“Voicetramentalist” Michael Winslow Brings Life to Characters and Objects on Screen, on Stage, and Behind the Mic
by Christy DeBoe Hicks
Is it a bird? A plane? Machine gunfire? A police siren? No. It’s Michael Winslow, doing what he has been doing since he was a child — imitating sounds and voices to perfection.
Known as the “Man of 10,000 Sound Effects,” Winslow is best known for his role as Cadette/Sargent Larvelle Jones in all seven movies in the Police Academy franchise. Others know him from stand-up comedy routines, which he has performed at venues that range from small clubs to big television specials. Some may even know him as an ad man for national and regional brands such as GEICO, Budweiser, Reebok, Suzuki, Cadbury, and Insurance King, a discount car insurance company operating in eleven states in the South, Midwest, and Mid-Atlantic regions. Less known about Winslow is that he is a voiceover artist who voices animated characters for film, television, and other projects.
Finding His Voice on an Airforce Runway
Winslow was an Air Force brat who grew up on a series of military bases in Washington state, Montana, Ohio, and Colorado because his father, Robert Winslow, was in the Army Airforce Corps and was part of the famed Tuskegee Airmen. When his father was stationed overseas, including in Okinawa, Japan, Winslow and his five brothers were left in the capable care of his mother, Verdie Winslow. “And she wasn’t taking no mess from us,” he recalls.
The closest brother to him in age was six years old when Winslow was born, in Spokane, Washington. Between the age difference with his siblings and moving around so much, which kept him from developing close friendships, Winslow spent a lot of time alone. He began imitating the airplane sounds he heard on the base.
“Kids reflect what’s around them, and for us, it was the ability to make things fly because there was always stuff in the air,” Winslow explains. “Growing up, I was living next to an active runway, so the sounds were around me, day and night.” Winslow discovered that he could imitate those sounds, and he started doing it to amuse himself.
His mother was not so amused. “I would make these sounds, and my mother would ask where they were coming from,” he reminisces. “She would think the radio wasn’t working, or something was wrong with the dryer, but the noise kept going, and it sounded like a plane. She knew the schedule for the runway use. So, she eventually figured out it was me.”
Winslow expanded his repertoire when the family moved to Montana, where there were plenty of dogs, and the “wildlife was excellent,” he says. “I figured out ways of getting all the neighborhood dogs upset and getting a barking chain going,” he says. “Then I learned that crows had a whole squawk set that I could join.”
Winslow grew up in the 1960s in environments that were not always friendly. His sound-making skills became a way for him to cope with his situation. “The first problem was that there were these idiot kids who would pick on me,” he says. “So I had to make them think I was crazy so they would leave me alone, which worked for a while until I got into the later grades in school. You would have to be borderline psychotic for people in high school to leave you alone.”
He had an opportunity to get back at the bullies. “They were behind the school smoking cigarettes. Next to the school, there were big yards with dogs,” he recalls with evident satisfaction. “I decided to make the sound of an angry rottweiler coming around the corner. And it worked because they had a choice — they could stick around and keep smoking and wait to see if it was an angry rottweiler coming around the corner, or they could drop and run. They had seen that dog. It was going to hurt if he got to them. So they ran.”
What started as a hobby for Winslow would become a coping mechanism and eventually form the foundation for his career in comedy and film. As Winslow’s repertoire of sounds continued to grow, he became interested in using his unique ability to impersonate everything from planes to telephone operators to go into comedy. He began his stand-up comedy career in a club in Boulder, Colorado, known as Tulagi’s, which had hosted legendary acts musicians such as The Doors, The Eagles, and Jimi Hendrix. Winslow’s connection with Hendrix would continue as he developed and performed a rendition of “Purple Haze,” including his guitar solo.
However, there were not many avenues for training in the media arts or performing in Colorado. After attending The University of Colorado at Denver, where he studied architecture for a year, Winslow decided to go to Hollywood and take his shot at a comedy career, promising himself that he would go back to college if things didn’t work out. “I hitchhiked to California, and I didn’t come back,” he notes.
California Dreaming
Things were not easy for Winslow when he first got to Los Angeles. He was homeless for months, he says, spending his nights in Venice Beach with a homeless community that included musicians, street musicians, and street performers. “There were gangs, too, so you had to be vigilant, and it could get ice cold,” says Winslow.
He struggled to find a space for his unique entertainment style, trying out his routines in open mic nights at comedy clubs across Los Angeles and looking for bit parts in film and television. In the meantime, he took numerous acting and comedy classes at the Los Angeles location of the Lee Strasberg Theater Institute (currently the Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute). He studied with top instructors, including Peggy Feury, co-founder of the Actor’s Studio and the Institute’s artistic director. He also studied with Harvey Limbeck, one of the best improv teachers in the business.
During the day and early evenings, Winslow worked in restaurants. He was a busboy at a restaurant called the Great American Food and Beverage Company. Later on, he worked at Poppy’s Star, where all the servers and bartenders had to audition because they performed between taking orders and delivering food during their shifts. The restaurant was in the San Fernando Valley, near Glen Larson Productions. Studio staff would come in and cast some of the servers for television shows such as B.J. and the Bear, The Misadventures of Sheriff Lobo, and Knight Rider. Winslow got some studio work and valuable performance experience working at the restaurant.
His try-outs at comedy clubs did not go as well. Most clubs were not interested in his routine, he says. However, one night he entered and won a talent competition at the Palomino Club in North Hollywood and got an audition for The Gong Show. Chuck Barris, the show’s host, invited Winslow onto the program, and he won.
That win did not lead to overnight fame and fortune. However, it provided Winslow with the means to upgrade his living situation. “The $516.32 that I won enabled me to buy a car to live in, so I was no longer homeless on the street,” he says. His “mobile home” was a 1969 Mercury Cougar. “That one little appearance was never enough, so I had to try to use it to get some representation, someone to look after me and help me,” he says. “And it did, but it took almost a year.”
Winslow was cast in the TV series Battlestar Galactica because Glen Larson, the show’s creator, had seen him when he was serving and performing at Poppy’s, and he liked him. He did one episode before the series was canceled. Winslow was cast on an episode of the White Shadow titled “Pschyed Out,” which received an Emmy Award nomination.
After that, Winslow had minor roles in several movies and was cast in two Cheech and Chong films, Next Movie (1980) and Nice Dreams (1981). He says working on those movies was a very different filmmaking experience. “Chong would direct the movies, but there wasn’t a script. He would tell us where to stand and what to do and let the camera go,” he recalls. “By the third take, we had it.”
His work on Next Movie captured the attention of Paul Maslansky, the creator and producer of Police Academy, and High Wilson, the film’s director. They were having dinner and working on the script “when I popped up doing a stupid scene in a welfare office,” he says. Winslow later learned that Wilson had said, “This is funny as hell. Who is this guy? They found out, talked to my agent, and came to see me perform live at the Red Lion Inn, where I was doing stand-up and opening for the Count Basie Orchestra.” Things went so well that they wrote me into the [Police Academy] movie.”
The seven-movie series of Police Academy was a game-changer for Winslow. He starred in all seven movies, filmed over ten years between 1984 and 1994. His character, Larvelle Jones, is the only one to be in every iteration of Police Academy, including the films, the animated series, and the live-action television series. In addition, Winslow also voiced Larvelle Jones for episodes of the Emmy Award-winning animated television series Family Guy and Robo Chicken. In 1987, Winslow was nominated for an NAACP Image Award for outstanding supporting actor in a major motion picture for his role in Police Academy 4: Citizens on Patrol.
Winslow says that Police Academy also provided him an opportunity to showcase a hip-hop phenomenon. Doug E. Fresh may be the OG of beatbox, but Winslow says he was the first to perform it in a motion picture with an international audience. The first time his character, Larvelle Jones, meets Carey Mahoney [played by Steve Guttenberg] is when the police bring an arrested Mahoney into the station and sit him next to Jones, who is beatboxing. “No one had ever seen beatboxing on film before,” declares Winslow.
Another bonus in his work on the Police Academy series is that Winslow got to know George Gaynes, a Finnish-born American singer, actor, and voice artist who played the role of Commandant Eric Lassard in the series. Gaynes became a mentor and friend to Winslow.
Winslow toured and worked on other projects between stints as Larvelle Jones, including Mel Brooks’ movie Space Balls. Winslow did all of his sound effects for the movie, which Mel Brooks said saved money on the budget for Winslow’s scenes.
Although many of Winslow’s roles have been small, they have been plentiful. The IMDb site lists sixty-six acting credits for him, for roles in film, television, and video, ranging from co-star to cameos. These projects include A Wrestling Christmas Miracle (movie, 2020), Jimmie J.J. Walker and Michael Winslow: We Are Still Here (television comedy special, 2018), Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No (television movie, 2018), Robo Doc (movie, 2009), Lenny the Wonder Dog (movie from the script written by Winslow, 2004) The Drew Carey Show (TV series, 1997), and The Love Boat (TV Series, 1987), where he appeared in three episodes as the same character.
The “Voicetramentalist” Expands his Repertoire
Winslow considers himself a “voicetramentalist.” It is a fitting title for a person who can use his voice to create a symphony of sounds. He is also a voice artist, and voiceover has long been an essential part of his career.
Most of his voiceover work has been dedicated to breathing life into animated characters, but he has also done commercials, created voices for video games, and developed phone apps. Winslow has voiced a wide range of characters for film and television programs, including New Kids on the Block (TV, animated 1990), Starchaser: The Legend of Orin (1985), Gremlins (1984), and Space Stars (1981), an animated series where he voiced his own character.
Winslow expanded his voice art skills to mobile and gaming platforms. He debuted his own iPhone and iPod Touch apps in 2010. The “ThatsKungFu” app generates Winslow’s kung fu fighting sounds when the device is swung in a fighting motion, and “NoizeyMan,” billed as the “World’s Noiziest App,” contains video, ringtones, sound effects, and mini-games, all created by Winslow.
In 2011, Winslow worked with Phyken Media, an Orlando, Florida-based game development studio, providing all the sound effects for a mobile game for iOS and Android platforms titled Wizard Ops Chapter 1. He also lent his voice on Wizard Ops Tactics, a turn-based tactical game, and successor to the prior game. He previously voiced a pedestrian in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. “I want to get back into phone apps eventually, and I’m going to do my own hood app,” Winslow says. “I did that first couple of apps for fun; now I think I’m going to go interactive with educational tools. I’m heading in the direction of gaming and sounds and voiceovers,” he says.
Winslow is currently focused on doing more voiceover work, saying, “Technology has finally caught up to the voice, so it’s no longer just analog anymore. It’s digital, and now people are learning how to do things with virtual reality and artificial intelligence.” In this digital environment, people are consuming more content in a greater variety of ways, which changes the industry. He believes that new technology opens up the voiceover field to a more diverse group of people with various approaches to creating and promoting content.
“That brings both opportunity and challenge,” he notes. “YouTube stars are becoming voiceover people. You can advertise yourself on social media as a voiceover artist. You can sell your voice,” he says. But, he declares that operating in this new environment means acquiring new skills. “Now I have to learn this new technology,” he says. “I’m back in school all over again, and in eleven months, it could morph again.”
Winslow believes that succeeding in the voiceover business is still more difficult for African Americans, but he sees a more level playing field these days. “A person with good voiceover ability and an excellent portfolio, who knows what they’re doing, can now walk into agencies and talk to people. You actually can go to Atlanta and walk over to Tyler Perry Productions and submit yourself,” he says, adding, “The industry has so many different layers, and there are so many different ways of going about doing voiceover work. The whole thing is shifting. We don’t know where it’s going right now. So I thank God I can make noises!”
The Podcast Explosion
Winslow says the increased demand for online content has led to an explosion of podcasts. “People have studios in their houses now,” he exclaims. He notes that the way people do voiceover and podcasts is changing because people are no longer just satisfied with hearing the message; they want to know more about who is bringing the message.
“Because everybody has been cooped up so much, they want to see that now,” he says. “People who do their podcasts are learning that audio podcasts may not be enough. You’re going to have to put video highlights in there because some people have moved from audio to video, he says. “Even with a video podcast, there’s still a need for graphics, some animations or some caricature portraits, and some video clips.” He adds, “This whole podcast business is still new, and it’s still shaking out. It may be a couple of years before we know where this is headed.”
Winslow has done a ten-part podcast series, titled Noize Cast. “I did the first ten of them as a test to see if anyone was paying attention, and they were, so now I’m trying to figure out where I’m going to go with it,” he says. “Because there are so many different genres where people can be reached, I’ve decided to have more than one channel. Some will be interviews and variety. Some of it will be scripted. Some of it can be news. Some of it can be sports,” he reveals.
The Downside and Upside of the COVID-19 Pandemic
Winslow says the pandemic has been bad for the entertainment business unless it is online. “It’s completely turned everything upside down and backward,” he laments. “Now, everything is on a deep-freeze hold. “There are some live shows and productions, but income is now basically internet-based or voiceover-based,” he said.
The COVID-19 pandemic thwarted Winslow’s plans to shoot for a Guinness World Record. “We were going to do a stand-up comedy show — fifty states in forty-nine days. We were going to do that, and then this hit, and now I have to wait another year before I try again.”
However, Winslow believes that, for all its downsides, this pandemic offers actors, voice artists, and others in the creative industries an opportunity to get back to basics. He says that entertainers have to find different ways to connect with their fans without live shows and studio audiences. “This is a once-in-a-hundred-year medical emergency for the planet, so now we have to use our old-school ‘Jedi Trekkie’ skills,” he says. “I used to watch Star Trek, and Scotty had duct tape because Velcro hadn’t yet been invented. They had to come up with ways of making stuff work. There is also this ’70s TV show called MacGyver. (There’s a new MacGyver, which isn’t nearly as good). The old MacGyver could take a diet soft drink, a battery, and a Tootsie Roll and make a building blow up. Now, suddenly we have to go to 0ur old-school skills and use them on the web. A lot of it is working.”
Winslow plans to use social media platforms such as Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram in new and different ways, take older style videos, remake them, and explore new ways to incorporate sounds into video posts. He also would like to put today’s spin on old-time radio shows. “I’m trying to break the rules of the internet in an organized manner,” he says.
Winslow says he devotes about 60 percent of his time to voice acting and online and other pursuits but still is anxious to get back on stage. “Live work still has to be an integral part of what I do,” he says.
After forty years in the business, Michael Winslow is continually reinventing himself and pushing the envelope to see where his hard work and talent can take him. He doesn’t just do it for himself. “Life is a series of soundscapes, and I have to paint one,” he says. “It is my job to help people forget about how they’re going to pay the rent for an hour or two.”
Christy DeBoe Hicks is a communications consultant, writer, and editor with more than 30 years of experience working with policy, nonprofit, education, and community organizations, as well as in the music, theater, and publishing fields. After a hiatus, she has returned as a regular contributor to Global Communicator.
