Youthful-looking Ogden native enjoys career as character actor

Gedde Watanabe will turn 50 this year, and he's been in movies and televison shows ranging from the recent "Alfie" remake to a recurring part on TV's "ER." But he is still most recognized for his first film, "Sixteen Candles," made more than 20 years ago, in which he played a teenager although he was approaching 30 at the time.

"I still get that all the time on the street," Watanabe said by phone from his Los Angeles home. "It's kind of mind-boggling. People tell me I don't look older, but I don't see that.

"I look at Anthony Michael (Hall) and John Cusack — and they really were 16 when we made that film. They were really going through puberty, but I already went."

Watanabe laughs as he says this. In fact, he laughs a lot throughout the interview, and says he's quite happy with his career as a character actor, though it's had its ups and downs.

The Ogden native says it's difficult as a Japanese-American to overcome stereotypes, and he knows many Asian-American actors who don't get much work, so he feels fortunate that he's kept himself busy on the stage and on the big and small screens for the past 30 years or so.

Right now he's promoting Disney's straight-to-video animated sequel "Mulan II," which was released this week. Watanabe reprises his voice-role as the bumbling Ling, a comic character he originated for the first "Mulan."

Watanabe said he is pleased with the finished product, and he enjoys doing voice work; he's also done "The Simpsons" and some Nickelodeon cartoons.

Though he does sing — he began his show-biz career as a street singer in San Francisco — Watanabe said he didn't do the singing for Ling in "Mulan." "I actually created this character voice, but then I couldn't hit the high note. I said to them, 'You know, he would do that — he just has a cracky voice.' But they didn't buy it."

He enjoys doing animation voice-work because it's such an easy gig. "You get in, and you get out. It took three years to make the first 'Mulan,' and I think I went in there six or seven times. The same with this one. It's a great job."

It's also a little scary because each actor performs solo, isolated in a booth, with no interaction with the other actors. "That's where you ultimately have to trust the director. Also, they gave the script in parts, in sections, and they were always rewriting, adding things. You kind of had to be reminded where you were at."

Watanabe was born and raised in Ogden, and his mother and some other family members still live in Roy. He says he returns a couple of times each year to visit.