Our Interview with "Micro Machine Man" John Moschitta Jr.
- Dave
- 3 hours ago
- 12 min read
The average person may not recognize John Moschitta's name, but they've probably seen him. Or more to the point, heard him. He's world renowned as the "Fast-Talking Guy," and his lightning-speed articulation has been featured on television, movies, and more. For '80s and '90s kids, Mr. Moschitta will always be the Micro Machine Man, Blurr from The Transformers, and "Terrible" Testaverde on Saved by the Bell.
I've been a fan of John Moschitta since 1987. My elementary school classmates would act like they could do the Micro Machines commercials no problem, but they never got past saying "Micro Machine Man here" as fast as they could. Everyone knew they were bluffing.
I contacted Mr. Moschitta on a whim, after showing my wife The Transformers: The Movie (1986). Long story short, he gave Retro Injection this interview!
What's your favorite part about being a pop culture icon?
When you do a project you're in a studio with a few people and everybody has a job to do and works their hardest. You all of course hope it turns out OK but you never really know how it will be received. When you're done ....you're done and it's on to the next job and at least from my viewpoint I never really thought much of the impact it would have on people when they finally got to see it. When fans come up to me now and tell me how much I meant to them growing up and the fond memories they have of watching and hearing me on various shows it's not only a shocker but an extreme honor to have had such a positive place in their childhood recollections. So I guess my favorite part of being a Pop Culture Icon, if I can really be called that, is the knowledge that I in some small way I helped make growing up a bit more tolerable and fun.
I have to ask if you have any memorabilia of your many endorsements. A Micro Machines or Transformers collection? Of the over 100 Micro Machines commercials that aired, which was your favorite? What Micro Machines commercials did we not get to see, because the toys didn't get picked up for distribution?
I used to have a Federal Express model airplane that I loved but it unfortunately was dropped and shattered during a move. I think I pretty much have every version of the Blurr action figure from The Transformers. I have original versions of my Motor Mouth game and the Commercial Crazies game as well as several editions of my 10 Classics in 10 Minutes and 10 Minute University tapes/CDs.
As far as Micro Machines, they used to send me the entire collection every year which I then passed on to my 9 nephews in New York. I did keep one playset ... a yellow box with a clear cover that holds about 50 cars.
We always filmed the commercials the first week of January so they would be finished to take to Toy Fair in NYC in February. Each year we did 25 or so spots and depending on which models sold some or all of them would eventually make to your TV in the fall in time for Christmas shopping. I'm not sure which ones ended up in the recycling bin.
It would take about 5 days to film my portion of the spots and then the crew would take a couple of weeks shooting the cars for the product shots. They did a lot of stop motion photography with the cars. In fact they made a cast of my hand and forearm so they could film the cars driving around in my hand. It was very strange to walk into the studio and see your hand in a C-stand.
My favorite and probably the most difficult spot to shoot was definitely Car Wash City. It was a freezing cold January morning in the studio and I was in a car wash set standing on a roller board that a stagehand would manually pull forward so it would look like I was automatically moving through the car wash. They were showering me with water spray and soap suds while I was creeping toward the camera, pointing to the toy and trying to read the script off the teleprompter. I was cold, wet, trying to keep my balance and had soap in my eyes making it difficult to see the prompter copy not to mention getting a mouthful of suds when I talked. It was a crazy shoot but the end result looked great so it was worth the shivers and the multiple takes to get it right.
What other industry professionals do you admire? What voice actors are of influence to you, if any?
When I was a kid, my Grandfather took me to an event where I got to meet Mel Blanc the legendary voice actor famous for characters like Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig ... well practically all the Warner Bothers cartoon characters I grew up with. I was in awe watching him effortlessly switching from voice to voice. I could never really do justice to any of his voices but as I grew into my voice I discovered I had a bunch of character inside me which I hoped would some day be allowed to come out. I got my first chance to show my stuff with the original Transformers cartoon series where I got to work with some incredibly talented voiceover actors like Frank Welker, Scatman Crothers, Dick Gautier, Roger C. Carmel, Michael Bell, Sue Blu, Dan Gilvezan, Casey Kasem, Peter Cullen and Neil Ross...to name a few. It was great fun and a fantastic training ground getting to see real pros do their thing.
What's the biggest challenge you've faced with material?
I can usually do OK with any material provided my mouth, brain and voice cooperate with each other. Luckily for me they did most of the time. There was a day when I was doing a spot for Toyota and my mouth refused to say Toyota clearly ... which was pretty important since it was the product I was selling. Eventually it came out clearly but it was a real challenge and very frustrating.
I also do not like doing lists of thing or people's names. There is no logical connection or train of thought from one thing to the next and that makes it very hard to do fast. When it comes to lists of names people listening only care about hearing their name and God help you if you mispronounce it. I know people have murdered my name many times ... Mot-two-sheet-toe, Ma-two-shoes, Most-queet-toe, and of course Mo-SHIT-ta....so I feel their pain!
You've performed for presidents and world leaders. What were your monologues? How did they go over?
I performed some of my 10 Classics for several former Presidents that were gathered at a luncheon after the opening of the Nixon Library and made appearances at various events like the 100th Birthday of the Wall Street Journal Celebration. Happily, I was always very well received. I wasn't curing cancer, so I could be fast, funny and leave 'em laughing.
As someone who's recorded commercials for thirty-seven countries, what's your advice to aspiring globetrotters? What's your craziest travel story?
I flew over 250,000 miles a year for 15-20 years and all I can say is you learn to go with the flow. It's nice when things go as planned but the universe generally has a different agenda. When I'm in a new place I like to do what the locals do so I can get a real feel for the place. I was never big on on-the-bus / off-the-bus group tours.
As far as a crazy story ... I was sitting in the Cairo airport and a group of people came up to me and starting pointing at me yelling "Funny mouth." I had no idea what was going on. I was travelling with a friend who spoke Arabic and evidently my appearance on That's Incredible had just aired on Egyptian TV and the subtitles referred to me as Mr Funny Mouth.
What projects have you done that your fans might not know about? (For example, your work with board games.)
A large portion of my work has only been seen by a limited number of people. Over the years I did hundreds of in-house videos and in-person appearances for many corporations and companies that were only ever seen by the employees. Also, the majority of the commercials I did were for local markets so only the people in those cities would get to see them.
As far as other stuff, there was my board game called Motor Mouth which I created with David Fuhrer (the World's Fastest Backwards Talker) and Mark Setteducati for Tiger Games. It's a really fun tongue twister game that unfortunately was released in the worse year for retail sales of games. Even though is sold fairly well it still pretty much died a horrible death. You can still find it on Ebay.
You've done spoken word recordings, such as “10-Minute University,” which I'm proud to say I purchased on cassette in the early '90s! How did these albums come about? Did you write your own material?
The first "cassette" was 10 Classics in 10 Minutes and it was the brain child of Jim Becker and Andy Mayer who were known for their novelty books like The Thumb Wrestling book. It had 60 second comedic recaps of books like Gone With the Wind, Moby Dick and The Great Gatsby. While I did contribute to the scripts a bit they wrote most of it.
The sequel was 10 Minute University which was conceived by Jim and Andy but primarily written by Bob Tzudiker and Noni White. It was 4 years of traditional college in 10 minutes and had subjects like biology, physics and football. It even came with a mini diploma.
What's a career highlight that doesn’t involve speed talking?
Most everything in my career involved fast talking. Hollywood loves to fit you in a box ... if you're lucky enough to be allowed to be granted a box... so in most of the stuff had me zipping through dialogue. I did get to play a variety of different characters along the way but at some point I usually had to do the talking. My favorite and most personally fulfilling jobs would be doing theater. I love being on stage in front of a live audience. The curtain goes up and it's off to the races until the curtain comes down. No stopping, no second takes, instant feedback from the audience and no fast-talking!
Are there any projects you're working on now or that any you'd like to be part of?
I am pretty much retired now but I would love to get a multi-camera sitcom where I could play the grouchy grandpa or something like that. Those sitcoms are as close to a 9-5 job you can get in TV/film. I have very little interest in doing a one camera show, whether it's a sitcom or hour drama because the days are brutally long and pretty boring. You might be there for 12 hours and only work a few minutes. Movies are the same way.
What do you consider your legacy in entertainment and advertising?
Well legacy is for others to determine. I can only hope I did my job well and managed to give people a few chuckles along the way.
You've recorded commercials which aired only in specific territories. What regional commercials do you wish would get more exposure?
I did a series of commercials for JetBlue airlines playing a character called Mr. Non-Stop. JetBlue has a hub in Boston and they have the most non-stops flights to places than any other airlines flying in and out of Boston. Unfortunately that meant they could only run in that area. They were really funny and I wish more people could have seen them.
What was it like working in the early days of cable television, specifically with Nickelodeon?
I had been working game show production in NYC and a friend got me an interview for this thing called Qube. It was the world's first two-way interactive cable system being tested by Warner Brothers on their cable system in Columbus. I got the job as a producer/performer and moved to Ohio. It was quite a culture shock. I went from skyscrapers to a view of a cow field out my living room window. We went on the air on December 1, 1977 with 11 hours of live programming a day ... a monumental task. Also at that time Nickelodeon was starting up and they filmed their shows at our studios in Columbus, I hosted one of the first shows called Nickel Flicks which was on several times a day 7 days a week. It was also the first show canceled. Nickelodeon prided itself on non-violent TV for kids and my show features old time movie serials which were anything but non-violent so we exited stage left pretty quickly.
Your “Fast-Paced World” Federal Express commercial, winner of six Cleo awards and considered one of the greatest ads of all time, gave you a meteoric rise to stardom. What was the sudden fame like?
Well actually the thing that started my rise was of all things an appearance on That's Incredible. It aired on Thanksgiving 1980 and by the following Tuesday I was booked on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, The Merv Griffin Show, The Mike Douglas Show, started negotiating a talent contract with ABC and was offered the Federal Express commercial. The sudden fame was overwhelming and a bit frustrating because I was just the Fast Talker and couldn't talk about being an actor. The FedEx commercial started airing in September 1981 during football and became an instant sensation. All of a sudden I was an actor who talked fast which was fine with me.
I did a variety of jobs that hit different audiences ... FedEx on sports and news, Minute Rice on daytime, Sesame Street for kids so I got recognized everywhere I went. It's very strange to be stared down by a 3 year old in a supermarket! I still get recognized now but nothing like back then and I am fine with that. I really didn't like the constant attention.
You played “Terrible” Mr. Testaverde for eleven episodes on Saved by the Bell. What was your favorite part of the role? How was the atmosphere on the set?
I actually only appeared on 1 episode as Terrible Testaverde. With all the re-runs it probably seems like more. In fact, nearly 40 years later I still get a couple of residual checks a month. With the exception of the principal Mr. Belding, the producer only wanted the teachers to appear in one episode so the kids would be the real stars of the show.
I spent most of the day talking to the parents of the kids while they were in school. When we did get around to filming it was all business because we had a limited time before the kids had to head back to school. Everyone was friendly and got along so it was a very pleasant experience.
You provided the voice for fan-favorite Blurr in both The Transformers: The Movie and in season three and four of the original TV show. How does it feel to have contributed to such an enduring franchise?
Well of course when you are first doing it you have no idea what a worldwide phenomenon it would become. I was in the animated film, the first season now called G1 and Transformers Animated. It was great fun and still wildly popular today. In fact, I just did TF Con in Burbank last week and it was attended by thousands of fans. Parents who were fans way back when have now introduced their kids to the show. Blurr was the comic relief character on the show so people really love him which is great!
What are the differences (if any) in doing voice work for television versus film? For example, is there more room for improvisation when recording for one or the other?
It was a bit different back in the day. More laid back, more fun. Now there is so much pressure to crank stuff out that there is little room for improv. It's wham bam thank you ma'am ...get in ... get it done ... get out!
What's it like, hearing your voice work in a completed, animated medium? When you're recording, can you envision the finished product somewhat (with the aid of storyboards, character models, etc.), or are you going at it blind?
It's a little bit of everything. For Blurr in the Transformers I had nothing to go on. No storyboards, no character sketches. Who knew what a Decepticon or Autobot was. I had completed the 1st season and the movie before I even saw what Blurr looked like. You really have to depend on the director and the writer to point you in the right direction.
Sometimes you get to see a sketch beforehand but many times you don't even see the full script. You just show up at the recording session and only see your lines. You read them and go home. Not nearly as fun as the old days when everyone sat around mikes and talked about their struts melting.
Finally, what show-business advice would you give to anyone with a unique gift?
I wish there was some secret formula for success I can pass along but if there is I haven't come across it. All I can say is that if and when opportunity knocks be sure you are ready because it's probably only coming once. I have been extremely lucky in my life. Tons of being in the right place at the right time and being up for the challenge. For that I am eternally grateful.
Thank you, Mr. Moschitta, for your industry insights! Thanks also to contributing Retro Injection writer Luke Worle for his help with this feature. Transformers fans can check out these reviews of Powermaster Optimus Prime, and Repugnus and the Monsterbots.
Any more celebrity interviews? Right here, baby.
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