Was 'New Mickey' a hoax?

[Ezra]

Was 'New Mickey' a hoax?

Was 'New Mickey' a hoax? A work of Detective Fiction Ezra David Haith As recently as Sept. 6th, The website of Chapman Recording & Mastering had a very exciting Disney-related notice on their website. One which briefly read: MICKEY MOUSE GETS NEW VOICE Local character voice talent Bret Iwan is the new voice of Disney's famous mouse. Bret competed nationally to become the voice of Mickey and will handle a wide variety of talent duties. His first sessions with Chapman Recording was a voice used in a learning toy and then a series of prompts for the Disney cruise Line. Congratulations to Bret and Disney! (L-R Engineer Evan Clark & Talent Bret Iwam) The accompanying photo was of a tall, smiliing young man sitting next to sound engineer Evan Clark. What we thought we had was an advance lead on the latest hot story. Many of us thought, Surely, Disney's planning to announce this at the huge four-day D23 EXPO. Fans would eat this up! So, we waited. The EXPO has come and gone, and not a peep has been reported yet. Perhaps the reporters, and bloggers and tweeters, and forum posters, are all plumb-tired-out, and will make their reports on this in the morning. It's possible, although many of them seemed very propmt today, judging by their posting times. As of this evening, MICKEY MOUSE GETS NEW VOICE has been removed from http://www.chapmanrecording.com/. Not only that, but any and all mention of Bret Iwan in the Staff pages and Project pages is gone too. It appears that this young man has been scrubbed from the site. So... what happened? Doing a little digging, I find just a shread more story. Craig “Voiceroy” Crumpton of Voice Actors in the News contacted Chapman Recording and spoke with Neil Simpson who stated that the mention of Bret Iwan on their website was removed and had no comment as to the reason for doing so. He also could not confirm that Bret Iwan had indeed recorded any Mickey Mouse dialog for Disney at their studio. Crumpton's attempts to contact Feld Entertainment, the entertainment producers who handle Disney on Ice and the shows available on Disney Cruise Lines, were completely uncussessfull. It's an intersting read. He sour's Bret Iwan's two blogs as well, looking for clues. A Post made on August 5th says that Iwan is going to LA, but that he still has no job there and has exhausted all leads. There have been no follow up posts about the move at all. However, as of Sept 4th, his profile lists his residence as "Passadena, CA" (I won't link to his blogs for the sake of privacy, in case this turns out be something embarrassing.) So... what happened? Did he actually get a job with Disney after his arrival in California, and it's being kept secret? If so, why? Is it too soon after Wayne Allwine's death to make an announcement like that? Probably. Or is Disney waiting for a big surprise Micky Project, and will announce it all then? Also a possiblility. Who knows if Wayne's death may have sent some project or other into turn-around? Why has Chapman Recording removed all reference to this talent? Is Disney hushing it up? And if so, is this to create buzz or kill it. What might have happened? Remember Disney having a Pixie Hollow press event announcing Brittany Murphy as the voice of Tinker Bell? The fans repeated this voice talent's name but Disney, and the press, were completely silent. And when the Toon Disney finally did have something to show, Brittany Murphy was nowhere to be heard. Is Bret Iwan's name being supressed because he's In?, but Disney doesn't want to embarass themselves if they change their mind later? Or is Bret Iwan Out?, and Disney want's the fan community to quietly forget about all the forum postings we all saw. Or maybe, jut maybe, it was all a hoax? A former talent at a recording studio hacks the company website to place a joyous notice about himself landing the part of Mickey Mouse permamently? (It does seem suspicious that his name is spelled two different way in the post, was it put up hastily?) This could be an odd, viral-marketing way for Mr Iwan to get some name recognition in his new chosen profession. (He is also a greeting card designer, whose in-store events included drawing cartoon characters for children and imitating their voices) We are all passing this around, and Disney really does notice these things within their fan communities. A move like this could just be an old Hollywood tactic. Run a little article-looking ad in the trade papers that referrs to your movie as an "Oscar Winner" instead of just a Nominee (or worse, not even Considered). Whoopsie, it was a typo... sorry. It could also website sabotage from a bitter ex employee who had arrangememts with Feld Entertainment. He could have been excellent as Mickey and his boss only gave him chorus or extra voices. This could be a simple revenge sting against a former employee for "foiling his plans" to get the big Mickey job. Suddenly that simple little recording studio website is getting thousands and thousands of hits... Everything I've proposed is of course, wildly speculative. Let's call the title of this thread, and the entire lower half of it "a work of detective fiction." Visions Fantastic News Center Rumor Mill

Submitted by Ezra

[Piglet]

Wow, this is really confusing! None of it makes sense to me, so I will follow this thread closely to see what else develops on this story.

[TimmyII]

I'm sure there will be SOME announcement by Disney when Mickey has a new voice. There's nothing pressing right now, so I can wait for the Company to announce!

They could ask ME to do it if they want! I'd do it for FREE! :)

[stevo505]

Did they announce Mae Whitman was cast as Tinkerbell?

[Ezra]

Originally Posted by stevo505

Did they announce Mae Whitman was cast as Tinkerbell?

Yes, they did. but it was all very quiet. It wasn't one of those red-carpet paparazzi things. Her name was just off-handedly tucked into a press release.

Meanwhile they had video of John Lasseter talking about how exciting it will be to finally hear Tinker Bell speak. If I recall, I don't think he even mentioned her name.

[Wedbliss]

It think it's interesting that the quote from the Chapman site says that Bret competed nationally to become the voice of Mickey. Is there any evidence that such a competition ever took place?

Doesn't seem more likely that Disney would select someone from in-house who had experience with Mickey? That's how Jim McDonald and Wayne Allwine got the role.

[nawif]

FYI...not a hoax. Check his blog. Remember Disney is a conservative company.

[nawif]

Maybe because there was never a national competition is the reason Chapman was ASKED to remove their information!!

[Ezra]

Originally Posted by nawif

FYI...not a hoax. Check his blog. Remember Disney is a conservative company.

There is a new post dated Sept. 20th that says he's headed to L. A. :

I've packed up the car and am on my way to LA. I'm excited to be getting back home, back to my family, and back to mountains. One big adventure!

...but still no mention of a job. So, we'll all wait...

Originally Posted by nawif

Maybe because there was never a national competition is the reason Chapman was ASKED to remove their information!!

Well, that one untruth calls the rest of the story into question.

[nawif]

Originally Posted by Ezra

There is a new post dated Sept. 20th that says he's headed to L. A. :

...but still no mention of a job. So, we'll all wait...

Well, that one untruth calls the rest of the story into question.

Hmmmm. Well I know it's not a hoax so stop trying to cause trouble.

[emman]

I dont think Ezra is trying to cause any trouble, he is just stating that there is nothing "OFFICIAL" about a new mickey mouse voice. And I actally agree with him, whatever Bret's blog says, nothing will be treated as "true" or "not a hoax" until Disney confirms the info

[Executioner]

^ I agree. Until Disney says they have a new voice, then all we can do is guess. Hoax or not, there is no official word on the matter and therefore the person's story can only be taken with a grain of salt.

[Wedbliss]

The only information which I find credible at this point is that Feld Entertainment lists Bret Iwan as voice talent in the program for the Disney Ice show "Celebrations" and that he has recorded voice tracks for a learning toy licensed by Disney and for the Disney Cruise Line.

If Mr. Iwan is going to be the new voice of Mickey, then it's weird that others are announcing this before Disney. Wouldn't Disney be fairly ticked off if they signed Iwan and then he went out and told the world before they did.

I think the lack of official announcement signals that Disney has not come to a final decision as to who is getting the role of Mickey.

Originally Posted by nawif

I know it's not a hoax

I would be very interested in hearing how you know this. Please let us know.