A Voiceover trip to New York City

This weekend I made a trip to New York City to meet up with a bunch of my voice actor friends from not only New York, but lots of other places in the world.

Dave Courvoisier and I shared a hotel room to keep our costs to a minimum. He arrived Friday evening.

Dave and I drove into Manhattan around lunch time on Saturday, where we caught up for lunch at the famous Katz’s Deli with Doug Turkel.

And Anthony Mendez.

We hung out at Katz’s as long as we could, but the place was so busy that we didn’t feel we could keep our table forever. Eventually we found a table at a Starbucks not too far away and spent a wonderful afternoon talking about everything from the joys of being a Dad to how to field strip an M-16. OK. I made up that last part, but we did cover a wide variety of topics, including some stuff about voiceover, of course.

We met up with Philip Banks, Elaine Singer, Moe Egan, Liz de Nesnera, Melissa Exelberth and Elisa Cañas and then made our way across the street to the Boca Chica for our dinner. Also joining us was John Florian of VoiceOverXtra.

Doug Turkel and Philip Banks, sitting across the table from me.

Just to my right were Liz de Nesnera and Elisa Cañas.

Across the table and next to Philip Banks was Melissa Exelberth.

Also with us at the dinner, but of whom I don’t have good photos were Peter O’Connell, Tony Impieri, and Lee Gordon.

Making a dramatic, late, appearance were DB Cooper …

… and her husband DeWitt Hardy, Mary McKitrick and Mandy Nelson. And and even later and more dramatic appearance was made by Pam Tierney. Oh, what a wonderful evening of fun, laughter and joyous conversation it was.

And things were just getting started, because after our dinner we walked across the street and down a block to the White Rabbit for the New York VO Mixer organized by Erik Sheppard and his Voice Talent Productions. With Erik was the lovely and talented Lindsay Reiss.

One of the more dramatic moments during the mixer was at the end of the “door prizes” when Erik announced that Lindsey had won a prize, then pulled out a small box, knelt to one knee and asked Lindsey to marry him. Fortunately for Erik she said “yes.”

It so much fun meeting Elaine Singer before the event, and seeing and spending time with Doug Turkel again for much of the day.

One of the highlights of the mixer for me was getting to meet Dave DeAndrea in person.

Dave Courvoisier taught Bob Bergen how to tweet from the floor of the event. (OK, not really. Tthey were talking, but about what I don’t know.)

Here’s a shot of the crowded floor from near one end.

Getting a hug from Pam Tierney.

And it was a great delight to see September Day Leach at the Mixer, too.

Aside from the music being so loud it was almost impossible to hold a conversation and the name tags being hard to read, it was a whole lot of fun. I’m very glad I went. Thank you Erik and congratulations Erik and Lindsay. May you have much happiness and a long life together.