When celebrities lend their voices to puppets or animated characters, it can be a marketing boon for the studio. But it can also be a distraction. Somewhere in the back of your mind, your suspension of disbelief might have taken a knock because your brain knows that Mario is actually Chris Pratt, or Zendaya is Meechee. With no celebrity voice to distract from Project Hail Mary’s material, we don’t separate newcomer Ortiz from Rocky, and, as a result, we’re deeply affected by Rocky’s upsetting backstory, his dreams of reuniting with his mate, and the harm he suffers after saving Grace from certain death.
Social media has been awash with posts from people attending Project Hail Mary screenings, admitting they openly wept about the possible fate of a character who doesn’t even have a humanoid or animal face, and that’s down to the extraordinary puppeteering and voice work behind Rocky, who seems just as real as Gosling himself. Having been physically on set with the Barbie actor as he puppeteered, Ortiz’s delivery is heartfelt and touching, even when his lines end with “question” or “statement,” as the computer’s translation of the alien’s context dictates.
It takes you back to the time when artists like Jim Henson and Frank Oz would more regularly voice big characters rather than A-list actors, which is no accident — Rocky was designed by Jim Henson’s Creature Shop alum Neal Scanlan, and his VFX company built all the Rocky puppets in Project Hail Mary. Scanlan and Ortiz worked together throughout the film’s production to bring Rocky to life onscreen, and Ortiz told Inverse that he initially asked Neal for directions. “He said, ‘No, no, no, James. Think of it like this: You’re Frank Oz, and I’m making Yoda for you.’”
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