Hello Kitty is likely one of the largest stars within the Japanese popular culture world, and she or he’s voiced by one of many largest stars within the anime voice appearing trade. Kitty-chan had no voice when she first appeared within the mid ‘70s, but for the past 33 years she’s been voiced by the one and solely Megumi Hayashibara.
Hayashibara (whose credit embrace “Evangelion’s” Rei, “Cowboy Bebop’s” Faye, “Slayers’” Lina, and “Ranma 1/2’s” feminine Ranma, amongst many, many others) turned the voice of Hello Kitty after auditioning for the function when Sanrio was on the brink of open its Sanrio theme park in Tokyo in 1990, and aside from a small variety of scattered exceptions, she’s been voicing the character ever since.
But on November 1, which is Hello Kitty’s official birthday, Hayashibara posted on each her Twitter account and official weblog that she’s leaving the function. “Looking ahead to the next 50, the next 100 years, it has come to be that I’m leaving [the role of] Kitty,” Hayashibara writes. “As we say in the industry, I’m ‘graduating.’”
▼ Hayashibara’s announcement tweet
Hayashibara goes on to say that she was knowledgeable by letter of Sanrio’s determination, and was startled by what she felt was its suddenness. However, in a subsequent assembly Sanrio workers mentioned their future advertising and marketing plans for Hello Kitty with Hayashibara, together with their hope to broaden the character’s international enchantment and attractiveness not simply to households and kids, but additionally to members of Generation Z, and in addition “cherish the future and AI.” After in depth inner dialogue, Sanrio got here to the conclusion that with the Hello Kitty character approaching its fiftieth anniversary, this marked stopping level milestone for her voice to this point, a call that Hayashibara says felt “extremely natural” to her following the reason.
Unfortunately for followers wanting to return and re-listen to Hayashibara’s performances in Kitty-chan’s YouTuber-style movies on the official Hello Kitty YouTube channel, it seems that all movies by which she voiced the character have now been eliminated. It’s unclear if this occurred concurrently along with her saying that she’d now not be voicing the character or if the movies had already been eliminated.
Hayashibara wasn’t the primary voice actress to play Hello Kitty. That distinction goes to Fuyumi Shiraishi, who voiced the character within the 1981 “Kitty, Mimi, and the New Umbrella” animated brief film. Mami Koyama then stepped into the function for the 1989 brief “Hello Kitty’s Cinderella,” the Hello Kitty model of the “Terebikko” video telephone toy, and Sanrio’s first amusement park, Puroland, in Oita Prefecture. When Koyama left Japan and moved to the U.S., although, Sanrio held auditions for a brand new voice actress, with Hayashibara profitable the function.
Hayashibara isn’t the one vocal performer who’s leaving the Hello Kitty franchise, as she writes that Miina Tominaga will now not be voicing Kitty-chan’s twin sister Mimi, nor will Go Takahashi be persevering with to voice Hello Kitty’s boyfriend Daniel.
While it’s a bittersweet growth for individuals who have develop into accustomed to listening to Hayashibara’s efficiency, the voice actress herself is treating this as a optimistic second, asserting that she feels completely no unhappiness nor remorse, and likens her emotional state to seeing a daughter go away the household family when getting married, including that she’ll proceed to be a Kitty-chan fan even after there’s one other voice popping out of the character’s mouth.
Source: Megumi Hayashibara official weblog, Twitter/@MHayashibara_PR, YouTube
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