声優

声優 – seiyuu. voice actor. A professional actor who uses their voice as their primary means of expression. Originally, they were rarely under the spotlight. In fact, that’s why this career path is appealing for some people. To paraphrase Minami Tanaka, the voice Lily Hoshikawa in Zombie Land Saga and Mary Saotome in Kakegurui: In theater, one can become someone else with the crowd watching you; in voice acting, one can avoid all that directed attention and become someone new altogether.

As the industry’s popularity grew over the years with notable waves attracting more and more hopefuls, they are seen as entertainers who appear in a variety of media. However, because of preference, their voice acting training, their affiliation to a voice acting agency (or possibly because it’s more marketable), on paper and press releases they tend to be labelled primarily as seiyuu.

That is worth noting because many seiyuu branch out to different fields. Sometimes, by the nature of the voice acting jobs that they take, seiyuu become solo singers, screen actors, stage actors, models/endorsers, designers, tarento, show hosts, idols, radio, TV and internet personalities, even mascots. It’s not uncommon for a seiyuu to find themselves being thrust into jobs they weren’t trained for, only to find that work sustaining them in the immediate future, if not their entire career. Some seiyuu are not even known for their voice work but are instead known for their personality and stage presence which are then leveraged to promote a product. In some cases, screen/stage actors transition into voice acting to gain experience (and employment) only to find more success in the voice acting field.

For seiyuu who mainly do voice work, there are a variety of media available: anime, games, narration, foreign dubbing, commercials, public announcements, radio, audiobooks, and voice dramas. There could be more. The work they get generally depends on their agency, specifically their manager, who has the connections to provide them with opportunities.