Women in VO: Cree Summer

From California where she was born, to the Red Pheasant Reserve in Sascatchewan, to the dozens upon dozens of roles she’s played on the screen and behind the mic, Cree Summer is an acting powerhouse. Her father was Don Francks, a Canadian actor and musician, and her mother was Lili Clark, an adopted member of the Plains Cree First nations. She has a younger brother named Rainbow Sun Francks, who is a music DJ. Cree and her family traveled and worked around British Columbia for the first few years of her life, until Cree started school in Toronto at age 8.

Early Life

Cree credits her father with some of her start in the acting business. Don Francks was a voice actor and screen actor in Canada, so she was able to make an early start at age 11 behind the mic with his help. An early major role of hers was the niece of Inspector Gadget, Penny. Her voice was easily recognizable to viewers, so she was cast in many parts throughout the eighties in blockbuster series, like the Care Bears Movie, and Ewoks.

It wasn’t long before her face became as recognizable as her voice, with the Cosby Show Spin off, A Different World. She played Winnifred “Freddie” Brooks, and was a regular cast member on that show from 1988 until the end of it’s run in 1993. She made guest appearances on other live action shows like Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, and Living Single. While she was on these on camera shows, she also continued working on her voice acting career. The show The Real Ghostbusters made a format change in 1988, increasing it’s on air time from a half hour to an hour, and making it’s content more youthful and humor oriented. Cree voiced the part of Chilly Cooper, the neighborhood ice cream woman, and the love interest of Slimer.

1990s-2000s

Over the next 20 years, Cree voiced over a hundred roles in all kinds of cartoons. She was Elmyra Duff in Tiny Toon adventures, a role she later reprised in Pinky, Elmyra, and The Brain. She played Mary Melody, or Pela in WB’s Histeria, Cleo the Poodle in Clifford the Big Red Dog, Suzie Carmichael in Rugrats, Valerie Grey in Danny Phantom, Foxxy Love in Drawn together, Numbuh 5 in Codename: Kids Next Door, Dulcy the Dragon in Sonic the Hedgehog,Penelope in Barbie As Rapunzel, octogenarian villain Granny May on WordGirl, Tiff from Nickelodeon’s My Life as a Teenage Robot, and Blackarachnia in Transformers: Animated. he also played a role in “Scooby Doo Mystery Incorporated” as Lady Marmalad in the episode The Haunting.

Videogames

She also lent her voice to numerous video game titles. These include Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance, BLACK, as well as Tony Hawk’s American Wasteland. She voiced Auriel in Diablo 3,[8] and reprised the role for Heroes of the Storm. She was also the voice of Tandi in Fallout and First Citizen Lynette in Fallout 2, Tatjana in Arc the Lad: Twilight of the Spirits, Lady Belgemine, Young Tidus and additional voice-overs in Final Fantasy X, Lenne/Calli in Final Fantasy X-2, Storm in Marvel Super Hero Squad, Cynder in The Legend of Spyro: A New Beginning, Magma in X-Men Legends, and the Inca Princess Micay in Pitfall: The Lost Expedition.

She had a small role in Mass Effect. She also did miscellaneous voices in World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria. She reprised her voice of She-Hulk in Marvel Super Hero Squad: The Infinity Gauntlet. She also voiced Kit Brinny in the introduction video for the MMORPG Wildstar. She provides the voice of vampire derby girl Roller Brawl in the Skylanders series. She has also voiced Professor Penelope Young, a minor character original in Batman: Arkham Asylum.

Disney

Cree also played Princess ‘Kida’ Kidagarsh in the Disney movie and franchise of Lost Atlantis. She has voiced that this is a favorite role, and shared frustration that Kida is not included in the main line of Disney Princesses. ““I just feel like it’s bullshit. I feel like Kida gets the crap end of the stick, she’s in the back of the bus. She’s just a beautiful representation of powerful womanhood, and being a brown girl. It bums me out because Kida is a princess and she’ll always be a princess. I think there’s something to it too for all of us brown little freaks. I think it makes us push a little more and realize that we still have some fighting to do.” Kida surely deserves a place in Disney Princess canon alongside all the growing number of Black and Princesses of Color.

Music

In addition to her other talents, Cree Summer has also performed music most of her life. She joined her first band at the age of 13 and has been using her voice as a part of her career ever since. She sang background vocals for her A Different World castmate, Jasmine Guy’s self titled LP. During the next several years, she had ups and downs with various recording companies, most of the disagreements coming about because the labels thought her music was too political.

Cree became friends with Lisa Bonet and Lenny Kravitz, and Lenny joined her on and also produced a solo album called Street Faerie. She went on tour with Lenny as his opening act, but unfortunately the label dropped her shortly after, and a planned tour stop at Lillith Fair was canceled, although the label continued to promote her album.

A number of Summer’s portrayed animated characters are singers or sing songs within the soundtrack of a show. The character of Susie in All Grown Up! was portrayed as a singer with real talent, allowing Summer to sing in the role. Summer also sings the opening theme song for All Grown Up!. The character of Foxxy Love in Drawn Together was a singer, Numbuh 5 from Codename: Kids Next Door sang a lullaby. Elmyra Duff sang several times on Tiny Toon Adventures.

She co-performed lead vocals in the song “Cool Kitty” with friend and frequent co-star Tara Strong, which accompanied a cartoon called Class of 3000, directed and written for Cartoon Network by André 3000. She provided the voice of a recurring pomegranate singer in The High Fructose Adventures of Annoying Orange. Her character Priscilla on Sheriff Callie’s Wild West also sings many times.

The freedom of Voice Acting

Despite her lengthy list of accomplishments, Cree Summer stays humble, and also has an abiding love for voice acting. This article quotes her as saying, “I love doing both voiceovers and on camera acting, but I really like the freedom I get in voice acting,” she explained. “I really get into a character, and use its traits, age, and even jaw and teeth type to determine how I should do its voice. Another positive aspect of voice overs is the closeness of everyone in the whole community. It’s like being a part of a unique club, where everyone respects one another. It’s not like the music business, or live acting, where certain people will see others as competition. I am blown away and humbled when I walk in the studio and see a woman who can do eight character voices and none of them sound the same! Another reason there’s no uptight attitude about competition is because all of us are silly people and love our job.”