She Doesn't Sound Like an Old Essex

Yes, she was known for cartoons. And, yes, she was known for being Talky Tina. And, yes, she appeared on records and radio with Stan Freberg. But June Foray did so much more than this during her career.

June’s vocal qualities were in demand to loop dialogue. In other words, after a film was completed, June would be called in to dub over the voice of someone on screen for whatever reason.

Here’s a syndicated newspaper column that began appearing around November 20, 1959 that talked about her dubbing work.

Rigging Isn't Just for the Quiz Shows
Body is the Body Of the TV Star ... But Her Voice is the Voice of 'Ghost'
By HAL HUMPHRIES
HOLLYWOOD Since the national sport at the moment is exposing everything on TV which isn't strictly on the up-and-up, you may as well have the facts about some of those sexy starlets emoting on your home screen.
Male viewers, especially, must have noticed that these young glamor queens usually possess soft, sultry voices.
As an example, in a recent Laramie episode a well-upholstered heroine looked into a cowpoke's eye and purred, "You've got to take me with you," with a come-hither voice Mae West would envy.
In real life, as it happens, this particular damsel's vocal chords sound like the starter on an old Essex.
THE DULCET TONES you heard were those of a diminutive ex-radio actress by the name of June Foray.
Miss Foray is a voice bootlegger. And she is so busy dubbing her repertoire of voices for TV "actresses" that she has difficulty finding time for her stock in trade TV and radio commercials.
During the past year the vari-voiced Miss Foray has been used to cover up vocal deficiencies in just about every Western on TV, besides some of the top adventure shows, including 77 Sunset Strip.
ONE OF HER MOST recent jobs was "looping" (dubbing) all of the dialogue for a heroine on CBS' Rawhide. The gal in the role had a shape like Marilyn Monroe, but she talked with a Brooklyn accent thicker than Mabel Flapsaddle's.
Miss Foray sat in a projection room, adjusted a pair of earphones on her, then waited for each of Miss Glamour's scenes to be repeated on the screen. Cue lines were marked on the film, and as each one came up, Miss Foray read aloud each line of dialogue.
It is a tricky process, because Miss Foray must "lip-sync" her words to match the lip movements of the girl on the screen. Her voice is then duly recorded on tape and later inserted into the film.
NOW I CAN HEAR someone out there in the audience asking, "Why did they hire this dame with the Brooklyn accent in the first place?"
That, dear viewers, must be answered very delicately. There are cases where the fresh young starlet is a "close friend" of eomeone who pulls a lot of weight on the show.
In other cases, Miss Glamour has a voice like a fishwife's but has other talents, as noted, which compensate for that shortcoming.
THERE ARE TIMES, too, when a voice deficiency is not noticed until too late. Perhaps Miss Glamour has a leaky lisp, which is not detected until the first "dailies" or "rushes" are run off. Production can't be held up while a new girl is cast, so Miss Glamour lisps her way through the show.
An emergency call is put in for Miss Foray or one of the other half-dozen other good voice-dubbers in Hollywood, and Miss Glamour is given a siren's voice to match the rest of her equipment.
MISS FORAY charges $150 for the first two hours of her services! $350 for an eight-hour day.
At this rate she frequently makes more money than the sex-wagon who is borrowing her voice.
NO ONE ELSE doing this work has the range of Miss Foray. For an episode of "The Deputy" she recently dubbed the voice of a small boy, who during rehearsal had picked up his mother's dialect as she coached him in his lines.
Stan Freberg uses Miss Foray for many of the characters in his records and commercials.
"I used to eat my heart out, want to be an actress that people could see," she says, "but now I'm happy just going to the bank."
WITH TV'S SUDDEN passion for doing nothing to deceive its audience, I'm sure that Miss Foray will soon be getting billing at least "Body by Simone LaRue; Voice by June Foray."