The beloved stop-motion animation series, Wallace & Gromit, is back with a new movie, Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl, now streaming on Netflix. But unfortunately, a core member of the family is missing: Wallace’s longtime voice actor, Peter Sallis, who died in 2017 at the age of 96.
But you wouldn’t know it from the movie. Ben Whitehead, the new voice of Wallace, does such a seamless impression of Sallis, that one doubts most viewers will even notice the change.
“When Peter Sallis passed away, it was of course incredibly sad,” said Wallace & Gromit creator Nick Park, in an interview for the new movie’s press notes. “What he brought to Wallace the character was irreplaceable really, so that gave us a big problem.”
As Merlin Crossingham—who co-directed the new movie with Park—explained in that same interview, it was a no-brainer for the team when it came to who would voice the bumbling, British inventor in this new film.
“Ben Whitehead, who is now the voice of Wallace, was actually Peter’s understudy,” Crossingham said. “Over the years we’ve worked very closely with him and for us it’s been a very natural progression. For everybody outside, it’s quite a new thing, but Ben has done Wallace’s voice for a good eleven years or so.”
Who voices Wallace in the new Wallace and Gromit movie on Netflix, Wallace and Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl?
Wallace is voiced by British actor Ben Whitehead in Wallace and Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl. Originally from Cheshire, England, Whitehead has been working with Aardman Animations on the Wallace & Gromit films since 2003. He voiced the character of Mr. Leaching in the 2005 feature film, Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit, and also acted as a stand-in for Sallis in certain scenes.
“I had the pleasure and honor of working with Peter on Curse of the Were-Rabbit,” Whitehead said in an interview for the Vengeance Most Fowl press notes. “I was a ‘read in’ actor, but it just so happened that I could do his voice, so it was helpful for the other actors when they were recording their lines. Peter was a brilliant guy to work with, and I’m so glad I got the chance to be in the same room as him.”
Whitehead was also already the voice of Wallace in the 2009 Wallace & Gromit’s Grand Adventures video game. Needless to say, he was the most experienced candidate for the job!
“There are always challenges to approach a character that someone else has done,” Whitehead said. “You take as much as you can from what Peter brought to this character, which was really created with Peter Sallis in mind, but then you have to bring your own characterization. There’s a musicality to the way Peter talks, the inflections and the elongated vowels, which very much influenced the character of Wallace, but it’s important not to focus too much on that.”
Whatever Whitehead did, it absolutely worked. He completely embodies Wallace in the new film, from every verbal tic and unique inflection. A smashing, cracking job!
