Meet Kitty Jay

The Voice Behind the Spice, the Sailor's Girl, and a Thousand Hospital Tears

The first time Kitty Jay realized she was voicing characters in Dune: Spice Wars, she screamed so loud her husband came running downstairs. "The first line I had that said 'The Spice is life,' I screamed so loud my husband had to run downstairs to see what was up." For a self-described sci-fi girlie who grew up mesmerized by Batman: The Animated Series, landing 30+ NPC characters in a major franchise was the kind of full-circle moment most actors only dream about.

Kitty's path to the microphone was anything but a straight line. It wound through children's theatre stages, Manhattan restaurant floors, NYC real estate offices, hospital exam rooms, and a home-built vocal booth assembled during a global pandemic.

From Theatre Kid to Voice Actor

Kitty knew she wanted to be a voice actor since the 1990s, watching Batman: The Animated Series on repeat. The technology intimidated her, and the cost was prohibitive. So she did what any dedicated performer does: she built a career from every adjacent opportunity she could find.

She earned a BFA in Theatre and worked professionally on stage, with a particular emphasis on children's theatre. She took years of vocal and music lessons. She bartended and waited tables in Manhattan (serving more than a few celebrities along the way). She wrote freelance, blogged about food, reviewed restaurants, and sold real estate in New York City.

Then Covid hit, and a more financially stable Kitty finally had the time. She spent days and nights absorbing YouTube tutorials, booked coaching sessions, and enlisted her husband and a handy friend to build her booth. The dream she'd carried since childhood finally had a home.

A Career Built on Connection

Before the booth, Kitty spent years as the sole Standardized Patient Actor for a major hospital system. If you've seen the Seinfeld episode where Kramer fakes gonorrhea for medical students, you have the general concept. Kitty's work went deeper.

"I can cry on cue, so I cried for thousands of hospital employees for years," she says. "They even took me out on the road, performing our program for hospital execs from around the world at medical conventions. Like, full out sobbing, up to 20 sessions per day."

Some scenarios were devastating. One required her to wear a fake pregnancy belly while staff practiced delivering the news that her baby had died. She performed these scenes repeatedly, day after day, because the training saved real lives.

"At the end of the day, all of it is acting, in one form or another. Using my voice, or tears, to connect with people."

Trust the Instincts

Kitty talks about her process with the confidence of someone who has been dissecting scripts her entire life. "If I am starting early I might do a quick theatre-style vocal warm-up, but usually, I just swig some coffee and get to work. Read through it once, bang it out. Trust the instincts."

She credits years of cold reads in theatre auditions, the old-school kind where you walked in and performed without preparation. "Reading through is a luxury," she says. Her specialties reflect that fearless range: character acting, children's apps and stories, audiobooks, nurturing reads, quirky reads, and emotional performances. In three words, her voice is animated, warm, and bright.

From Olive Oyl to Arrakis

Kitty's resume reads like a voice actor's wish list. King Features selected her as the voice of Olive Oyl for a series of Popeye game apps and television and online ads. "I mean, Olive Oyl? Feminist Icon," she says with pride.

Then came Dune: Spice Wars, credited as an "unnamed sci fi project" that didn't stay unnamed for long. Her commercial credits include Toyota, Black and Decker, Volkswagen, AMC Theatres, and Shiro Games.

A Family Audiobook (and the Hardest Project Yet)

Her most challenging project was also her most personal. Kitty recorded two children's audiobooks as a family production: her teen played an Elf, her husband played Santa, and she voiced every other character. She directed both of them, recorded their tracks separately, then spliced the whole thing together. Each book ran around 7,500 words, long for children's audio.

"It was arduous, but we will always have that, it will always exist. We created a piece of art together, and got paid. That's amazing."

Beyond the Mic

Kitty remains active in the Jersey Shore theatre community, directing and performing regularly. She teaches acting and improv at local schools and camps, and judges theatre competitions.

She also runs Jersey Santa and Friends, a holiday entertainment company featuring professional actors performing as Santa, Mrs. Claus, and Elves across New Jersey. Kitty herself has been Mrs. Claus for Bloomingdale's, Amazon, Bentley, and thousands of families.

And then there's the softer side: volunteering for a local cat rescue and feeding the raccoons that visit her backyard creek. "I am that neighborhood lady," she admits.

The weirdest thing she ever voiced: dubbing the grunts of a famous professional tennis player, every time the ball was hit, for over an hour straight.

Why the Human Voice Still Wins

Kitty's answer to why human voice actors remain irreplaceable: "Heart."

She also has thoughts about what people get wrong about the profession. "More than once I have told people I am a Voice Actor, and they've said something like 'Oh yeah, let me hear your Bugs Bunny.' That's not how this works. We are creating something new. That's a lot harder than it sounds."

A Note for Clients

Kitty's advice is characteristically direct: "Don't use ChatGPT to write a 500-word set of directions on how we should deliver a 75-word script. In fact, let me write your script too. It will be better than ChatGPT's, I promise."

She also wants potential clients to understand two things about the VO community: it involves more than talking into a mic, and voice actors are possibly the most generous industry people you will ever meet.

Work with Kitty

Bring warmth, character, and theatrical instinct to your next project. Listen to Kitty's demos and learn more at her RealVOTalent profile, or book her directly.