Eliza Schneider

Eliza Schneider
Born Eliza Jane Schneider
February 3, 1972
Other names Blue Girl
Eliza Jane Schneider
Occupation Actress, Singer-songwriter, Historian, Dialectologist, Playwright
Years active 1992–present
Website
www.elizaschneider.com

Eliza Jane Schneider (born February 3, 1972) is an American actress, singer-songwriter, playwright, dialect coach and dialectologist, historian and voice artist. She has appeared on television, and as a voice over actor on videogames and cartoons. She performs various musical, and stage shows.

Early life, and Television work

Schneider spent her formative years on a Chippewa Reservation with her two older brothers, in a mostly Jewish family.[1] Her father was a math and drama teacher at the School of Arts High School in Rochester, New York,[2] where she graduated as salutatorian. Her mother was a attorney for the Reservation. She started playing violin, learning in the Suzuki method,[1] after seeing El Shenkar. When she was sixteen, she had started her first musical group.[3] From ages 7–20, she went to Jewish summer camp, becoming a counsel, and where she started performing on stage. By the time she was in the fourth grade she began writing, and performing her own plays, because as she put it, the teacher "told me I could do a play only if I did everything: wrote, produced, directed." Four years later she was chosen for a part in the Annie (musical), something her later replacement Senta Moses from Beakman's World also appeared in, however Eliza's parents wouldn't let her go touring with the troupe after being cast.[1] She also participated in a theater program at Northwestern University's National High School Institute and graduated from UCLA as a world arts and cultures major.

While in college she continued going to auditions, and got the role of Sheila Brentwood in the television series The Amazing Live Sea Monkeys, where she got to be the best friend of the three human size Sea Monkeys, a form of brine shrimp. For the show she got to pick the actors who played her parents. After the show got canceled, she got to be the replacement of Alanna Ubach, in Beakman's World, for the shows second and third seasons. [4]

Dialect research, and One-Woman shows

For her college senior thesis, she made a cross-country road tour in a former ambulance studying regional dialects.[5] During her research into accents, she "visited all the English-speaking countries in the world, conducting more than 7,000 interviews over all."[1] From the interviews she created a one-woman show called Freedom of Speech, in which she tells the stories of 34 people, in their voices.[6] The various quotes are combined into a story.[7] When interviewed by The Western Front, a Western Washington University newspaper about the shows, she explained that "People in America today are scared to speak up and tell their perspective on what our nation is or where it is going... I wanted to repeat the peoples' words verbatim so the audience could develop their own perspective."[2] In a autobiographical way she links the quotes, and stories together saying "it’s really a love story about a petulant girl who starts out hating America for perpetuating hate. She begins collecting sounds and winds up falling in love with her country." The show won her the 2003 New York International Fringe Festival award for "Best Solo Show". Her next solo show, titled "Words of the Prophets", is reported to have quotes from "homeless people all over the world."[1]

Music, and Voiceover work

When explaining about her dialect and musical interest she said; "You know how they talk about a photographic memory?" "That’s not actually how my mind works. It’s aural. I remember what I hear." "When I try to do a piece onstage, I hear the next words [they actually said]. I hear the rest of the monologue. It takes every bit of strength and intellect that I have to control that." In the same interview she explained that "[In the past] I’ve injured my voice and have had to be silent for two weeks, three weeks, and six weeks."[8] In a 2013 interview she explained that "to me, music, voice, voices of the people, play writing, dialect, language, violin – it all springs from the same well of fascination with sound."[1]

After hearing about death of Mary Kay Bergman, the voice of many South Park characters, she was approached by a friend, whom asked her to contact her agent to try and get Eliza the role of doing those various voices.[4] She alongside Mona Marshall were the lead female voice actors on the animated cartoon series. This was a position she held until 2003, when she left over a contract dispute. "I asked for a union contract, played hardball and walked," she told a journalist.[2] She was replaced by April Stewart. During this time she was also part of the all female, country and western trio named "Honey Pig".[8]

Accident, and Family life

In 2006, she was involved in a car accident, resulting in a head injury, and a broken hand. She is also a political activist.[3] Because of which she wrote a play called "Sounds of Silence: A Documentary Puppet Musical Farce" about the 2004 United States election voting controversies in Ohio.[8]

In 2010, she 'caught the baby bug', and as she describes it; "I wanted to have a baby soon, and I didn’t feel like meeting somebody new". "I thought of the most wonderful human being I’d ever met, and his name was Roger Ray, from college". After reconnecting, together they had a son named Raiden Daniel, whom she taught violin, while also being a violin teacher for other children.[1]

In 2012, she joined the cast of Spider Baby the Musical for a San Diego performance, playing the role of Emily Howe.[9]

Voice over projects

Television

Character voices

These are a list of the charcaters that she performed multipule voices for, on the same show.[2]

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 1.5 1.6 Launer, Pat (August 2013). "The Sound of America". San Diego Jewish Journal. Retrieved 26 December 2014.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 Hancock, Jaynie. "In Her Own Voices". Western Washington University. Retrieved 5 December 2014.
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 "About, Eliza Jane & the Barnyard Gypsies". SonicBids. Retrieved 5 December 2014.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Cloverleaf Radio Presents: Actress Eliza Schneider "South Park"! (AUDIO PODCAST). Interview with Jimmy Falcon, Gremlina, and Eliza Jane Schneider. 29 March 2011. Cloverleaf Radio. Retrieved October 25, 2014. 5:09 [I got to] "be the best friend of these three life size sea-monkeys..." 6:58 "They showed me a bunch of headshots and were like 'Pick your parents'. 7:15 "Luckily I got to do a audition for the replacement show which was Beakman's World. 13:42 "He brought me in his room, and locked the door behind me, and said 'I don't want South Park to go off the air. I know you can do those voices. Don't you have an agent?'" 14:23 "He forced me to call my agent at ICM, from his room. And so I called, if they need anybody I can do that.
  5. ↑ "Eliza Jane Schneider talks about traveling the country in an ambulance". San Diego Reader. Retrieved 5 December 2014.
  6. ↑ "Woman of 1,000 voices – Eliza Jane stops by Night & Day on U-T TV". U-T San Diego. Retrieved 5 December 2014.
  7. ↑ Weber, Bruce. "Critic's Notebook; A Spiritual Search And a Noir Comedy". The New York Times. Retrieved 5 December 2014.
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 Salaam, Elizabeth (16 October 2013). "The First Time I See Eliza Jane Schneider Onstage, I Want To Be Her Friend: Who is This Multimedia Bombsells". San Diego Reader. Retrieved 26 December 2014.
  9. ↑ Zaragoza, Alex (16 October 2013). "Spider Baby the Musical, Unmasked: Comic Art in San Diego Revealed, and Sabrosura Sundays". San Diego City Beat. Retrieved 31 December 2014.

External links

Preceded by
Mary Kay Bergman		 South Park lead female voice
1999–2003 (together with Mona Marshall (1999–present)) 		Succeeded by
April Stewart