Atlanta, Georgia Local News
Prolific Black anime voice actor set to appear at MomoCon 2024
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Actor John “Beau” Billingslea, 79, is scheduled to appear at MomoCon 2024, May 24-27, to participate in curated panels and fan meet-n-greets. As a voice actor, he is known for iconic roles in popular anime such as Ay, the Fourth Raikage in Naruto and Jet Black in Cowboy Bebop.
“I will be at MomoCon in two weeks,” Billingslea said. “I look forward to seeing my friends, family and fans. I’m looking forward to coming back to Atlanta.”
This will be Billingslea’s first time participating in MomoCon, which started in Atlanta at Georgia Tech in 2011. The convention that celebrates Japanese Anime, American Animation, Comics, and Gaming (video games, esports, tabletop, LARP) has been consistently held at the Georgia World Congress Center since 2015.
This year, MomoCon anticipates the participation of 50,000 guests, compared to the 48,000 attendees who came in 2023.
Few Black actors, or any actors, have a comparable resume to Billingslea regarding on-camera and voice actor appearance. Since the 1970s, he’s acquired on-camera roles in television and film, and as a voice actor for animation and video games.
As an on-camera actor, he appeared in The Atlanta Child Murders television miniseries, MacGyver, NYPD Blue, Baywatch, Walker, Texas Ranger, NYPD Blue, 7th Heaven, The West Wing, NCIS, and more. Some of his film credits include Hannah Montana: The Movie and Star Trek Into Darkness.
However, his role as a voice actor in anime gained him an international fanbase. The Naruto franchise is one of the most popular anime series that consists of television shows, films, graphic novels, video games, toys, apparel, and other merchandise.
Earlier this year, trendy shoe brand Crocs released a limited-edition collaboration with Naruto. The brand took its signature clog-like shoe and created multiple designs based on characters from the anime series, along with special charms to place on the shoe.
This role is even more special because the character in Naruto that Billingslea gives his voice to is also Black, and considered to be a force to reckon with as the leader of one of the top ninja villages in the series. Known as The Village Hidden in the Clouds, this fictitious community consists of the most characters of color in the entire series and depicts cultural traits that resemble Black culture.
“When I started, there weren’t very many characters of color that were drawn in animation. I started my career doing caucasian characters. Luckily, I was in an environment where everyone was caucasian but my race did not hold me back in terms of them hiring me to voice characters. I was very fortunate in that way where I didn’t experience a bunch of discrimination because of my color,” Billingslea said.
Already an on-camera actor, Billingslea started his voice acting career in the late 1980s.
He continues, “A friend of mine was producing and overseeing the dubbing of foreign live-action films into English. There would be a German film with an African character, and he would ask me to dub the character into English. We did quite a few of those and one day, he asked me if I would do anime. I said ‘Sure, what’s anime’ because I didn’t even know what it was.”
That decision sparked a career that would also include anime series Digimon, Rurouni Kenshin, Rave Master, Cyborg 009, Hunter × Hunter, and Wolf’s Rain, most of which have aired on Cartoon Networks’ popular programs Toonami and Adult Swim; in addition to Naruto and Cowboy Bebop.
“A lot of people expressed how Cowboy Bebop helped them through hard times in their lives. I’ve gotten that a lot,” Billingslea said. “They’ll say, it was a bad time in their life for whatever reason, and watching cowboy bebop helped them through those hard times in their life.”
“When I hear stories like that it just warms my heart. Because when we’re in the booth we’re not thinking about having a profound effect on people. We’re just trying to entertain people with our work.”
Furthering his impact, Billingslea is also the voice actor for Leroy Smith, a new Black character in the Tekken franchise, which started as an arcade game in 1994. The character was introduced in Tekken 7, released in 2019, and carried over into Tekken 8, which was released in January 2024.
Tekken 8 sold over two million copies worldwide within its first month. Currently, it’s considered one of the top 10 selling video games in the United States according to monthly sales reports produced by research firm Circana.
Attendees can register for four-day or single-day memberships. Four-day memberships are $85-$100. Single days range from $45 – $60 (kids 9 and under free). Game tournament registration and separate concert tickets are also available at www.MomoCon.com.
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Martel Sharpe
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