INTERVIEW: Marvel’s Black Widow With Its Narrator Sarah Natochenny

Serial Box has been a leader in creating original content that offers subscribers the ability to listen to programs. Last month, the platform finished their first Marvel collaboration, Marvel’s Thor: Metal Gods, and now this month, they’ve begun a season of a new one: Marvel’s Black Widow: Bad Blood. This story is 14 episodes long and comes from an all-female writing team led by Lindsay Smith (Serial Box’s Orphan Black: The Next Chapter), with writers Mikki Kendall (Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women That a Movement Forgot and Amazons, Abolitionists, and Activists), L.L. McKinney (A Blade So Black), and Taylor Stevens (Vanessa Michael Munroe series), and screenwriter Margaret Dunlap (Netflix’s Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance). Additionally, it’s narrated by acclaimed voice actress Sarah Natochenny (Ash Ketchum in Pokémon).

I got the chance to sit down with Natochenny to discuss her work on the project and voice acting in general. In Marvel’s Black Widow: Bad Blood, someone has stolen the Black Widow’s blood, and now she must find them before it’s too late. As Natasha Romanoff follows the trail across the globe, she discovers she isn’t the only target. Whoever is responsible stole Bucky Barnes’ blood, too. And only one thing is certain: anyone who wants the blood of the Widow and Winter Soldier needs to be taken down and fast. Despite a tangled web of shared history stretching back to their Red Room days, Barnes and Romanoff must join forces, confronting the demons of their past as they race to protect their future. A single drop of blood could be all it takes to save or destroy the world.

In this interview, Natocenny breaks down the differences between voice work for individual characters (or 10 characters in the case of one of her show appearances) and narration. She explains the way different styles of voice-over are required. While she is focused on producing character voices which are often over the top on shows like Pokémon, narration calls for a calmer tone, one that doesn’t distract from the writing but still offers each character enough variation to immerse the listener. Additionally, Natochenny talks about her experience on Marvel’s Black Widow: Bad Blood, explaining some of her favorite scenes and characters, and how she got involved in the project.

To hear the interview with Sarah Natochenny in full, hit play on the audio player above. The first two episodes of Marvel’s Black Widow: Bad Blood are available on the Serial Box app,  Google Play, and the Apple App Store, or through the Serial Box website.