Warner Bros. Japan released an interview with Mr. Patrick Seitz (English dubbing creative lead for STEEL BALL RUN JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure) on June 4, titled “Chronicle of the Journey of Creation - Enjoy STEEL BALL RUN with English Dub and Japanese Subtitles,” for Japanese audiences.
Today, we are pleased to present the full interview with Mr. Seitz in English.

As you read this insight-filled interview, we hope you’ll look forward to the 2nd STAGE coming to Netflix later this year.

The Response after the Release

◆Since the streaming release of STEEL BALL RUN JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure (hereafter, SBR), the series has received a tremendous response in Japan-how has it been received in the United States? Could you share your impressions of SBR’s popularity from your perspective?

PS: Everyone I’ve spoken to about SBR since its streaming release has been very enthusiastic, whether they’re longtime fans of the manga who already know what to expect, or viewers who are experiencing it for the first time as an anime. For as long as I’ve been involved with JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure over the years as Dio, I’m always amazed to discover how the fandom here in the US gets bigger and more ardent with each passing year. If someone knows JoJo, they love JoJo—and they love to share it with as many people in their lives as possible. I foresee a lot of SBR fans bringing their friends into the fold, which is great.

Experience of Portraying Dio Brando

◆You have portrayed Dio Brando throughout the JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure series. From your point of view, how do you see the appeal of the JoJo series as a whole, and what do you find most compelling about the character of Dio?

PS: To me, the JoJo series is gripping, action-packed narrative filled with beautiful people doing cool stuff in a high-stakes, high-concept version of our world. It’s stylish, brutal, though-provoking… and always bizarre in the best of ways.

When it comes to Dio, I honestly so appreciate his enduring hatred of the Joestar family and his unyielding lust for power. It’s all well and good to have antagonists with redeeming qualities if you dig deep enough, but every now and then you just want a character to be very good at being very horrible, and Dio excels at villainy. I’ve heard him described as a “generational hater,” and I think that’s apt. In some ways, he reminds me of Iago from Shakespeare’s Othello (whom I’ve never gotten to portray, but who’s on my acting bucket list). When Dio puts on the Stone Mask and rejects his humanity, he doesn’t hold back—and I respect that resolve, horrible as it is.

Appeal of SBR

◆In SBR 1st STAGE, you participated in the production as both Dubbing Director and Casting Director. To begin with, what aspects of SBR personally attracted you to this project?

PS: I had the chance many years ago to do a bit of script-adapting and substitute directing for the English dubs of Phantom Blood and Battle Tendency, and so the opportunity to participate in adapting, casting, and directing SBR 1st STAGE in English felt like coming home, in a sense. I’ve experienced a lot of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure in the meantime, thanks to portraying Dio over the various seasons, and I was excited at the challenge posed by working on SBR in these production capacities. It’s very familiar to me, but very novel and fresh at the same time.

Decisions Made when Casting

◆What criteria did you use when selecting the cast for this production? In particular, could you tell us why you chose Daman Mills for Johnny Joestar and Kaiji Tang for Gyro Zeppeli? We would also love to hear about the appeal of their voices and performances.

PS: I wanted to make sure that SBR 1st STAGE got a diverse cast that meshed well together, one in which folks were excited about the newer faces, and also felt like the ringers and the veterans were employed to their greatest strengths. Having first-hand knowledge of how rigorous of a recording process the JoJo series can be, I also wanted to ensure that everybody had the endurance and the chops for what will ultimately prove a wild story. There are folks in our cast whom I’ve known and respected for 20 years, and folks whom I’d never even met before they walked into the studio for their first session—and all levels of familiarity in-between.

My casting partner Kris Perotti and I listened to hundreds of auditions during the casting of SBR 1st STAGE, a great many of which were for Johnny and Gyro in particular. I’ve worked with both Daman and Kaiji over the years, and respect them both. I didn’t know ahead of time if they’d be my top picks for the roles, per se, but I knew they’d both turn in strong reads.

Daman’s great at portraying Johnny’s headstrong, tempestuous nature, a byproduct of the dizzying highs and lows the character has already experienced at such a young age. Johnny’s circumstances are so unique to him, but the way Daman lays his emotions bare, it feels universal in a way that figuratively and literally takes us along for the ride. A character like Johnny could feel forced or abrasive in the hands of a less adroit actor, but with Daman at the helm, you want the best for him and you want to see the journey through.

Meanwhile, Kaiji is so good at delivering nuance and playing his cards close to his vest as Gyro. He’s much more controlled than Johnny, but just in SBR 1st STAGE alone, we see Gyro be coy, menacing, dismissive, supportive, and competitive. We don’t see his beating heart the way we do with Johnny, but all of those different aspects of Gyro ring true because Kaiji’s doing the work to inhabit his interiority, even if it’s not on full display. Gyro sits in a voice-print that could feel forced or monotonous from someone less experienced, but with Kaiji we hear that engine revving and know the car is primed for action.

Recording Behind-the-scenes

◆During the recording sessions for SBR 1st STAGE, what kind of direction did you give in order to bring out the魅力 (appeal) of characters such as Johnny and Gyro? Were there any especially memorable interactions with the cast?

PS: Thankfully, characters like Johnny and Gyro are so inherently appealing that I never really had to go out of my way during the recording of SBR 1st STAGE to have Daman or Kaiji do more than what was natural to the scene. Between all the thought and care Araki-san put into creating his characters, and the outstanding work David Production (the SBR animation studio) put into bringing the manga to the screen, I felt like I could really just focus on honoring the hard work that had already been done upstream of us in the process by localizing it to the best of my ability.

Some of the memorable 1st STAGE moments with the cast include: laughing at Steven Steel’s turn from confident promoter to weeping crash-out with his voice actor, Jamieson Price; loving everything out of Cedric L. Williams’s mouth as Pocoloco; marveling at the energy Dave B. Mitchell brought to the role of the race announcer; smiling at Damien Haas’s “It’s called technique, you troglodyte” read and knowing I’d passed the Dio torch to the right guy; and realizing during Kaiji and Daman’s sessions that no matter how we tackled any one particular line, overall we were going to be talking about balls… a lot.

To Japanese Audiences

◆When watching SBR with the English dub and Japanese subtitles, it felt like watching an American film or TV drama, which was incredibly enjoyable. We would love Japanese fans to experience this as well—what points would you especially like viewers to pay attention to in the English dub?

PS: First off, I (and the whole SBR English cast/crew) would be honored for Japanese fans to experience our dub. It’s a different experience, to be sure, but we go to the same place—like Gyro cutting through the woods, but still racing to that same finish line at the abandoned church in 1st STAGE.

With SBR being set in America’s past, I feel like it gives us a fun (and legitimate) opportunity with the English dub to really lean into the place and time. Even with how the characters talk, you’ve got folks who get straight to the point like Sandman, and characters who use language as baroque bombast, like Steven Steel and the race announcer. Right out of the gate, Johnny’s narration in 1st STAGE talks about westward expansion in the 1800s, and that spirit—of being the first, the best, the strongest, the last man standing—invigorates the race and the series as a whole. Historically, it was an era full of people with strong wills and big personalities striving for things, for the best and worst of reasons. If ever there was a more appropriate time for folks to start manifesting Stands, I can’t think of it.

To The 2nd STAGE

◆Expectations are already being built for SBR 2nd STAGE. Could you share what you are personally looking forward to, and what you hope fans around the world will be excited about?

PS: I don’t want to delve into spoiler territory, but suffice it to say that I can’t wait to fill in more of the SBR cast and watch (and listen!) as they keep galloping east on this most bizarre of adventures yet…!