Voices of the Spaghetti Western ~ “Alive or Preferably Dead”

 As we know most of the Euro-westerns were co-productions from Italy, Spain, Germany and France which incorporated British and American actors to gain a worldwide audience. The films were shot silent and then dubbed into the various languages where they were sold for distribution. That means Italian, Spanish, German, French and English voice actors were hired to dub the films. Even actors from the countries where the film was to be shown were often dubbed by voice actors for various reasons such as the actors were already busy making another film, they wanted to be paid additional salaries for dubbing their voices, the actor’s voice didn’t fit the character they were playing, accidents to the actors and in some cases even death before the film could be dubbed.

I’ll list a Euro-western and the (I) Italian, (S) Spanish, (G) German and (F) French, (E) English voices that I can find and once in a while a bio on a specific voice actor as in Europe these actors are as well-known as the actors they voiced.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Today we’ll cover – “Alive or Preferably Dead”

[(I) Italian, (S) Spanish, (G) German, (F) French, (E) English]

 

Monty Mulligan – Giuliano Gemma (I) Pino Locchi, (S) Félix Acaso, (G) Rainer Brandt, (F) Claude Giraud

Ted Mulligan – Nino Benvenuti (I) Oreste Lionello, (S) José María Cordero, (G) Claus Jurichs, (F) Serge Sauvion

James ‘Bad Jim’ Williams – Cris Huerta (I) Corrado Gaipa, (S) José Martínez Blanco, (G) Alexander Welbat, (F) Michel Barbey

Rosella Scott – Sydne Rome (I) Rita Savagnone, (S) Maite Santamarina, (G) Ursula Herwig, (F) Michelle Bardollet

Mr. Barnes – Antonio Casas (I) Roberto Bertea, (S) Salvador Arias, (G) Martin Hirthe, (F) William Sabatier

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Claude Giraud  (1936 – 2020)

Claude Pierre Edmond Giraud was born in Chamalières, France on February 5, 1936, he was a French actor and voice actor. He had very few movie roles, albeit quite memorable ones, such as Philippe de Plessis-Bellières in the 1960s “Angélique” period pieces and rebel leader Mohamed Larbi Slimane in “The Mad Adventures of Rabbi Jacob”.

His voice was quite recognizable. Among many others, he frequently dubbed Robert Redford, Tommy Lee Jones, Jon Voight, Tom Selleck (though sadly not in ‘‘Magnum, P.I.’), Liam Neeson and Alan Rickman (Severus Snape in the “Harry Potter” films, most notably). He also dubbed Patrick Stewart as Captain Jean-Luc Picard in “Star Trek: The Next Generation” and Harrison Ford in “Raiders of the Lost Ark”, and he is well remembered as the French voice of Ulysses in the animated series “Ulysses 31”.

He retired from acting and voice acting in 2012 and passed away at age 84 on November 3, 2020. in Clermont-Ferrand, France. That was three days after the passing of Sean Connery, who was dubbed in French by Giraud in “The Name of the Rose”.