BEAUTIFUL VOICES BLOG SERIES: PART 1 - CHRIS PARNELL
OH MY GOD IT’S CYRIL
In about 2012 I stumbled across one of my now all-time-favourite animated series, Archer. The acclaimed comedy show, now in it’s 11th season, follows a group of dysfunctional secret agents at a fictional American intelligence agency, and is one of those shows that wraps itself around you and tickles you into submission. We were addicted to it and obsessed with it. The jokes had a kind of shortcut to our funny bones that felt like drunkenly catching up with an old friend. We loved all the characters in different ways for their various moral bankruptcies and kinks. Lead character Archer for his bimbo headed sleaziness, gorgeous Lana Kane for her sarky sass, and neurotic accountant Cyril Figgis for his most excellent and beautiful voice.
With the exception of Games of Thrones (of which, I officially can’t get enough) I’m not normally someone who re-watches films or re-reads books. My partner really is though and so we have watched Archer over and again, sort of taking solace in it at times.
As a musician and voice artist respectively, our ears are finely attuned to certain voices, spotting them, categorising them, imitating them – working out what it is that is special about them. For me it is a bit of an obsession or a sport. Being the first one to bellow the name of who is voicing a character within seconds of them arriving in a scene is up there with my other (probably equally annoying) favourite hobby of working out what old song is being ripped off by a new song. And then singing them on top of one another.
So ever since diving into the world of Archer, every so often in our house you’ll hear someone shouting “OH MY GOD IT’S CYRIL”. Now I’m going to caveat this early on by saying that at least half of those frenzied cries are in fact, incorrect. It happens a lot.
We think everyone is Cyril. We were recently convinced that the smarmy king from some princess fodder that our 4 year old was watching was Cyril. It wasn’t, but to be fair it did sound like him. And then the aforementioned 4 year old was watching one of her faves ‘Elena of Avalor’ (plucky princess gets political whilst also being caring and wise), and lo and behold, a flying leopard appeared who was definitely Cyril. We were triumphant, we almost both wet our pants with excitement. And then hastily checked on imdb. And it was totally him. YES. We knew it. We love Cyril.
Cyril Figgis is a character from (you guessed it) Archer, who is played by brilliant actor Chris Parnell, who you will almost certainly know from his years as a featured actor on Saturday Night Live, or as the inept Dr Spaceman from 30 Rock, or as Jerry in the world’s coolest animation, Rick & Morty.
So what is it about Cyril’s, I mean Chris Parnell’s voice that is so great? For me, his voice is the place where sexy and nerdy meet. It’s a super distinctive voice which you could spot anywhere, but which also has a real ‘everyman’ quality. It has quite a nasal sound to it (the nerdy) but with a slightly unexpected bass note (the sexy) which you’re kind of always waiting for. His voice fits the role of the straight man perfectly, but there’s always this edge of weirdness to it – you feel like you just don’t know where a joke or a line could end up. It’s exciting to listen to! Here is Archer attempting to murder Cyril https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ocsFv1g44AU
Interestingly since writing this I’ve discovered that Chris voices commercials. He is the voice of “the Progressive Box” in a commercial for insurance brand the Progressive Corporation - https://www.ispot.tv/ad/7A6N/progressive-the-box
Finally check out this brilliant sketch from Saturday night Live – known as “the cowbell sketch” it features Christopher Walken and Will Farrell getting all the laughs of course, but really it’s Chris’s straight delivery that holds it all together: https://vimeo.com/257364428
We love you Cyril!