#jay goede

[pealeii]

A Year With Frog and Toad with Mark-Linn Baker and Jay Goede (Photo by Rob Levine)

[emsiecat]

I had a fantastic day yesterday!

As many of you know this year marks 25 years since Pokémon: The First Movie ‘Mewtwo Strikes Back’ was released. To celebrate, MCM London Comic Con - which was held this weekend - decided to stage a reunion for the original English dub cast of the anime. The convention organisers had managed to get the amazing Veronica Taylor (Ash), Eric Stuart (Brock and James), Jay Goede aka Philip Bartlett (Mewtwo in ‘Mewtwo Strikes Back’), and Rachael Lillis (Misty and Jessie), plus Dan Green (Mewtwo in ‘Mewtwo Returns’ and Entei in ‘Spell of the Unown’) as guests!

As you can imagine thousands of fans descended on the convention to have the chance to meet their childhood heroes, myself included. (I’ll pop the rest under a read-more to save your dashboards lol).

I still have a real soft spot for Pokémon and it has, to date, been my longest loved fandom; especially the character Mewtwo. As a kid and then teen, he was the character I really felt a connection to. I think a lot of fans did. It was also thanks to the first movie that I met a lot of friends in online fan forums and websites (ah, Geocities fan-sites and the ToM forum, you will always be missed).

I have actually met Jay once before at Wales Comic Con in April 2022 and I found him to be very friendly and charming, making time for everyone who came to his autograph booth. So, when I found he had a Facebook and Instagram account following Wales Comic Con, I followed him there as he makes some really great artwork. I never expected him to follow me back, or just casually chat with me! (If you had told 11-16 year old me that she would meet and chat online with the voice of Mewtwo, she would have melted into a puddle of fangirl goo 😂, and to be honest, I’m still kind of star-struck now)!

Naturally, I wore a lot of Mewtwo and Pokémon themed items to celebrate the occasion and made my way over to the autograph tables when I eventually got in the venue. It was so crowded! I’d made sure to bring a little something for the voice actors to say thank you for basically making my childhood and teen years special, and queued up to see them all, starting with Jay.

Jay recognised me as soon as I got to the front of the queue at his table and greeted me with a big smile and ‘Oh wow you’re here, that’s great!’ after we chatted briefly he asked if it was okay to give me a hug. I said sure, though he couldn’t find a way around the tables (they were all in a long line reaching right down the main hall) so saying ‘Hold on I’m finding a way round’ he then (to the amusement of his assistant and others in the queue) proceeded to crawl under the autograph tables, got up and gave me a big hug, then took a selfie with me. He’s an absolute sweetheart. My day was made right there! I also managed to get two of his original Mewtwo paintings. They’re brilliant, and I love them to bits.

I got my Mewtwo Strikes Back novel autographed and chatted with Jay a bit more before going to queue for the photo-ops. They were great fun.

I queued back up again after to try to get the rest of the casts’ autographs. The lines for them all, especially Veronica, were huge! I loved chatting with fellow fans whilst we waited, and every single cast member was so friendly, taking the time to really interact with everyone.

Dan Green made me laugh as when he gave me his autograph, he saw Jay’s signature and signed his ‘Dan “Mew-too” Green’ and explained he did it because ‘We share him, he was first though, so Mew-too for me makes sense’ 😆 He’s a sweet guy.

Eric and Veronica were so cool, doing impressions for younger fans who came to see them, and making sure all the fans had a great experience. Veronica spends a good amount of time with every single fan, which is just amazing considering the sheer amount of people who were waiting to meet her.

Rachael and her assistant loved my denim jacket (it has a huge embroidered Jigglypuff patch on the back as well as other iron on patches on the sleeves) and as Jigglypuff’s VA, Rachael was happy to see it.

It was such a great atmosphere there and a lot of fun. I’m so glad I went and got to meet the cast that defined my childhood.

[titles-for-tangents]

Okay so

I am well aware this post is going to be the third post about this guy on tumblr but

Hear me out.

I've watched enough anime in high school and had enough friends who watched anime in high school to remember one very important lesson one of my upperclassmen taught me:

"Voice actors will surprise you."

She said it wisely, carrying where my sentence and questions trailed off and making it a suggestion. She was right. At the time it was about the guy who played the dub English voice of Jin in Samurai Champloo, Sean "Kirk" Thornton. I had seen a picture and a quick interview with him in an issue of Anime Insider while the magazine was still in publication. You can get so used to the idea that anime voice actors are young people in their twenties and thirties you can be completely blindsided by someone who's older.

That said,

HOLY FUCKING HELL, JAY GOEDE

THIS MAN IS FUCKING MYTHICAL. YOU WANNA KNOW ABOUT JAY GOEDE? I'M ABOUT TO TELL YOU ABOUT JAY GOEDE. I GUARANTEE YOU LESS THAN 200 PEOPLE ON TUMBLR REALLY KNOW ABOUT HIM.

HE IS THE LEGENDARY PHILIP BARTLETT. "Who?" you might ask. Right you ask. Here's a hint:

REMEMBER THIS GUY?

HOLY MOTHER OF SHIT

HE'S ALIVE

LEMME EXPLAIN TO YOU A THING

Older Pokemon fans and curious younger ones will know the guy who first voiced Mewtwo in Pokemon The First Movie: Mewtwo Strikes Back is not the same guy in Mewtwo Returns, the famous Dan Green. Anime fans in general will know Mewtwo's voice just appeared out of the blue - not just in 4Kids' roster, but in the anime voice acting business in general. He came, he saw, he conquered, and was never heard from again. Who was Philip Bartlett? Back in the early days of the Internet and IMDB nobody had anything on this guy. A rumor spread that he had tragically died of heart disease (thought to be a heart attack) in 2001, just two years after the movie's premiere and it wormed its way into every corner of the Internet. It seemed to us kids at least the one of the reasons why Dan Green took over in 2001's Mewtwo Returns, the direct-to-TV episode special. IMDB has the rumor, Anime News Network has the rumor, Wikipedia had the rumor, it was everywhere.

Until October 2011.

A sharp member on behindthevoiceactors.com messaged Jay Goede on October 24th politely asking if he was in fact the voice of Mewtwo, having noticed his name was listed as having done Mewtwo's voice in the production show but it was also the same voice used in the movie. Halloween rolled around and of all days and nights the spirits should come out, he answered yes. Goede explained his real name was used without his permission for the touring show against union rules. And LO AND BEHOLD his pen name was a clever little moniker: Goede said "Philip" was his middle name and "Bartlett Blvd." was the street where he grew up.

Goede had no idea for years how much people have been wondering about him and how influential he's been. The forum member noticed also there was an extra "l" in the name "Phillip Bartlett" listed on most sites, and it seemed someone had confused the name for someone else's obituary. Goede had tried editing the Wikipedia page multiple times only for people to change it back, but these days it would seem Wikipedia's the only site that's been corrected. Goede laughed the job didn't pay well, he had to sign a load of paperwork, it was a ton of recording over a period of two or three days, and as he put it, he probably let his ego get in the way of him because he was an actor, not a voice actor and at the time he didn't see any artistic merit in his work. He confirmed too he was the original voice of Dr. Fuji, with the other later scenes of Mewtwo's Origin having Eric Stuart fill the role as well as play the voice of young Mewtwo. A while later Goede was directing a theater production of Hamlet at the University of Miami and his lead actor came up to him dazed and stunned while his friends pointed and giggled from the wings. Goede asked him if he was alright and the actor said, "I just heard something but I think it's a lie." The forum member's caption of Goede's story ends there, but you can imagine where it was going.

Goede hasn't done any voice acting since it seems but he's been all over the place. His official website is where he showcases and sells his fine art (!) and his IMDB page shows he's done a bit of television work often credited as "Philip Bartlett", but the page is still incorrect about his birth place and supposed death in 2001 despite listing more work in 2003. Again his Wikipedia page is the only correct site at the moment, stating he was in a number of Broadway theater productions in New York City such as Angels in America, Cabaret, The Play's the Thing, Looped, and for children A Year With Frog and Toad and he was the Grinch in How the Grinch Stole Christmas. Holy fuck! He can sing, he's funny, and he's freaking adorable.

Courtesy also goes entirely to Flareth on Tumblr for finding out about this and posting it this past November 12th. I had found the post through six degrees of separation and wanted to spread the news with a bit more backstory to it. Also get a look at his signature:

Hot damn! That's badass!

As for his general attitude towards the role of Mewtwo, he more or less lol'ed it off in good humor. I recommend reading the interview in the link above because he seems like a sweetheart.

[flareth]

Yo you know how everybody says the original voice of Mewtwo died?

That has been DEBUNKED

Thank you rosebr10 from BTVA for finding this out and working so hard for the truth to come to light.

[yourdailybway]

A Year with Frog and Toad | Alone Jay Goede and Mark Linn-Baker performing at the Tony Awards Music: Robert Reale Lyrics & Book: Willie Reale