In a world, where after every yearly anniversary of a person's birth society celebrates that date, there was one man...and his name was Don LaFontaine, the "King of Movie Trailers", who was born on this day in 1940.
For those of you unfamiliar with Don by name, I can tell you now you will DEFINITELY have encountered his work at some point in your life. The dude truly was the king of movie trailers, and it is estimated he worked on 5,000 movie trailers and over half a million TV spots, with some of his most famous outings being voice over work for film trailers such as Terminator 2, Friday the 13th, South Park the Movie, Batman Returns, and of course the iconic cinema classic, Shrek. If you've ever heard the famous "IN A WORLD..." line uttered in that signature, dramatic and bassy voice, then I can guarantee you have heard LaFontaine's voice.
Growing up in Duluth, Minnesota, LaFontaine's golden voice came into his life when he was 13; his voice broke one day mid-sentence, and would remain that way for the rest of his life. At first he was very conscious of it, however after he begun making playground-grade bank by having kids pay him to ring up the school pretending to be their fathers claiming they were off with an illness, he soon warmed to his gift.
After high school and a stint in the army, he begun working as a recording engineer, and this led to the first radio spot he engineered - Dr. Strangelove. This opportunity came about after LaFontaine had the opportunity to work with producer Floyd Peterson, who was extremely pleased with LaFontaine's work and even incorporated some of his ideas into the radio spot, leading the two men to go into the business of film advertisement together in 1963, which is where LaFontaine first came up with his signature "in a world..." hook.
Up until this point though, LaFontaine was still just an engineer, but it was just a year into his new business venture that whilst working on Gunfighters of Casa Grande for MGM, the voice actor meant to be recording that day never showed, and at the last minute LaFontaine agreed to step in. With a voice perfect for his style of work and plenty of industry know-how under his belt, this was the event that catapulted LaFontaine into his illustrious voice over career.
And boy, was his career illustrious. Like I've already mentioned the exact numbers of his output, but the truth is his hard work and dedication cannot simply be boiled down to the number of jobs he did. He was in the industry for over 40 years, and it is reported that in a single day he could produce over 100 separate pieces of voice over work. To deter every fucker in Hollywood blowing up his phone for trailer work, he begun raising his prices to thin out the workload, as he never turned down a job, but when this proved ineffective minus making him millions in the process, he eventually just had to come to terms with the fact he'd have to say no here and there.
That's not to say he truly slowed down however, as it is known that even when on vacation he'd take recording equipment with him, and if he got an urgent call during his holiday, he'd simply lock himself in his hotel bathroom and smash the job out in one take.
In 2007 he finally revealed the origins of his iconic in a world line, stating that "we have to very rapidly establish the world we are transporting them to. That's very easily done by saying, "In a world where..." You very rapidly set the scene". Not only that, he also revealed that of all the work he had done, his personal favourite voice over work he did was for the film The Elephant Man.
Sadly though, as with everything in life, the good times have to come to an end sooner or later, and that time for LaFontaine came in 2008. Four days before his 68th birthday on the 22nd August, he was admitted to the Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre in Los Angeles due to a pulmonary embolism, and by the date of his birthday he was reported to be in a critical condition, with his family making a public appeal online for thoughts and prayers for him. Sadly God must not have been listening that day, because ten days later on the 1st September, Don LaFontaine had passed through the mortal coils of this world, following complications from pneumothorax.
His final film trailer credit was for the documentary Call+Response which tackled the global slave trade, and his final ever voice work was for the Phineas and Ferb episode "The Chronicles of Meap", with his final ever recorded lines being "In a world...there, I said it. Happy?" Just as one final point to showcase how influential LaFontaine was on the industry, following his death voice overs for film trailers died out almost entirely, with most trailers now relying either on audio from the film or music, as there was clearly only ever one man for the job, and now he is gone.
So sleep well, Don LaFontaine, as we try to continue on in a world where there is no longer a Don LaFontaine.
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