Hank Azaria just can’t help himself. Less than a minute into our interview, the voice behind so many denizens of The Simpsons is breaking into one of his countless accents and characters. As a Nineties kid, I can’t fail to hear the nasal tones of Moe Szyslak, Springfield’s surly bartender, or the recidivist criminal Snake Jailbird when listening to Azaria’s familiar voice. “Snake was inspired by my stoner friend at college. I think he sounded like that when he was wasteeed,” he says in the character’s signature SoCal drawl.
His latest incarnation is Chaim – the dubious music manager of Lily-Rose Depp’s fragile pop star in The Idol, HBO’s controversial new drama from Euphoria creator Sam Levinson and Abel Tesfaye (better known as pop megastar The Weeknd). It’s not a voiceover – Azaria appears on screen – but the attention to vocal detail is the same. “Chaim eez an Israeli guy, so I worked wiz an Israeli dialect coach to create zis,” Azaria explains, flipping excitedly into his character’s thick accent. He was loosely inspired by Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus – the infamous pair of Israeli producer cousins who terrorised Hollywood in the 1980s with their violent, often racist, always sexist, B-movies like Bolero and Sahara. “Chaim is one of those guys who made it in the entertainment industry through legit and not-so-legit means… to put it politely,” he says.
