"The main character is a guy just like me. I wouldn't even have to act, just be myself."
— Johnny Fontane, The Godfather
When a character in a film, TV show, or other form of media shares details of their heritage, upbringing, and/or backstory with the actor playing them. When this material and information is written to be a vital part of the character and story, it runs into Meta Casting.
While this may seem like a trivial case of Cast the Expert, there are very justified reasons for following this trope, at least when it comes to race and ethnicity. In the United States, for example, the Screen Actors Guild requires that an actor at least partially share the ethnic background of whatever character they're playing, precisely to avoid blackface, yellowface, and other offensive ethnic caricatures. While this isn't required for voice acting, nowadays it's strongly preferred to cast a voice actor who shares the character's ethnicity. Sometimes it happens in reverse as well, where the actor is cast first, and the character's family and ethnic background are then based on the actor's, such as a biracial actor being given biracial siblings and interracial parents whenever the character's family makes an appearance.
One area where this becomes controversial is sexuality and gender identity. Whether or not an LGBTQ character must be played by a matching actor is the subject of ongoing debate; many say the role should simply go to the best actor who auditions even if they're straight, while others think openly-queer actors should be encouraged to represent themselves onscreen after a history of exclusion. But many jurisdictions (including California and New York) have non-discrimination employment laws that make it illegal for producers to specify that they want a queer actor in casting calls. Ironically, such laws are meant to protect LGBTQ people in the workplace.
When this goes from a minor detail to the focus of the story, it can be an example of Real Life Writes the Plot. Compare The Danza (where the character and the actor share a name), Disabled Character, Disabled Actor (where a character and the actor portraying them have the same disability), Actor Plays Their Own Relative (where an actor is related to the character they are playing) and Queer Character, Queer Actor (where a character and their actor are both part of the LGBT+ community).
Examples subpages:
Other examples:
Anime and Manga
- Many anime characters with a Kansai dialect are usually voiced by people from the Kansai region.
- Akiba Maid War: Jenya, who voices Zoya, has a very similar background to her character; they're both Russians who grew up in the former Soviet Union and later went to live in Japan. Jenya even worked part-time in Akihabara (where the anime takes place) after first arriving there in 2005.
- Alya Sometimes Hides Her Feelings in Russian: Russian-American Sarah Natochenny voices the titular Russian-Japanese character Alisa "Alya" Mikhailovna Kujou in the English dub.
- Black Butler:
- In the dub of the Public School Arc, some characters are voiced by actual Brits such as Kieran Flitton as Violet and Ciarán Strange as McMillian.
- In the dub of the Emerald Witch Arc, Ludger, a German Grim Reaper, is voiced by Damien Haas, who's originally from Germany.
- Bocchi the Rock!: Eliza Shimizu and her voice actress, Sally Amaki, were both born in an English-speaking countrynote and moved to Japan in their late teens.
- The Devil is a Part-Timer!: Mao's English voice actor, Jessie James Grelle, mentioned in a commentary that they used to work in Sonic in Clifton, Texas as a part-timer before they became an actor. And like Mao, they also ran into the broken appliance at one point, which in this case was the griller. Jessie also added that their classmates were trying to make fun of them.
- In Fire Force, Captain Akitaru Ōbi's English voice actor, Jeremy Inman, was once a career firefighter/paramedic and a hazardous materials technician before becoming a full-time voice actor.
- Girls und Panzer: Sumire Uesaka studied and majored in Russian language at a Japanese university and so she was cast as Nonna, the second-in-command of the Soviet-themed Pravda tank team. Later in the movie, she was joined by Klara, who was, unlike Nonna who is ethnically Japanese, was Russian and voiced by the aforementioned Jenya.
- In K, the Silver King, Adolf K. Weismann, who is German, is voiced by Tetsuya Kakihara, who grew up in Germany and speaks fluent German. Averted in that, as of the first two seasons and Missing Kings, he hasn't spoken German in the show... but at least one more animation project has been greenlit, so it could (and should) happen. (He hasn't had the most screentime, since he's spent the series thus far body-swapped with Daisuke Namikawa's character, but he's back in his original body as of the end of Return of Kings).
- Lady!!: Sarah Frances Russell is a Christian, and in the Arabic dub, she is voiced by Reem Saadeh, a Jordanian Christian.
- In Neon Genesis Evangelion, most of the characters have the same birthday as their original Japanese voice actors.
- In the Ranma ½ 2023 remake, Laotian-Taiwanese-Chinese-American Grace Lu plays the Chinese Amazon Shampoo, giving the character more accurate-sounding Mandarin as well an authentic Chinese accent when speaking English, averting the You No Take Candle from the 1989 dub.
- Shouwa Genroku Rakugo Shinjuu: Many of the major voice actors and actresses were chosen due to their prior experience in rakugo. Rakugo and voice acting are quite similar in that one uses their voice to portray characters, sometimes by changing one's voice.
- Summer Time Rendering: A few of the voice actors, such as Saho Shirasu (Mio) and Katsuyuki Konishi (Masahito), are natives of Wakayama prefecture who can naturally speak the region's unique variant of the Kansai dialect just like the characters they voice.
- Why does Tsubasa Kazenari from Symphogear sing enka (Japanese folk music) when she goes to karaoke with Hibiki and Miku in episode 9? Must be because Nana Mizuki spent most of her childhoodnote being trained to sing enka and participating in enka singing contests and jobs
before she finally debuted as a voice actress/singer in 3rd-year high school. Normally, young people don't sing enka when they casually hang out with friends...
- Tobe! Isami: Japanese-American Isami Hanaoka is voiced by the Japanese-American Rumiko Varnes.
- Tweeny Witches: Three-quarters Japanese, one-quarter Vietnamese Yuuki Tai provides the voice of Lennon, the son of a Japanese man and a native humanoid witch.
Fan Works
- In the Coreline story Coreline: Invasion of Portland, it's revealed that Rosalind Price, originally from Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., is German-American in ancestry. It's a nod to Constance Zimmer, who portrayed Price in the series. Zimmer is of German ancestry.
- In Discordant Princess' The Great Mouse Detective 2: Unexpected Love, Ratigan's tombstone states that he was born on May 27th. In the movie, Ratigan is voiced by Vincent Price, who was ALSO born on May 27th.
- Similarly, one of Discordant Princess' headcanons for Ratigan is that he is bisexual; it was rumored that Price was also bisexual.
- In The Twilight Zone (1959) fanfic I Have Seen You, there is an In-Universe example. Margaret is an actress particularly famous for the leading role in Elisabeth (she is implied to have moved from the US to Austria just to play it, and it has earned three Grammy wins for her). Like Elisabeth, she feels a romantic connection to Death — although in her case, it is a Precocious Crush (It Makes Sense in Context) that went out of control and is very much not reciprocated; also, like in Elisabeth's case, it causes marital strife with her actual husband, but unlike Elisabeth, Margaret realizes she really loves her husband after all.
Film — Animated
- Barbie: Princess Charm School: Isla is Asian, and is voiced by Shannon Chan-Kent (though Isla is Japanese and Shannon is Chinese). It is played straight with two of her dubbers: the late Hiromi Hayakawa in the Latin Spanish dub and Rubina Kuraoka in the German dub.
- Tip from Home (2015) is an immigrant and is half Barbadian, just like Rihanna (half Afro-Guyanese, half Barbadian).
- Dog Man (2025): Sarah is Australian, just like her voice actress Isla Fisher.
- Encanto: Almost all of the voice actors for the film are Hispanic, with a majority being of Colombian descent. Plus, the four black characters—Felix and his children Dolores, Camilo, and Antonio—are voiced by black actors, and most of them are Hispanic as well except for African-American Ravi Cabot-Conyers voicing Antonio (the only non-Hispanic actor in the main cast).
- In Justice League: Doom and Superman vs. the Elite, Alfred Pennyworth and Manchester Black, who are British, are both voiced by Robin Atkin Downes, who was born in the UK.
- In Luck (2022), Grey DeLisle and Kari Wahlgren who voice the leprechauns Saoirse, the Penny Depot boss, and Aine respectively are of Irish descent themselves (though the latter is mostly Swedish but a little Irish).
- With the exception of Heihei (who is, mind you, a chicken with no dialogue) and the elderly villager who wants to eat Heihei (both played by Alan Tudyk), all of the speaking roles in Moana are performed by actors with Polynesian ancestry. The only singing done by non-Polynesian performers is Chief Tui's singing (performed by Christopher Jackson), and the English portions of "We Know The Way" (performed by Lin-Manuel Miranda).
- Dwayne Johnson (Maui) is half-Samoan; Oscar Kightley (who plays a fisherman) and former Pittsburgh Steelers player Troy Polamalu (the villager with the leaking roof) are both Samoan.
- Auli'i Cravalho (Moana) and Nicole Scherzinger (Sina) are part Native Hawaiian.
- Rachel House (Grandma Tala), Temuera Morrison (Tui), and Jemaine Clement (Tamatoa) all have Maori ancestry.
- The Māori dub adds Māori voice actors Jaedyn Randell (Moana), Piripi Taylor (Maui), and Amanda Ashton (Sina) to the original Māori cast members.
- Tiger from Over the Hedge is a Persian cat voiced by Omid Djalili, who's of Iranian (Persian) descent.
- The Princess and the Frog takes place in New Orleans, and has one of its main characters, Ray, voiced by Jim Cummings, who grew up in the area.
- In The Rescuers, Miss Bianca is portrayed as representing Hungary. She was voiced by Eva Gabor, who was Hungarian herself.
- The Super Mario Bros. Movie:
- Aside from Charles Martinet, all the actors who voice members of the Mario Bros.' family (Jessica DiCicco, John DiMaggio, and Rino Romano) are of Italian descent like the Mario Bros.
- Giacomo Campeotto, who voices Mario and Luigi's father in the Danish dub, is also of partial Italian descent on his own father's side.
- Splinter in TMNT is a zigzagged example. Mako Iwamatsu, who's from Japan like Splinter is, recorded most of his dialogue for the character. After his death though, his remaining dialogue was done by Greg Baldwin, who's American.
- Turning Red: The voice actress for Mei Lee, Rosalie Chiang, was called Mei-Mei as a child by her mother just like her character, her mom's middle name is Ming while Mei's mom's first name is Ming, and her favourite animal was actually the red panda before being cast, the animal Mei transforms into.
- Wreck-It Ralph: Ralph and his pursuits to shed off the bad guy cred can draw parallels to his voice actor John C. Reilly's acting career as like Ralph, Reilly similarly initially garnered recognition by playing Mook henchmen in Casualties of War and The River Wild but later on underwent Leslie Nielsen Syndrome in order to branch his ability to do other roles besides being just remembered for his initial roles, also what Ralph is trying to do.
Literature
- The Cat in the Stacks Mysteries: Author-shared background, in this case — both Dean James and the character of Charlie Harris grew up in Mississippi, lived in Texas for some times, and eventually returned to their home state.
- Agatha Christie's short story "Swan Song" has an In-Universe example. Paula Nazorkoff is an opera singer who is particularly famous for her rendition of the part of Tosca. It turns out she suffered a tragedy similar to Tosca's; for extra irony, the Scarpia counterpart is a baritone singer who excels in the role of Scarpia. She gets her revenge on him years later by stabbing him onstage during a performance of the opera.
Live-Action TV
Music
- Tom Waits' song "Eyeball Kid" from the album Mule Variations is shown from the perspective of a freak show carnival barker showing off the kid, mentions the kid's birthday being "the seventh of December, 1949". This is, of course, Tom Waits' own birthday.
Professional Wrestling
This is a very common occurrence in Professional Wrestling, where a wrestler's background will be used to create a gimmick for that wrestler.
- One famous example is Ray Traylor's background as a prison guard at a Georgia prison, which was used to create his character the Big Boss Man.
- Another famous example is that of Paul Bearer, most famous as manager of The Undertaker. In real life, Bill Moody was a funeral director who owned and ran a funeral home until his death in 2013.
- Naomi was brought up as the dancing valet for the 'Funkasaurus' Brodus Clay. She had been a dancer for the Orlando Magic for years prior to getting into wrestling. Averted with her partner Cameron, who was not a dancer.
- Aiden English was given the gimmick of a snobby pretentious actor wannabe, later transitioning into a vaudeville performer. He studied acting in college and has a Bachelor of Arts, and he had been stage acting for years beforehand.
- Devin Taylor was assigned the role of backstage interviewer. She's a qualified broadcast journalist in real life.
- Back in the 1980s, Wendi Richter's first gimmick was that of a Texas cowgirl. She had done rodeos and worked with horses for years. The props and costumes she wore were what she had used back then.
- Tyson Tomko and Brodus Clay were both bodyguards for famous artists (Tomko for Limp Bizkit, Clay for Snoop Dogg) before they were enforcers for higher-rated WWE and TNA wrestlers like Christian, Trish Stratus, Alberto Del Rio, or EC3.
- Bob Holly's original gimmick was that of a NASCAR driver-turned-wrestler. He had been racing cars for a while while not wrestling and even drove a World Wrestling Federation-sponsored super late model in the 1995 NASCAR All Pro Series.
Puppet Shows
- A partial example, since the shared background wasn't established until after the performer's death: Kermit's Swamp, which had previously wandered around most areas of the US where a swamp might be, now seems to be firmly established as in Mississippi, not far from Jim Henson's birthplace.
Radio
- The Navy Lark:
- Just like CPO Pertwee, Jon Pertwee had served in the Navy in 1941. He served on HMS Hood and escaped being sunk by the Bismarck by a matter of weeks due to transferring off the ship for officer training and his later espionage career under Ian Fleming.
- Tenniel Evans had Welsh heritage just as Leading Seaman "Taffy" Goldstein did. However, while Goldstein was born in Wales and never shut up about his homeland, Evans' Welsh background was from several generations ago on his father's side.
Video Games
- In Fate/Grand Order, the French servant Jacques de Molay, or her female counterpart, is voiced in Japanese by Shiki Aoki, who is a quarter French.
- Trevor Philips from Grand Theft Auto V is Canadian, as is his actor, Steven Ogg.
- Joe Zieja attended a military academy before joining the Air Force and then going into intelligence gathering. He voices Claude in Fire Emblem: Three Houses, who's also attending a military academy, and Full Band in Ace Combat 7: Skies Unknown, who's an air force pilot, and both of them have a way of gathering intelligence.
- Troy Baker provides the voice of Joel in The Last of Us. Both Baker and Joel are from Texas.
- One of the motion actors playing Snake in Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater, Motosada Mori, is a real-life mercenary. He also invented CQC for the games, paralleling how Snake and The Boss developed CQC together.
- Michael "Mikee" Tsarouhas, an ex-Marine, has voiced soldiers in several Source engine games and mods, most notably Insurgency and Black Mesa.
- The English version of World of Final Fantasy cast Broadway and musical actress Christina Rose as Celes Chere mainly because of the character's famous opera scene. It doesn't count as Cast the Expert since Celes never sang anyway.
Visual Novel
- In the Yuri visual novel Yumeutsutsu Re:Master, Marie Mahler, a Greek expat in Japan and an illustrator, is voiced by Haruna Ikezawa, who is one-fourth Greek and was born in Athens.
Web Video
- Critical Role:
- Taliesin Jaffe is known for writing characters that mirror things he's going through in real life.
- Percy de Rolo's struggle against Orthax is a mirror for Taliesin's own struggle with depression. When Vox Machina finally gets to fight Orthax, Taliesin even cheers "THERAPY!"
- Ashton Greymoore is a young punk who grew up in a terrible group home, and the way Taliesin plays him shows how familiar he is with the gutter-punk community and their general attitude toward life. Taliesin has also stated that Ashton's chronic pain mirrors his own, though Ashton is significantly worse at managing theirs.
- Dallas-born Travis Willingham gave Fjord Stone a thick Texan drawl. In the animated adaptation of the campaign Fjord stars in, the accent is depicted as an affectation he picked up from his captain.
- Taliesin Jaffe is known for writing characters that mirror things he's going through in real life.
- Epic Rap Battles of History:
- In "Rasputin vs Stalin" Rasputin, as well as Vladimir Lenin and Vladimir Putin are all played by Peter Shukoff, who is of Russian heritage.
- Peter would then go on to play another infamous Russian historical figure, Ivan the Terrible in "Alexander the Great vs Ivan the Terrible".
- "Bruce Banner vs Bruce Jenner" features transgender rapper No Shame as Caitlyn Jenner post-transition.
- Any time a combatant is non-white, Peter and Lloyd will always bring in a guest star of the appropriate ethnicity. They also usually get women for the female roles, except for Lady Gaga, who was played by Peter in drag (which wasn't a huge stretch as Gaga is often compared to drag queens).
- In "Rasputin vs Stalin" Rasputin, as well as Vladimir Lenin and Vladimir Putin are all played by Peter Shukoff, who is of Russian heritage.
Western Animation
- Millie from Alice's Wonderland Bakery is a Filipino character voiced by Isabella Abiera, who's Filipino American.
- Amphibia: The main character, Anne Boonchuy, is Thai-American. She's voiced by Brenda Song, an American who is half-Thai.
- Batman: The Animated Series had one-off villain Calendar Girl, voiced by Sela Ward, who were both former models "past their prime" in the eyes of the industry, with Ward in particular being told "What we really want is Sela, but Sela ten years ago" when she applied to be a Bond girl at 39... opposite 42-year-old Pierce Brosnan.
- Blue Eye Samurai: The series' main character Mizu is biracial as she's of mixed Japanese and European descent like her voice actress Maya Erskine, though the European half is different between the two as Mizu is half British, while Erskine is half Irish.
- Cyberchase:
- Novie Edwards is of Jamaican descent like Jackie.
- "Designing Mr. Perfect" introduces Wicked's sentient wand, Wanda, who only appears in this episode. Her voice actress, Danica McKellar, is also a mathematician. Naturally, she'd be in a show with math as a core concept.
- Dave the Barbarian: In "I Love Neddy", antagonist Ned Frischman becomes a comedian, just like his voice actor, Richard Steven Horvitz.
- DC Super Hero Girls:
- Jessica Cruz, a Green Lantern of Latina background, is voiced by Cristina Milizia, who has Spanish relatives.
- Frost's Hero of the Month entry shows her being good at math, as well as making some math-related puns in later episodes. She's voiced by Danica McKellar, who's also a gifted mathematician.
- Dorothy and the Wizard of Oz has Dorothy, a Kansas girl, voiced by Kari Wahlgren, who was born and raised in Kansas.
- For DuckTales (2017), series showrunner Frank Angones admitted to casting as many ethnic characters with actors of their respective nationalities as much as possible. It's impressive how much they do. For example:
- Scrooge in this series is voiced by David Tennant, making this the first time he's been voiced by an actual Scottish actor. Likewise, his parents are voiced by Graham McTavish and Ashley Jensen, who also have a Scottish background.
- Catherine Tate, who's British, voices Magica DeSpell, who's been subjected to Adaptational Nationality to match her ethnicity.
- "The House of the Lucky Gander" takes place in China, and has a character named Toad Liu Hai voiced by Chinese-American actor B.D. Wong.
- "The Spear of Selene" takes place in Greece, and has Selene, Zeus, and Storkules voiced by actors of Greek descent (Nia Valadros, Michael Chiklis, and Chris Diamantopoulos respectively).
- Don Karnage is made into a Latino, and is voiced by Mexican actor Jamie Camil.
- Panchito and José are voiced by Arturo del Puerto and Bernardo de Paula, who are respectively Mexican and Brazilian like their characters.
- Gizmoduck is Race Lifted into Hispanic and voiced by Lin-Manuel Miranda. The same applies to his Mama who's voiced by Selenis Leyva.
- The Middle Eastern warrior Faris D'Jinn is voiced by Iranian actor Omid Abtahi.
- Jormungandr is a serpentine wrestler that came straight from Norse Mythology and voiced by Norwegian actor Kristofer Hivju.
- Zan Owlson is implied to be African-American, and she's voiced by black actress Natasha Rothwell.
- Elena of Avalor has a few examples:
- Jillian Rose Reed (Naomi) is American but is reportedly raised by Puerto Rican parents. Naomi and her family are said to be from another kingdom, though Naomi seems to consider Avalor a second home.
- Lou Diamond Phillips (Victor) is Filipino (Filipina mother, American father), though he has passed as a Mexican-American in some of his roles, such as in La Bamba. Probably helps that the Philippines has a prominent Spanish influence, on par with that of Latin American countries.
- Jane Fonda supported the Chilean "No" movement against Pinochet's dictatorship, as seen in No, making her character role in Elena of Avalor ironic.
- Antonio Angama is voiced by Danny Trejo, who was born in Mexico.
- Gargoyles: Elisa Maza was originally going to be Hispanic, but her race and ethnicity were changed to half-African, half-Native American after Salli Richardson-Whitfield was cast in the role.
- The Ghost and Molly McGee: Early development work had Molly's family as mixed Caucasian and African-American. When Ashly Burch was cast as her voice, the character became half-Thai, half-Caucasian instead.
- Harley Quinn (2019): Not only are the canonically non-white characters voiced by matching actors, like Phil LaMarr as Black Manta and Aline Elasmar as Talia al Ghul, but so are the characters that were made into racial minorities for this series. Lex Luthor, the Queen of Fables, and Catwoman are black and respectively voiced by Giancarlo Esposito, Wanda Sykes, and Sanaa Lathan. Golden Glider and Captain Cold are Asian and voiced by Cathy Ang and Ben Levin. And while Nightwing's ethnicity isn't established, he is Ambiguously Brown and voiced by the Hispanic Harvey Guillén, suggesting that he too is Hispanic.
- Hazbin Hotel:
- Adam's voice actor Alex Brightman is Jewish, fitting for a Hebrew mythological character.
- While VivziePop didn't have most of the main cast's ethnicity down, she has stated that she wrote Niffty as being of Japanese descent in mind. In the show she's voiced by Kimiko Glenn, an actress of Japanese descent.
- In Infinity Train, Jesse Cosay is a Native American who hails from the Apache tribe. His voice actor, Robbie Daymond, is part-Apache himself.
- Legend of the Three Caballeros has Panchito, a Mexican, voiced by Jamie Camil, who's also Mexican.
- The Legend of Vox Machina: At the end of Season 1, Percy shoots a hole through his own right hand to stop Orthax from taking over his body, and later develops a prosthetic glove to help with the use of his fingers. His voice actor, Taliesin Jaffe, has a benign tremor in his hands, which is especially noticeable during moments of high emotion. Percy's struggle against Orthax is also a mirror for Taliesin's own struggle with depression, with Orthax even being jokingly nicknamed "the dark specter of [Taliesin's] soul" in the original stream.
- The Magic School Bus:
- Dom DeLuise's character in "Gets Ready, Set, Dough!" is a baker, a reference to his second career as a gourmet cook.
- Keesha is black, just like her VA Erica Luttrell.
- Mickey and the Roadster Racers reveals that Billy Beagle has a car collection, much like his voice actor, Jay Leno.
- Molly of Denali: All the Indigenous characters are played by Indigenous actors. For example, Molly is voiced by Sovereign Bill (Tlingit and Muckleshoot).
- Monster High (2022) consistently casts voice actors of the same ethnicity/gender identity/disability of the characters they play. For example, Coach Thunderbird, a character based on a creature from Native American mythology, is played by Tamara Podemski, an actress of Canadian First Nations descent.
- Ninjago: Out of the main cast, only one of them is voiced by an actor with Asian decent. That being Kai, who is voiced by the Chinese-Canadian Vincent Tong.
- The Owl House: Luz is a Latina, as is her voice actor, Sarah-Nicole Robles. Similarly, Gus and Skara, both Black, are played by Issac Ryan Brown and Kimberly Brooks.
- In Puppy Dog Pals, it's revealed that Chloe's family is Jewish. Chloe's mother is voiced by Tara Strong, who was born to Jewish parents.
- Rosie's Rules: All of the Latino characters are voiced by Latino actors.
- Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Recurring villain Hypno-potamus is from New Zealand, much like his actor Rhys Darby.
- A similar instance happened with Shaggy from Scooby-Doo. Shaggy's original voice actor, Casey Kasem, was an avid vegetarian who quit voicing the character in 1997 due to a dispute over having to voice Shaggy in a Burger King commercial. After Kasem returned in 2002, Shaggy was written as a vegetarian and continued to be portrayed as such until Kasem retired from the role permanently in 2009.
- In one episode of The Simpsons, Dennis Weaver voices Buck McCoy, a former Western star who had a detective show in the '70s. Dennis Weaver himself, of course, was a former Western star who had a detective show in the '70s.
- Star vs. the Forces of Evil:
- Adam McArthur is an avid martial artist who occasionally competes in tournaments, just like his character Marco Diaz.
- Tad, Kelly's ex-boyfriend, is a vegan, just like his voice actor, Greg Cipes.
- An episode of Static Shock featured a villain named Replay, who was a former child star who had trouble getting work after his sitcom was canceled. They got real-life former child star Neil Patrick Harris (who hadn't yet had his big comeback role with How I Met Your Mother) to voice the character.
- Stretch Armstrong and the Flex Fighters has a few cases of this:
- Nathan Park/Wingspan, one of the show's protagonists, is Korean and is voiced by Korean-American voice actor Steven Yeun.
- Riya Dashti, who's of Iranian background, is voiced in flashbacks by Kathreen Khavari, whose parents were born in Iran. Khavari also voices Riya's aunt.
- While she doesn't have French ancestry, Vanessa Marshall is fluent in a French accent, hence why she uses the accent for Madam Toussant, the leader of the Sables.
- Beast Boy in Teen Titans and Teen Titans Go! is vegetarian or vegan, depending on the episode (either way, he doesn't eat meat). His voice actor, Greg Cipes, has been vegetarian since he was eight years old and went vegan in 2009.
- There were numerous cases of this trope in Thomas & Friends:
- Togo Igawa is Japanese, just like his character, Hiro.
- Like her character, Ashima, Tina Desai is also from India.
- Victor, a Hispanic engine, is voiced in the US dubnote by Hispanic American actor David Bedella, who, like the character, is also fluent in Spanish (although Victor is Cuban, and Bedella is actually of Mexican descent).
- Luke, an Irish engine residing on the Skarloey Railway, was voiced by former actor Michael Leggenote , who is also Irish.
- Flying Scotsman (who, despite his name, is actually from England) is voiced by English actor Rufus Jones.
- From Big World! Big Adventures! onwards, the international engines all have voice actors with a relation to their specific country.
- New main cast member Nia is from Kenya. Her voice actress Yvonne Grundy is a black British actress who was born in Kenya. Her singing voice in the special, Patricia Kihoro, is also Kenyan-British.
- Kwaku is voiced by Abubakar Salim who is also of of Kenyan descent.
- Yong Bao finally gains a voice in the special, voiced by Asian-British actor Dan Li.
- Ace the daredevil racing car is from Australia, and is voiced by Australian singer Peter Andre.
- Shane, another returning international, is now voiced by Australian actor and presenter Shane Jacobson.
- Shane's coaches Aubrey and Aiden also have voice actors with Australian ties. Aubrey is voiced by Australian actress Genevieve McCarthy and Aiden is voiced by writer Tim Bain, who was born in Australia. Tamika the Australian railmotor engine is also voiced by another Australian actress, Rose Robinson.
- Carlos' voice is recast with Mexican-born actor Gabriel Porras.
- Hong-Mei, a blue Chinese tank engine is voiced by Chipo Chung, who is Zimbabwean-Chinese.
- Hong-Mei's twin coaches, An An and Yin-Long are voiced by Siu-See Hung and Windson Liong, who are also British actors who are both part-Chinese.
- An unnamed Chinese Diesel is voiced by Su-Lin Looi, another Asian-Brit actor.
- Rajiv, Noor Jehan, Charubala and Shankar's respective voices (Nikhil Parmar, Sheena Bhattessa, Sanjeev Bhaskar) all have an Indian background.
- Gina is recast with Anna Francolini, a British actress of Italian descent.
- Lorenzo and Beppe are both voiced by Vincenzo Nicoli, who is also Italian-British.
- Duchess, the titular royal engine in the special Thomas and the Royal Engine, is from England, and so is her voice actress, Rosamund Pike.
- We Bare Bears had an episode called "Ramen" which has a character named Kazumi, who owns a Japanese noodle shop. She's voiced by Romi Dames, who was born in Japan.
- Work It Out Wombats!: Tymika Tafari is Jamaican-Canadian, and her character Ellie is Jamaican. Also, JunJun, Kaya, Amado, and Gabriela are Philippine eagles who are all voiced by Filipinos.
