a bit meh nowadays really, isn’t it? We’re the iPad generation. We want 3D. We want High Definition. We don’t just want a talking head, we want the rest of him as well. Preferably naked. Um. It’s time for a change:
Liam Neeson joins War Of The Worlds musical as hologram
Wait… what? Liam Neeson? Well, OK, he did a good Aslan in “The Chronicles Of Narnia”. But he’s no Burton. And he’s Irish. Wasn’t Patrick Stewart available? Or Jim Carter, Carson off of Downton Abbey? He’d be BRILLIANT.
Any other thoughts? Who do you think should do it? Who has the gravitas and presence to pull this off?