Indika Interview
Interview with Isabella Inchbald, Actress for (Indika) in Indika
For call based interviews we try to present the conversation replies as close to verbatim as possible, for context.
A staple I do in all interviews in order to start things off is to ask that you elaborate a bit about your work, and this particular role for those not familiar with it?
Issy: My name is Isabella Inchbald. I'm a voice, stage and screen actress. I've been acting for seven years.
In Indika, you provide the performance for the titular character? Could you tell us a bit about the character and the situation she finds herself in?
Issy: Indika is a nun in the early 1900’s who leaves her monastery and goes on a physical and mental journey with an escaped prisoner by her side and the devil in her head.
When preparing to perform as Indika, were you given any initial direction in regards to the character? Just in terms of an example of prep work to get into the mind set of this particular performance?
Issy: I was given a little bit of back story but you're not given a huge amount in advance. Actually most of the work kind of happens in the studio. Obviously I was given my lines as well but I wasn't given the entire script as in everybody, all the other character’s lines.
The main thing we worked on actually or that a lot of work went into for this one was getting across Russian, a sense of Russianness and the way Russians communicate with each other.
Which is, you know like all countries communicate in a slightly different way so getting the Russian sensibility over whilst doing an English language and an English accent was something that we that we worked on a bit. To sort of get more into the mindset of the characters and the place and stuff.
There are some rather interesting thematic elements to Indika. From religion to culture and to really just being set against a particular era? How do you feel these pressures impacted Indika, and did they have any impact on how you were performing the voice?
Issy: It's funny actually, I'm literally just looking at a Virgin Mary right next to me. So you ask me that question, so how do they impact Indika? I mean they impact her enormously. I mean she's in a constant conversation with the Devil in her head because she's sort of so wrapped up in her religious life and what's good and what's bad but at the same time she's sort of also grappling with her Instinct.
Her instincts and her and her feelings and her doubt over her faith. So I mean it informs all her decisions. I didn't really change my voice when certain topics came up, it was more I changed my voice depending on you know who she was talking to. What she was trying to achieve through the question she was asking or the statement she was making you know.
Whether she's challenging Ilya or trying to apologize to one of the other nuns or it's more I more changed my voice according to the emotion of what was going on rather than necessarily what she was talking about but of course that informs it a bit.
Religion, and the questioning of religion is a big theme in Indika. That’s actually the main driving force behind many of Indika’s decisions. What are your views on how the character sees the religion, the role she’s found herself in at the start of the game and how her devilish pal influences her philosophical queries?
Issy: Well I feel quite sorry for her because, I mean it's all she thinks about but it's also completely normal. You know; those that have faith, not everyone does of course but those that do certainly in Christian faith anyway know that it's completely normal to have to have doubts about your faith sometimes and that they're just you know like ups and downs in life.
You just sort of work through it and try not to worry about it too much. So I think from that point of view she's actually completely normal in terms of being a normal nun she probably isn't a normal nun given that she didn't really choose to be in a monastery and she clearly has sort of doubts of a normal person rather than the doubts that a nun might have.
I am generalizing a bit there but yeah I feel I feel sorry for her because she's constantly torn between her instincts and what she's been told is right or wrong and what she thinks should be right or wrong.
Romance is another element behind the situation Indika finds herself in. What are your thoughts on how she views a youthful love versus potential romance on the road?
Issy: Her youthful love in what kind of happened to make her end up in the monastery. Yeah I feel like that seems like within the game it feels like history. Just history, far away history. That her youthful love story line she feels quite changed as a person I think by the time we're in her real time in the story and it kind of feels like it's starting over with Illya and the way they sort of start sort of touching on romance but they don't quite
They don't quite get there. It feels like a couple of teenagers in a really sweet way whereas obviously the first storyline's an absolute disaster. I mean, well I won't go into what happens with her and Illya because I don't want to give any spoilers but yeah so I'll stop there.
What’s it like to see your voice and movement attached to a game character?
Issy: It's awesome! It's so cool, well I mean it's so cool when getting to play characters and bringing the voice to all these emotions of a different person. It's a great honor, I love doing it. I love doing it.
When performing the role, were there any particular lines or moments that really stuck out to you? Whether that’s a behind the scenes moment or from the dialogue?
Issy: I love that conversation she has with the devil when she's in that moment where she can't do anything worse than this. I won't say what that it is obviously but I just think it's really beautifully written and we worked a bit more on that bit than other bits and I love how it's been put into the trailer.
The fair, unfair trailer. I think that's been beautifully done and Incorporated that part of the script in it. Every time I watch it I'm like I get it I just think it's so well done. I mean the whole game is well done but yeah that really stuck out to me.
I think it's very moving it's an out it's yeah I'm articulating myself very badly again but yeah I think that one that bit particularly stuck out to me. Also doing the song I won't forget doing the song. The song was quite hard, I do sing but it's a Russian lullaby the song and I only had a sort of very synthetically song to kind of learn it and it really jumps octaves.
So when you're in a sort of big theater and you’re belting out the octaves that it's easier than sort of trying to keep it really small and casual and it sort of goes all over the place you probably can't tell in the final sort of recording in the final edit but yeah that was. I remember sort of trying to learn that and trying to record it successfully which I hope we did in the end.
Context for behind the scenes on the back and forth between Indika and the Devil?
Issy: Yeah you know I actually never recorded with the devil himself so the director would read the devil's lines if the devil hadn't recorded them. If the devil had recorded his lines, it kind of varied then they would play his lines in between me doing my lines.
That's one of the sort of unique challenges about video game recording that you don't really get in other voice recording that you don't really, you often don't record with the other characters in the room.
So you can't bounce off each other in a physical sense at all in a kind of energy sense obviously you're not you're not necessarily physically acting but in a kind of energy sense you don't have them to bounce off. I'm glad that it came off well and that the rapport seems a success.
How do you personally view the ending of Indika, or well the conclusion of her story in the game?
Issy: I think it's pretty tragic. It really upset me when Ilya. Spoilers. I think it's really upsetting when Ilya sort of throws Indika to the guys with the guns in the church. That felt like such betrayal after the long journey they'd come on and then the very end. I mean it's supposed to kind of be ambiguous, you're supposed to make your own mind up about it aren't you.
I think it's really interesting that only really at that point do we have or I think it's only really towards the very end that we're suddenly the POV is Indika’s as then you can't, as then we're not looking at the back of the head we're literally in her head looking in the mirror and she's you know trying to use the Kudets to get rid of, get rid of the devil out of her head and just every time she looks in the mirror he's there and then he's not and you think has it worked.
It sort of, l I mean he's not there but it doesn't feel like something. I don't feel like we've been building up to this point where she, where that's actually going to work is it? I don't know the environment just doesn't I don't know it's kind of injected with just huge doubt really.
I think that's the sense I get when I when I watched that bit and when she's then turned around and she's looking around I when that happened I was sort of looking for the devil expecting to see him again and you don't but I don't think you're filled with yay hope that she's got rid of him and now everything's going to be great. I think it's quite sort of sad and morbid the ending.
You were also part of As Dusk Falls which was another experience I enjoyed, what was the voice work like on that project?
Issy: The voice work on that one was really fun actually. My main character was Deputy Coburn but I played lots of other little characters as well and try to remember all the different bits but for example like the weather woman on the TV and things like that.
It's always great fun when you're playing all these different parts and trying to make them all sound different but it's all within America so they've all got to you know they all had I think I gave them different American accents and then I was you know you sort of have these sort of there was a party scene where I had to just improvise characters in a high school scene.
Just in a high school party scene just on my own just for as long as possible like a girlfriend getting pissed off with her boyfriend for flirting with that girl and this girl get getting really drunk and you know and maybe they're all the same person maybe they're all the different people they sort of mash it up at the end to create a sort of scape of sorts I suppose. So yeah it was great fun, it was great fun and Interior Night was a lovely company to work with.
Do you see yourself being interested in additional game related performances in the future?
Issy: Absolutely. I hope so yeah. I mean it's yeah I love working in video games so yeah I hope I hope to do many more.
Lastly I would like to leave a spot for you to say something or go over anything I might have missed during the interview?
Issy: To go on tour with a stage play, it's only in the UK though. You're in Canada aren't you so I'm not sure you'll see it but yeah I'm about to do that it's called “Dial M for Mayhem” and we open at the Morban Theatres and we're going all around the UK later this summer and into autumn. Yeah I've also started writing, I've started writing screenplays so watch this space it's something I'm really excited about pursuing.
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