channel4.com
July 1, 2003

British actor Joseph Fiennes found providing the voice for a cartoon character harder work than filming a real-life movie. The hunky Killing Me Softly star spent two years recording the voice for the character Proteus in new Dreamworks animation Sinbad: Legend of the Sevene Seas.

Joseph says, "Doing Sinbad took me two years. Wherever I was filming; they set up a studio between Los Angeles and the film location and I would do a couple of hours work every two months. It was like an adventure."

However, cartoons have been a strong part of Joseph's life. He adds, "My dad had a big collection of black and white silent films - Charlie Chaplin and Mickey Mouse - and showed them on a projector.

"That's where I witnessed animation for the first time and fell in love with it. I still remember the noise of the reel and suddenly there was Chaplin on the screen. So it wasn't The Simpsons that created my love of animation, it goes right back to when I was five."