Iconic Irish voiceover artists.

Hangdogroad

Nostalgia thread about Irish actors whose voiceovers were familiar in the 70s, 80s and beyond. Applys mainly to television so this is probably the best forum for it but can also apply to film and radio. Tv commercials, childrens cartoons, public information films etc.

Setting the ball rolling with Jonathan Ryan. Familiar visually from Bosco and Fair City, also did a lot of voiceover on tv ads. Has several different voice styles so not always easy to identify. Here voicing the largely forgotten early 80s RTE cartoon CP & Qwikstitch.

https://youtu.be/EIxFN0iSqtE?si=oxXwhx3v_u4oNkS4

CP & Qwikstitch episode.

Hangdogroad

BIll Golding, played Rory in Wanderly Wagon for ten years from 1967 to 1977. Long career as a voiceover artist. Instantly recognisable voice on numerous public information films in the 70s through to the early 80s. From the 80s onwards he voiced "Auld Mr Brennan" in the Brennans Bread commercials.

1970s bus safety pif.

https://youtu.be/lIbwSXLdhss?si=_WC7fs7pAMqY7gcv

Brennans Bread outtake

https://youtu.be/vr5FjLlW-7M?si=3ssJs271TiTCWI56

trashcan

I thought the auld Mr Brennan ads were Benny Cauldwell ? (He was in Strumpet City, among other things, played Rashers friend)

Hangdogroad

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122607885#Comment_122607885

Can't find much info about him online, but Bill Golding was definitly doing it for years up to not that long ago. Benny Cauldwell could have been doing it at an earlier stage.

Edit: no wonder searches were drawing a blank. His name was Brendan Cauldwell. Died in 2009.

https://www.superannrte.ie/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2907:Brendan-Cauldwell-dies-at-83-2907&catid=52&Itemid=106

trashcan

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122607929#Comment_122607929

Fair enough. I may have just assumed it was him, as it sounded very like him.

Glaceon

Brian Munn was a huge one on Irish ads over the years. You may not know the name but you'd definitely recognise the voice.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBux7Erggi4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R95ONy8lJHU

Hangdogroad

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122607980#Comment_122607980

Yes, very recognisable voice.

Hangdogroad

Pat Nolan, another very recognisable voice from ads. He was one of the letter readers on Arthur Murphys Mailbag.

Not to be confused with either the Fair City actor or the GAA correspondent of the same name.

Mailbag episode 1987.

https://youtu.be/gEGISn8bSyA?si=IdKdoMsLobGSsJgK

odyssey06

Bosco Hogan did a lot of voiceover work, although he'd be better known for his on screen stuff.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bosco_Hogan

waywill1966

Who is the guy who does the Farmers Journal radio ads,he sounds very old?

Hangdogroad

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122608284#Comment_122608284

That's Bill Golding.

Hangdogroad

JImmy Greeley, best known from radio. Did a lot of voiceover for ads and for continuity on RTE in the 80s and 90s. Also took over from Bill Golding in voicing a lot of public information films from about the early 80s.

https://youtu.be/LIh0kMPdlUc?si=6edqnLZQQ0l409eW

https://youtu.be/oeQmZHiP_Eo?si=Daoj7fUgz0-aoOtc

https://youtu.be/1yiIsXThNfQ?si=W9V8D_CbA-2u41qf

FrancieBrady

An actor I knew had a great run doing voiceovers and drove a nice Volvo. He used say it stood for Voice Overs, Love Voice Overs. 😁

Hangdogroad

Those short slide adverts that used to run at the end of ad breaks on RTE up to about 89/90 used to have rotating voiceover artists. Sounds like Pat Nolan here.

https://twitter.com/KillianM2/status/1834163821230874657?t=u6-kXS8JNb8j_s6P_RKBaA&s=19

Hangdogroad

Alan Stanford, famous for playing George in Glenroe in the 80s and 90s. For years one of the most recognisable Irish based voiceover artists on advertisements, as documentary narrator etc. He moved to the States about 15 or so years ago which is why he's not heard so much these days

coylemj

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122609104#Comment_122609104

I believe that was Bill Golding. He was at an event a while back and someone remarked that they hadn't seen him on the stage or TV for a while. He was happy to inform them that he didn't need to tread the boards as he was making a tidy living from radio ads. He must have made a packet over the years from the 'Old Mr. Brennan' gig.

As mentioned above (posts #10 and #11), you can heard him these days (mid September 2024) on the radio doing an ad for the Farmer's Journal but the spark has definitely gone out of his voice.

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122612195#Comment_122612195

Don't want to name the actor without his permission but it wasn't Golding.
I did often wonder if it was his quip, may very well have pinched it.

Hangdogroad

Larry Gogan was also very prolific doing voiveover on tv and radio ads.

https://youtu.be/539OuFOZBr8?si=UpIQKNpF4_TxrIJP

https://youtu.be/tr-ZHsGz6lg?si=wei9UsRrNOvhgW5w

coylemj

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122612227#Comment_122612227

It was Bosco Hogan then.

If he told you, he told hundreds. Can't figure why you think you're bound by some imaginary vow of confidentiality. It's not like he told you the Third Secret of Fatima.

FrancieBrady

Ruth McCabe must be up there now as one of the most prolific of the last decade or more. Very distinctive

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkzzkDMMa5o

FrancieBrady

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122614653#Comment_122614653

edit

Hangdogroad

Anne Brogan, another one of the letter readers in Mailbag. Very prolific in the 80s and 90s. Not sure if she's still active.

She used to do the female voices for those cheap slide ads that used to run at the tail-end of RTE adbreaks up to about 1990.

https://youtu.be/oqUYurybBXY?si=m9I1rncJIgiRcEbP

https://youtu.be/NKvKehvNSjc?si=O9JWynqJxP6AYAec

extra-ordinary_

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122614653#Comment_122614653

Are all your 25k posts like that?

Hangdogroad

Radio 2 recording from May 1982 is a treasure trove of old radio ads.

Brian Munn I think on 3 In 1.

Jonathan Ryan doing the Moo one, with that mid Atlantic voice he'd often deploy. No idea of the singer.

Brian Munn (?) O Templemore motors, dont know who's doing the back and forth voices.

Unmistakable Larry Gogan.

Jonathan Ryan again on the Agfa cassettes ad.

TwInk doing the female voice on camping gas, not sure about the male.

Jonathan Ryan on Peugeot.

Larry again.

Jonathan Ryan on Silvermints

Open to correction on some of these.

https://youtu.be/-AGT-zxf0mo?si=h4xvlApgz0IaAYBm

Hangdogroad

Joe Lynch, best known in Ireland as Dinny Byrne in first Bracken and then Glenroe, did a lot of stuff in Britain in the late 60s/70s, where he'd be best remembered for the ITV sitcom Never Mind The Quality, Feel The Width plus a stint in Coronation Street.

He also did all the voices for a stop motion childrens show called Chorlton & The Wheelies. Wonder did he do much other voiceover work?

https://youtu.be/885aUJnKb-Y?si=70JlYbq1v6cTObPY

George White

Joe Lynch voiced the main villain in Thumbelina (1994) for Don Bluth, who was Dublin-based, and would often cast one or two local actors amongst the US names. So, for example, Lynch is paired with Gilbert Gottfried as a sidekick. Sadly, considering Gottfried was either in LA or NY, I doubt they ever met. I did once text in to Gilly's podcast, but he never answered, and he's gone now, bless.

George White

No mention of Brian de Salvo, a bit actor in various things, but a ubiquitous voice, esp. on Wicklow/Dublin radio ads.

Hodors Appletart

Don Wycherly of Bachelor's Walk has been a fairly prolific (and, might I add, divisive) voiceover artist for ads in more recent years

Hangdogroad

Jonathan Ryan deploying the same voice and persona as he did for Steve Silvermint.

https://twitter.com/KillianM2/status/1856645501170446601?t=011s2du9gg9cyinpNmZk3w&s=19

RoTelly

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122830260#Comment_122830260

Also as Batman as gaeilge

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3taFzMQUjIA&t=65s

Thelma Mansfield

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPPyVauKkjE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtwsptMMewg

s8n

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122611664#Comment_122611664

Move to US didnt go too well apparently

https://www.irishtimes.com/ireland/2022/07/13/alan-stanford-asked-to-step-aside-from-post-at-pittsburgh-theatre/

Hangdogroad

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122837482#Comment_122837482

On second thoughts it doesn't sound like Jonathan Ryan on either of the Steve Silvermint ads that are online, in fact sounds like they were both voiced by different people. I'd say the "Ugly Sweets" one with him rescuing the woman is the older of the two, late 70s early 80s vibe

https://youtu.be/C4J3LThd0NE?feature=shared

.

https://youtu.be/aIUWvOf3Iwk?feature=shared

George White

I think the voice on the earlier UglySweets one is Bob Gallico, son of Paul (creator of the Poseidon Adventure and the Snow Goose) Was voice on Radio Nova, but before that was one of those Rentayank actors in Britain who played Americans in ITC shows like the Persauders!, the Saint, the Invisible Man, Four Just Men, etc, and the absolutely hopeless British-made but NY-set Mickey Spillane-plays-Mike Hammer movie The Girl Hunters.

Hangdogroad

I forgot to point out that Jonathan Ryan has voiced Steve Silvermint at some stage, as heard in a radio ad in the 1982 2-FM recording that I posted a link of, but it seems he wasn't the exclusive voice of the character.

George White

RE:voiceover artists, Aiden Grennell, one of the fixtures of RTE radio drama,

In quite a few films (The Face of Fu Manchu, Michael Collins, In The Name of the Father, Taffin), and a panto star. But he alongside other RTE Radio rep voices (Colette Proctor, Jim Reid and Daniel Reardon, the latter of whom's CV has been merged with a US voice actor of the same name), voiced a series of Dublin-made cartoons of classics (Ghost Stories from the Pickwick Papers, the Phantom of the Opera) for Canadian animators Al Guest and Jean Matheson.

Hangdogroad

Frank Kelly was very prolific as well with voiceovers on ads.

https://youtu.be/mkwUZ0Nf4zo?si=Z1Dvs4jePfZ17-i0