Mark Moseley’s living room overlooks the pool that Mushu built _ well, almost built.
In Disney’s new animated film Mulan, Eddie Murphy is the voice of Mushu, a lovable, somewhat bumbling dragon. When Murphy’s tight filming schedule did not permit him time to create the voice for tie-in merchandise, Disney needed a sound-alike.
Enter Moseley.
“It’s a dream come true,” says the morning radio personality for WPWR-FM (96.5) in Miami. “Ever since I was a little kid, I’ve looked up to Walt Disney.”
Now, cradling a soft, talking dragon that speaks with his recorded voice, Moseley holds a piece of the Magic Kingdom in his hand.
Thanks to his near flawless re-creation of Murphy’s voice, Moseley can be heard yukking it up as Mushu on CD-rom games, talking books, a talking bank and a talking phone.
Power-96 fans recognize Moseley as the fast-talking gangsta Tyrone or perhaps that delicate diva of dubious sexuality known as Dion. Thanks to the endless stream of material from the Beltway, Moseley also has perfected a Bill Clinton persona that raps and routinely shares insights from local strip clubs.
“The best thing about Dad’s voice is that he can make [the different personas) fight,” says Chris, Moseley’s 16-year-old son. Like father, Chris easily shifts into character voice and then back.
Tyrone is one radio character known to Moseley’s fans as a talker prone to outbursts. He is always ready with a get-rich-quick scheme. Though his schemes are on the dark side of shady, even Tyrone would be impressed with the prosperity to be wrought from giving voice to a Disney character.
Moseley’s Cinderella story goes like this:
A commercial for an Orlando car dealer featured Moseley impersonating Eddie Murphy. While the spot was airing, Mulan’s producers were in Orlando working on the film. The studio needed someone to do scratch-tracks _ a temporary recording that would allow the filmmakers to hear dialogue. Murphy wasn’t available.
“So they heard my voice and called me to fill in,” Moseley says.
One small step for Mushu, one giant step for Moseley’s backyard pool.
“I remember thinking, ‘What if they really, really like me and I get to do all the voices for the product line.’ “
When Moseley went for the recording, he says the studio folks were a bit taken aback. “I had a little fun with them,” he admits. “I could see that look in their faces, like they thought I was the wrong guy.”
Although he has perfected the streetwise wisecracking of Murphy, Moseley’s appearance is less than urban. In fact, with his white skin and light brown hair, he is as visually different from Murphy as his voice is similar.
“I heard him and I thought he was great. Then I saw him and he was Mr. Wonderbread,” says Rick Dempsey, Disney’s vice president of character voices.
Dempsey’s office oversees all Disney characters to maintain the “integrity and continuity” of their voices. Though the studio shoots for the stars when it comes to product voices _ Demi Moore and James Earl Jones are a few of the big-name actors who did recordings for toys _ Dempsey says Mushu loses nothing in Moseley’s interpretation.
“I think he does a phenomenal job as that character,” Dempsey says.
Moseley’s wife, Marie, says she thinks her husband’s fortune is karma. “He loves anything that has to do with the Orient,” she says. “If I’d let him, he’d have bamboo hanging all over the place.”
Since Mulan comes from the China and it is Disney’s 36th annimated feature _ Mark is 36 _ Marie says the whole thing seems meant to be.
Moseley shakes his head. “That’s just a coincidence,” he says.
Even so, Moseley’s success as an impersonator is no coincidence. He grew up in Hattiesburg, Miss., where he got his first radio gig at 16. “The big voice back then was Andy Kaufman,” Moseley says. “He was a big part of my repertoire.”
Moseley had a scholarship to study art, and his mother thought he’d turn his love for drawing into a successful career as a commercial artist. That vision, though, was not to be.
“At the time I didn’t see any need to be back in school again. I was just so into the radio station at the time,” Moseley says.
So he dropped out of the University of Southern Mississippi and moved around a lot until coming to Power-96 in 1986.
Since then he has honed his voice and his skill. Along with his radio personas, he also does celebrity impersonations for ads. He used to imitate Murphy for Church’s Chicken, but “he made us stop,” Moseley says. Now he can be heard as Homer Simpson for Church’s.
Moseley goes out back and stands at the edge of his nearly completed pool. His wife quips, “We should build a Mushu fountain out here,” she says.
Back inside, Moseley shifts from playful to wistful.
“I was in a Disney store last night and heard a woman was playing with one of the Mushu dolls say, ‘I’ve got to see that movie.’ I can’t explain what it was like, hearing my voice and knowing it would be part of the Disney history.”
