Impressionist Jim Meskimen does Shakespeare in celebrity voices

Celebrity impersonator Jim Meskimen recites Shakespeare in many different voices.

Impressionist Jim Meskimen Does Shakespeare in Celebrity Voices (Via Blame in on the Voices)

Mark Frauenfelder is the founder of Boing Boing and the editor-in-chief of MAKE and Cool Tools. Twitter: @frauenfelder. Come and hear Mark speak at the ALA conference in Chicago on July 1.

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http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001906538909 Virgil McGee

I’m not quite clear on what this guy does.
tightlines

Most impressionists, while good at mimicking others, have one glaring weakness: they are not funny. At all. See Caliendo, Frank.
wrybread

Interesting how the first thing he does when he enters each character is make his mouth look like theirs.
bcsizemo

You just about wouldn’t need anyone else to do a Pixar movie… (possibly a female equivalent?)
Dave Faris

I used to have XM radio and they’d play Frank Caliendo on their stand-up comedy channels all the time. I’d say his biggest problem is timing. He’d switch back and forth between voices and characters so fast, it was too hard to follow. But he does a mean John Madden.
herrnichte

There’s what BoingBoing has been lacking! Entertaining commercials.
Luke Butcher

I’m not particularly impressed. None of the voices were spot-on, and only the really distinctive ones (Walken, Stewart, Bush) were even that recognisable without the names coming up. I can do a better Woody Allen… and Ricky Gervais sounds nothing like that. Sorry to be so critical, but impressions aren’t very entertaining unless they’re really good, or you have something funny to say.
jackrabbitslim

Oh, I don’t know. The dose makes the poison and, in this case, the juxtaposition of impressions and the coordination with the visual imagery of Clarence’s dream really worked for me. Also, this dude was on the second season of Parks and Recreation and was mocked really hard for his impressions. So, +1 for him
simonbarsinister

Uncanny impressions + scathing satire of the famous personality = win.

Good impressions reading the equivalent of “Ipsum Lorem”… not so much…
http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C3DV3XTTCY22LQA5VFROFXYBMM Kenneth

tough crowd
Iscah

If you can’t appreciate the difference between Richard III and Lorem Ipsum text, it’s hard to know where to start in pitying you.

I loved that he chose different sections of the speech that were perfect for the characterizations of the men he was doing impressions of, especially Woody Allen.
http://twitter.com/illexius A. J. H.

Impressions aren’t meant to be carbon copies, they’re mostly meant to be satirical. Some voices are hit or miss, but I nearly jumped out of my seat when I heard his Morgan Freeman voice it was so spot on.

His Peter Lorre, Burgess Meredith, and Tommy Lee Jones impressions were scarily accurate as well. (From the second video linked to near the end.)
Smash Martian

For more of this sort of thing, there’s the one-man play MacHomer (Simpsons do Macbeth) and the utter genius that was Peter Sellers doing “A Hard Day’s Night” in the style of Laurence Olivier’s Richard III
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLEMncv140s
- Pete Allen
  
  that just made my week. thanks for sharing!
http://chawedrosin.wordpress.com/ Lola Rogers

Very clever. It’s better the second time, once you get the hang of noticing who is speaking and what they’re saying at the same time. I like the way he chose the voice to fit the passage (Ron Howard, Jimmy Stewart, Simon Cowell). And it seems to me his impressions are very good. The Johnny Carson is uncanny.
Gulliver

This guy rocks. I’d even maybe watch Letterman if he was on it.
Darwindr

Pretty good impressions. Even more impressive to me is the fact that Jim was on the original Who’s Line Is It Anyway? and designed secondary characters for the original Thundercats. (oh, and his real mom is Mrs. Cunningham, Marion Ross)

That’s one cool cat.
L_Mariachi

He’s picking pretty easy targets. Anyone can do a passable-enough Peter Lorre or Christopher Walken to be recognizable as such. Edward G. Robinson, Jimmy Cagney, etc. The reaction is generally “Hey, I know who that is!” Where this guy adds a level is in attaching prosaic impersonations to particularly appropriate segments of the monologue, as per Iscah.

Nyah! Nyah! See?
http://www.facebook.com/jim.meskimen Jim Ross Meskimen

I’m delighted you all could find something, at least, to like in this video of mine. For more, visit my YouTube channel.