CJ, Trevor, and Niko my cousin – the characters of GTA are some of gaming's most famous. But not every actor who brought these characters to life feels like they got the star treatment. Here's what they really think about the roles that made them infamous.
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00:00CJ, Trevor, and Niko my cousin!
00:04The characters of GTA are some of gaming's most famous, but not every actor who brought
00:08these characters to life feels like they got the star treatment.
00:12Here's what they really think about the roles that made them infamous.
00:15Ned Luke played Michael DeSanto in Grand Theft Auto V, but before he took the job, he had
00:20no interest in starring in a video game.
00:22In fact, Luke had all but retired from acting years prior to landing the GTA role.
00:27He opened a restaurant with his brother, spent time with his family, and eventually
00:31he got curious about acting again, which led to his GTA audition.
00:35Luke told The Gamer that when his agent first mentioned the audition, his reaction was simple.
00:40I'm not going to do a video game.
00:41What would I want to do a video game for?
00:43I'm an actor.
00:44Curiosity went out in a big way, and Luke spent three years doing voice work and motion
00:49capture for the game.
00:50He ended up loving the experience, and the overwhelmingly positive reception to the game
00:55— arguably the most successful single game of all time — let him know it was all worth
00:59it.
01:00After all this time spent working on GTA 5, Luke said he'd be happy to go back for more.
01:04You're plainly addicted to chaos.
01:06Well, I'm not sure that's true, Doc.
01:08Stephen Ogg is another actor on record as loving his time with GTA 5, and it's easy
01:13to see why.
01:14Ogg had been acting for over a decade before working with Rockstar, but GTA made him a
01:18global celebrity.
01:20Since then, you've seen him on The Walking Dead, Better Call Saul, and Westworld.
01:25But his Trevor Phillips is still the character that people most associate with him, and all
01:28these years later, he doesn't seem entirely thrilled about that.
01:31Ogg has been open about how he really feels about GTA, calling the experience of making
01:36it fun.
01:37But he also famously lashed out when YouTuber Hugo1 asked him to take on his GTA persona
01:42once again in multiple cameo videos, making it pretty clear that he's beyond over it.
01:47Of course, I'm not Trevor, my name is Stephen, and I am an actor.
01:54Sean Solo Fonteno is a rapper, actor, and author who has been with the GTA series since
01:59the early 2000s.
02:01He provided miscellaneous character voices for Grand Theft Auto San Andreas, then eventually
02:05went on to star in GTA 5 as protagonist Franklin Clinton.
02:09But thanks to Rockstar's penchant for keeping secrets, he nearly left the franchise before
02:13his big moment.
02:14I quit, actually.
02:15I was like, man, f—k this stupid s—t.
02:18Fonteno explained in a 2022 interview with Say Cheese that he was wary of committing
02:22to the complicated motion capture process without knowing exactly what it was for.
02:27He ended up working on motion capture and voice recordings for roughly a year before
02:31he learned he was actually contributing to the next GTA.
02:34When he was asked to reprise his role as part of GTA Online DLC several years later, Fonteno
02:39told GamesRadar how happy he was to still be a part of the series' legacy.
02:43He said,
02:44It's surreal.
02:45It trips me out sometimes.
02:46Sometimes I just have to wake up and pinch myself to make sure, you know, like, is this
02:50s—t really happening?
02:52Michael Holick played Nico Bellic, the main character of GTA 4, and his experience was
02:57a bit of a rollercoaster.
02:58On the one hand, the role brought him into the spotlight, but he also never felt like
03:02he was fairly compensated for the work.
03:04Holick told The New York Times in 2008 that he was thankful to Rockstar for giving him
03:08a chance as a relatively unknown actor, but he wishes he and the other voice actors could
03:13have gotten a bigger piece of the game's massive windfall.
03:16He said,
03:17It's tough.
03:18When you see Grand Theft Auto 4 out there, it's the biggest thing going right now, when
03:21they're making hundreds of millions of dollars, and we don't see any of it.
03:24Holick worked on the game for 15 months and received $100,000 for his work, not much compared
03:30to how much money the game brought in.
03:32He reportedly received no royalties on the game, and wasn't paid for online advertisements
03:36that used his voice.
03:38Chris Bellard, a.k.a. Young Mele, voiced CJ in GTA San Andreas, and he also ended up
03:43having some issues with how well he was compensated for his work.
03:46In a since-deleted Instagram post from 2020, Mele wrote,
03:50I never publicly dissed them because I made money from them, but f—k Rockstar Games,
03:54them motherf—kers don't care if I'm eating or not.
03:57In no uncertain terms, he accused the company of underpaying performers, and shouted out
04:01Nico voice actor Michael Holick, saying,
04:04He exposed the truth.
04:05Mele made it clear that the only way he'd ever work with Rockstar again is if the company
04:09paid him a larger percentage of the money the games bring in.
04:13You might have forgotten that Cynthia Farrell voiced Catalina all the way back in 2001 for
04:18GTA 3, and again in 2004 for GTA San Andreas.
04:22Don't feel bad, she nearly forgot about it, too.
04:24In a 2022 interview with The Vogue podcast, Farrell said that she had no idea just how
04:29popular the games are to this day.
04:32Farrell was nine months pregnant when she got the role, and recorded all of her lines
04:35in about two hours, so you can tell she's still surprised to be talking about it, more
04:39than 20 years later.
04:41But like other GTA actors, she made it clear that the money wasn't anything to write home
04:45about.
04:46I don't know if you want me to tell you on air what I made, because let's just call it
04:51a pittance.