FEATURE: Ash Ketchum English VA Sarah Natochenny’s Journey of Finding Herself in Pokémon
Sarah Natochenny has voiced Ash Ketchum her entire adult life. For 17 years, she’s provided the voice of Pokemon’s intrepid 10-year-old protagonist: “To know that I have this legacy is absolutely mind-blowing to me,” said Natochenny. “I am so grateful for the gift that Pokemon gave me, to allow me to be this character for so long.”
Sarah Natochenny
Natochenny, a Russian-American actress (“Yeah, my parents thought it’d be fun to not teach me English. They let me start school and learn there,” she joked), had a knack for memory growing up. It not only allowed her to quickly learn English, but also made her a natural performer. But while many of her peers were trying to beef up their theater resumes or adapt to college life, Natochenny was suddenly given the chance of a lifetime. After a single voiceover role, she auditioned for Pokemon and got the leading part.
Images via Pokèmon TV
She was a fan during the “Pokemania” years of the late ‘90s like nearly every other adolescent, but making it a career was painstakingly new. “This was my first job,” said Natochenny. “This was my first animation dubbing. I didn’t know what I was doing. At my audition, I had no idea what dubbing was. All I knew was that acting was my basic skill, talent, and passion and I happened to be able to apply it to Pokemon.” She had no idea that, almost two decades later, it would still be a major part of her life.
But the achievement wasn’t wholly positive in the beginning. She became the target of fan backlash, with an immense amount of ire raised at the new voice actors cast during a licensing change in the anime. Natochenny has long struggled with depression, one that wasn’t “circumstantial,” but was “kicked off by the reaction I got when I first started. You’re doing what you love and you finally book your first huge role on a show that you loved as a child and people are like ‘You’re terrible.’ That’s really painful to experience.”
The following few years were rough for Natochenny, as she battled reassessing her career with convincing herself she should continue pursuing it. While voicing Ash and taking him to Sinnoh, Unova, Kalos, Alola and beyond, she worked as a model and explored a newfound talent in film editing. It was in this journey she found she related to Ash more and more over time. “When I first booked the job, I didn’t understand why I booked it,” Natochenny said. “Then I kept booking protagonists, and I’m like, why am I booking these protagonists who are so happy-go-lucky and ready to get out of the house and take on the world? Because that’s so little of who I was at the time.”
But the persistence of Ash related to her own persistence — with the consistency of the performance and with her passion for her career. “I started realizing, OK, there must be something in me that is like Ash Ketchum,” Natochenny explained. “Over time, it became second nature to play him. He inspired me to be more outgoing and to find that person in me that’s actually fun and exciting and adventurous and competitive. And, you know, he taught me a lot. So there’s so much of Ash in me.”
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In the last few years, Natochenny found her Ash Ketchum has resonated with fans as well. In early 2020, Vanity Fair published a video “How Pokemon Is Dubbed From Japanese To English,” one that has accrued 12 million hits at the time of this writing. Not only did it provide insight into the company’s process, but it publicly attached a face and a personality to the performance of Ash. Entire generations of Pokemon fans had known her as Ash Ketchum, and she found their response to be “uplifting” and “incredibly heartwarming.” They would share stories of their own experiences with Pokemon and how it had touched their lives.
“It felt good to be acknowledged for my work, because I’d been doing it for so long,” Natochenny said. “I’d put so much of my life and love and passion into it. When you do voiceover, you are in a booth, and the only feedback you get is from your director and engineer. We just keep going so to have been recognized by Vanity Fair, and then recognized at conventions was a really, really lovely moment for me.” When she records, a fan-drawn picture of Ash sits on her desk, one with the caption “To Sarah Natochenny – Thank you for voicing my childhood.”
Natochenny did not expect the news that Ash Ketchum was set to be retired.“That was a really hard day. I was at a doctor’s appointment when we had that Zoom call. I couldn’t reschedule it. I found out. I cried,” said Natochenny. But what Ash represents goes far beyond the end of any series.
“Most people aren’t born great at the thing that they’re gonna do, and have to work really hard. Even if you are born with talent, you have to develop it. Ash is a great example of a kid who works really hard to get really good at the thing he’s passionate about. He’s not the best at it, right? He loses all the time, but he still keeps going and he never lets it get him down.”
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As for Natochenny, she didn’t expect to land the role of Ash Ketchum, nor did she know what to expect from the future. But she’s optimistic about the new region in front of her.
“Whatever happens, happens for the best. Some wonderful things have already come to fruition. I have plans for my future, and I’m excited. Sometimes you need a real kick like this to refocus your goals on what you set out to do. I’ve been very content for a very long time. So new beginnings, you know?”
Daniel Dockery is a Senior Staff Writer for Crunchyroll. Follow him on Twitter! His book, Monster Kids: How Pokemon Taught A Generation To Catch Them All, is available wherever books are sold.
