Interview with Final Fantasy voice actor and Golden Joystick winner, Briana White

[00:00:10] Portrait of a Fangirl is a web series and podcast created by Temple of Geek. At the core of the project is the importance of telling the stories of women who have found inspiration, growth, and power through fandom. My name is Jenna Wrenn and I'm the host of the Portrait of a Fangirl Podcast and today I have the pleasure of talking with Briana White. Hi Briana, how are you?

[00:00:30] Hi, I'm excellent. Thanks for having me. I'm excited to chat today.

[00:00:34] Yes, me too. Thank you for coming on and I'm very excited to jump into your experiences in the world of gaming. And I was telling you a little bit before, I'm not really much of a gamer so I love to learn things and I fit no one better than you.

[00:00:51] Well, let's chat about it today.

[00:00:53] Let's go. Can you just start out by introducing yourself to our audience and letting them know a little bit about who you are?

[00:01:01] Sure. My name is Briana White. I am an actress, voice actress, and content creator online. I have been a lifelong gamer and I've always wanted to be an actress as well and so being able to voice act in video games is a perfect blend of my two life passions. So I feel very lucky.

[00:01:26] As a child, you said you wanted to be an actor, but did you always want to also go into something with video games or did that kind of happen along the way?

[00:01:36] I never expected to voice act in video games. It was not something that was ever really on my radar.

[00:01:44] Even though I loved games that had great characters and great acting, it never really occurred to me that that could be something that I could do.

[00:01:54] So when I got the audition for Final Fantasy VII Remake, I thought, whoa, this would be so cool.

[00:02:01] Although I never thought I would get it. I thought it would just be a really fun audition.

[00:02:05] I just sort of fell into it. I don't want to say on accident, but it certainly felt a little on accident.

[00:02:14] Right. It just kind of came to you along the way on your journey.

[00:02:18] Yeah.

[00:02:18] Were you a fan of the Final Fantasy series?

[00:02:23] So I had not played Final Fantasy VII because my family, when I was growing up, was a Nintendo family.

[00:02:31] And Final Fantasy VII was only available on the PlayStation.

[00:02:35] But I played Final Fantasy later on in my life because there are many Final Fantasy games.

[00:02:43] And I fell absolutely head over heels in love with Final Fantasy XIV.

[00:02:48] I have put way too many hours into that game.

[00:02:52] I have. I've played a lot of Final Fantasy XIV.

[00:02:55] And I've been playing it kind of ongoing since 2016.

[00:02:58] So for a long time.

[00:03:00] And I played Final Fantasy XV on my YouTube channel.

[00:03:04] And people really loved seeing me play that.

[00:03:07] So Final Fantasy VII Remake was the next stop on my Final Fantasy journey.

[00:03:14] Wow. And that was your first time voicing in Final Fantasy, correct? Final Fantasy VII?

[00:03:21] Yes. It was my first voice acting gig at all.

[00:03:26] Wow.

[00:03:28] So not just first time being part of that sort of family, but your first voice acting experience in general.

[00:03:35] What was that like?

[00:03:37] It was very overwhelming to voice one of the most iconic characters in gaming for my very first role ever.

[00:03:49] Overwhelming and terrifying.

[00:03:51] All of the above.

[00:03:53] I really didn't think I would get the role.

[00:03:57] So nerves didn't really play into it.

[00:04:00] I mean, I really went in there thinking,

[00:04:02] this is going to be a fun thing to audition for that I'll never, ever, ever book.

[00:04:06] I hoped, of course.

[00:04:08] And then when I did get the role,

[00:04:11] I had to grapple with the fact that people really care about this game and this character.

[00:04:17] And they really want us to do it right.

[00:04:19] And here I was with no experience on, on, with what is an incredibly technically challenging job.

[00:04:28] It's a localization from Japanese.

[00:04:31] So we have to match the timing of what we say exactly to the timing of the Japanese line.

[00:04:39] And even just voice acting and being able to convey emotion with one single tool at the same time as making sure my diction is good

[00:04:50] and my dialogue comes out clean of weird tiny mouth sounds.

[00:04:55] I mean, it was really, really, really overwhelming.

[00:04:58] It was a big challenge.

[00:05:01] Right.

[00:05:01] It was, you know, you're being really thrown into the fire on your first big thing.

[00:05:07] And I can only imagine what that must have felt like.

[00:05:11] And especially with other voice actresses having voiced Aerith in the past.

[00:05:17] So how did you feel coming into that?

[00:05:20] Did you want to kind of make the character your own?

[00:05:24] Did you want to try to, like, pay tribute to the actresses before you?

[00:05:28] For me, it was all about balancing the gratitude and honor for Aerith's previous voice actresses,

[00:05:40] while at the same time bringing something fresh and new to it.

[00:05:45] You know, Aerith's voice actress in Japanese is Maya Sakamoto.

[00:05:49] And I owe a lot to her.

[00:05:51] She's been Aerith's Japanese voice actress from the very beginning.

[00:05:55] And so I really leaned on her performance while I was sort of crafting my voice.

[00:06:02] And then I listened to the English voices as well.

[00:06:04] The benefit that I had was that the English voices only voiced Aerith at a different point in time than when we started.

[00:06:14] So a lot of people really identify with Aerith's voice actress in Advent Children, the movie.

[00:06:22] But that's not the same Aerith as the one I started with.

[00:06:27] So I had the benefit of being able to really meet Aerith where she is at the very start of Final Fantasy VII Remake,

[00:06:35] which is also the very start of Final Fantasy VII, which actually didn't have voice acting at all.

[00:06:41] So, yeah, it was absolutely a balance.

[00:06:44] It was a blend of honoring and bringing myself to the role.

[00:06:49] Right.

[00:06:50] It sounded like it was kind of a good opportunity to – I don't want to say reinvent the character,

[00:06:56] but it was a good jumping off point because you weren't necessarily coming on the heels of someone else, right?

[00:07:03] Yeah, it was a balancing act.

[00:07:06] It was a blend for sure.

[00:07:08] But, you know, I had a lot of help from the directors and the writers.

[00:07:13] I mean, it really was a team effort to make sure that this was going to be a quality product,

[00:07:20] that people were going to be able to really love Aerith the way that we love Aerith.

[00:07:26] And obviously, people loved your work so much.

[00:07:31] You just won the Golden Joystick Award for the Best Supporting Performer this year.

[00:07:36] Congratulations.

[00:07:36] That's amazing.

[00:07:38] Thank you so much.

[00:07:39] I feel so, so lucky.

[00:07:42] What did that feel like just to be nominated in the first place?

[00:07:45] How did you react to that?

[00:07:47] I was completely surprised.

[00:07:50] I've been so busy this year.

[00:07:52] I have been traveling all over the country and now the world being at different conventions

[00:07:58] so that I can meet the fans and give autographs.

[00:08:01] And I was actually at a convention in Huntsville, Alabama called Comic Con.

[00:08:07] And I woke up and I was, you know, focused completely on getting ready for the day

[00:08:12] and figuring out how I was going to, you know, get all of my stuff to the convention and get set up.

[00:08:18] And then I got this email from Score Enix that I've been nominated for a voice acting award.

[00:08:22] And just immediate tears, like, whoa, I have to, I'm getting whiplash here.

[00:08:29] Like, I was so focused on doing this and now this nomination.

[00:08:33] And now I feel like my brain is in la-la land.

[00:08:35] I mean, it was a total surprise, truly.

[00:08:38] And in the best sort of way, I feel really, really lucky that we get to celebrate how hard we've worked in this way.

[00:08:45] That's amazing.

[00:08:46] And I can only imagine what the win must have felt like if the nomination really had you in a whirlwind.

[00:08:53] How did the win feel?

[00:08:54] I mean, very much the same.

[00:08:56] Very unreal.

[00:08:57] I mean, truly, like, it's something that's been a part of my life for almost half a decade now.

[00:09:06] And so it makes, you know, awards are a little strange because it's really nice to be acknowledged for your hard work.

[00:09:17] And it's really lovely.

[00:09:19] But at the end of the day, especially the golden joysticks, which is 100% fan voted.

[00:09:26] At the end of the day, what it really means is that my performance touched some hearts and hopefully made their life a little bit brighter.

[00:09:34] And that means everything to me.

[00:09:36] That is the most important thing to me, that my performance, that my work could affect someone's life for the better.

[00:09:45] That's really, really awesome.

[00:09:47] And I get very emotional when I think about it.

[00:09:50] Yes, it's a huge accomplishment.

[00:09:52] And I know I just met you, but I'm so proud of you.

[00:09:56] Thank you.

[00:09:57] Thank you so much.

[00:09:59] I know.

[00:10:01] My parents are very proud of me, too.

[00:10:03] Oh.

[00:10:04] I'm like, I've only known you for 10 minutes and I already am proud of you.

[00:10:11] So gaming, I want to talk about gaming as a fandom in general.

[00:10:15] You know, it's not necessarily always known for being a female-friendly fandom.

[00:10:20] And you are very much involved in the fandom on Twitch and you stream as the Strange Rebel, correct?

[00:10:27] Yes.

[00:10:28] So first of all, how long have you been doing this streaming?

[00:10:34] I started my channel in 2015.

[00:10:39] Wow.

[00:10:40] And I started playing just a very large range of games because I didn't really know what I would find success with.

[00:10:47] And ultimately, I narrowed it down when I started playing Uncharted 4 on my channel.

[00:10:55] Because I love that series and it's so fun.

[00:11:02] But it's also so story-focused and character-focused.

[00:11:08] I mean, it's like a movie that you get to play.

[00:11:11] And that's amazing.

[00:11:13] And what people really latched on to was my emotional attachment to the game.

[00:11:19] People really like to see and hear me talk about the character analysis and why this scene was so impactful.

[00:11:31] And people really latched on to that.

[00:11:33] And so I started playing games on my channel that had emotional impact.

[00:11:37] Things with any games with great stories and great characters.

[00:11:41] That's what I really like.

[00:11:42] And so that's what people like watching me play and hearing me talk about as well.

[00:11:49] Luckily, that is a very friendly space for women, ultimately.

[00:11:55] You know, a lot of people talk about how toxic the internet can be.

[00:12:01] And there's definitely a truth to that.

[00:12:04] I've had incredibly toxic relations or toxic interactions on the internet more than I've ever had in person.

[00:12:14] Right?

[00:12:14] You know, I've never had anyone tell me in person some of the things that I've read on the internet.

[00:12:20] Right?

[00:12:20] Right.

[00:12:20] But even still, that's far and away the exception.

[00:12:28] I would say 99% of my interactions with people online are positive, are sweet.

[00:12:35] Most of the people out there are kind and smart and funny and generous.

[00:12:41] And I love that I've been able to be a part of the community of gamers online.

[00:12:50] I feel incredibly lucky.

[00:12:53] I mean, they really give me a little bit more faith in humanity than I had before.

[00:12:57] That is really great to hear because, you know, you don't hear that necessarily a lot in fandom.

[00:13:04] And especially, you know, a lot of the women that I've spoken to over the past two years to hear, we've discussed, you know, how do you handle online negativity?

[00:13:13] How is your fandom do you feel like is toxic in certain ways?

[00:13:16] And hearing your side is a rarity.

[00:13:20] It really is.

[00:13:21] You're probably the first time I've heard someone say that it's such a great...

[00:13:25] Probably.

[00:13:27] Probably.

[00:13:28] And I think that that's beautiful to hear that this is such an accepting and warm community.

[00:13:33] And you've found a space like this.

[00:13:36] So it's nice to hear.

[00:13:38] Part of it is because of what I play.

[00:13:41] You know, I feel like if you are a gamer who loves a good story, then there's a certain part of your heart that's very open.

[00:13:52] And if you are an open-hearted person, then you know what it feels like when someone's mean to you.

[00:13:58] And you are able to extrapolate that to mean don't be mean to others.

[00:14:04] And so I think just by nature of the games that I play, I attract a certain audience that honestly is quite kind and very sweet.

[00:14:14] And I call some of my longtime viewers, I mean my friends, genuinely, because I feel that way about them.

[00:14:22] I am happy to call them my friends because they're so wonderful.

[00:14:26] Right.

[00:14:27] And I would assume a lot of them have followed you.

[00:14:29] I mean, you've been doing this for almost 10 years now.

[00:14:32] Oh, it's crazy when you say that, but yeah.

[00:14:35] Right?

[00:14:37] That's quite an accomplishment.

[00:14:38] And I'm sure a lot of these people have followed you probably from the beginning, right?

[00:14:43] Absolutely.

[00:14:44] Mm-hmm.

[00:14:45] Wow.

[00:14:45] So you've grown together.

[00:14:47] You've really created this community.

[00:14:49] And I think it's a testament to the power of online friendships.

[00:14:54] I think that sometimes people can downplay it, like, oh, you're just a friend online.

[00:14:59] But that's not the case.

[00:15:00] It's like you're mentioning.

[00:15:01] It's like this community.

[00:15:02] It's this family of people that come together because of a shared love of something.

[00:15:07] Absolutely.

[00:15:07] And I think it, in some ways, can be even better than in-person friendships only because when

[00:15:18] you live somewhere, you are bound by whoever lives around you.

[00:15:25] And there is, you know, however many people you interact with on a day-to-day basis in

[00:15:29] person, there's bound to only be a certain percentage of those people that really understand

[00:15:37] you and really share your passions.

[00:15:40] But on the internet, you have a much larger pool of people.

[00:15:45] And that percentage of people is the same.

[00:15:47] But that still means that there are a lot more people that you can find that share your

[00:15:52] passion and share your interests and are kind in the same way that you are kind.

[00:15:56] And so I've been able to find a lot more people that I feel like are like me online

[00:16:01] than I ever would have in person.

[00:16:04] I just think that's the nature of the internet, right?

[00:16:07] You can find more negativity.

[00:16:08] You can find more bad, yes.

[00:16:10] But you can also find more good.

[00:16:12] You can find more people that are like you.

[00:16:15] And I think that's one of the great things about the internet.

[00:16:17] It is.

[00:16:19] And for girls who maybe are afraid to jump into the world of online gaming because of

[00:16:26] the perceived possible negativity, what sort of advice would you give them?

[00:16:32] That can be a challenge because, like I said, I play the sorts of games that I play.

[00:16:38] And a lot of those are single-player experiences.

[00:16:41] So a lot of the negativity that I usually hear about are in multiplayer experiences.

[00:16:46] And those games maybe just tend to attract a larger amount of people and tend to attract

[00:16:53] maybe a lot more toxicity.

[00:16:54] I don't spend a ton of time in those spaces, so I wouldn't know.

[00:16:59] But you know, I will say because I've played games like Overwatch.

[00:17:03] I've put a lot of hours into a game like Overwatch.

[00:17:05] And yeah, if I was to hop on voice with a bunch of random strangers, I probably would have experienced a lot more toxicity.

[00:17:17] But I kind of had a rule early on that I wasn't really interested in talking with those people.

[00:17:21] So I only hopped on voice comms with my friends.

[00:17:24] I played games with my friends and I hopped on voice comms with them and I didn't open that up to strangers.

[00:17:31] And so, you know, you can use the tools like that.

[00:17:34] You can use things like that to lessen the chance of you being harassed online.

[00:17:41] Similarly, it does depend on the game you play.

[00:17:43] So a game like Overwatch, highly competitive and extremely fast-paced and gets the blood pumping, right?

[00:17:50] That is going to bring more passion to the surface, which in turn, if you're not careful, can turn to negativity.

[00:17:57] Whereas a game like Final Fantasy XIV has a lot of opportunities to cool down in between the competitive instances.

[00:18:04] And there are calming things like fishing and crafting and making your new glamour, which are different aspects of a multiplayer experience that don't incite that passion.

[00:18:19] Not that they don't incite passion.

[00:18:22] It's just they don't incite that heart fire that might turn negative, right?

[00:18:28] Um, so, so if someone wanted to have that multiplayer experience, I would try different games because there are different games that might work better for you and have an audience that suits you better.

[00:18:42] So it just depends.

[00:18:43] And then, I mean, for me, I would also have to say just because you have one, one bad experience, one time on one game doesn't mean the whole world is like that.

[00:18:53] Does that suck?

[00:18:55] Yes.

[00:18:55] Am I so sorry it happened to you?

[00:18:58] Yes.

[00:18:58] Should it be that way?

[00:18:59] No.

[00:19:00] But should you prevent yourself from potentially finding an amazing friend group of people just like you because of one bad experience?

[00:19:09] No.

[00:19:10] You got to keep trying.

[00:19:12] Right.

[00:19:13] Not everybody out there is the same.

[00:19:16] Not everybody is going to be that troll or that negative experience.

[00:19:21] Exactly.

[00:19:22] So, Brianna, can you tell us where we can find you online and on Twitch?

[00:19:27] Yes.

[00:19:28] So, all of my gaming content is under the handle at the strange rebel.

[00:19:34] So, I'm at the strange rebel on Twitch and Twitter and Instagram and TikTok.

[00:19:40] On YouTube, you can find me at strange rebel gaming.

[00:19:44] You can type that into the YouTube search bar.

[00:19:47] But you can also just type in my name, Brianna White, and all of my socials will pop up.

[00:19:51] That's B-R-I-A-N-A with one N.

[00:19:55] And I also have, like, a separate Instagram and Twitter and Facebook for my, like, more acting and modeling stuff.

[00:20:03] So, that's a little bit different as well.

[00:20:05] So, you can find me on the internet.

[00:20:07] I'm out there.

[00:20:08] And I would love to have you join our community of incredibly kind, wholesome, positive people that love Final Fantasy and love gaming.

[00:20:17] Brianna, thank you so much for taking the time and talking to me today.

[00:20:22] Truly, you bring such a light to fandom in general.

[00:20:26] And thank you so much.

[00:20:28] Thank you.

[00:20:28] Thank you as well.

[00:20:30] It was really lovely to talk with you.