Key Takeaways
- Claudia Black is iconic as Morrigan, one of the most popular Dragon Age characters of all-time.
- But bizzarely, she got the role because she sent a slow, beat poet rendition of Smack That.
- Higher-ups had an image in their head of an 18-year-old Morrigan, so they weren’t too happy, but then they heard the performance. The rest is history.
Dragon Age creator David Gaider revealed that he cast Claudia Black as Morrigan after hearing her slow, beat poet cover of Akon (feat. Eminem)’s Smack That.
Tis quite merry to spit rhymes so freely, is it not?
As reported by Eurogamer, higher-ups weren’t too happy with the decision, as they “had this image of Morrigan as young, like 18 years old”. Gaider isn’t sure where that idea came from, but because of it, higher-ups complained that Claudia (who at the time was in her 30s) sounded “too old”, even saying that it “sounds like she smokes three packs a day!”
“The first two sessions we asked her to pitch her voice up and it was AWFUL,” Gaider posted on Bluesky. “So Carlone [Livingstone, then VO director] and I did the sneaky thing, and on the third session we asked her to just… act. Use her natural voice. We loved her performance so much we had the feeling that the team would love it too and forget their nonsense. They did.
Claudia Black hadn’t worked on a video game before, but she wanted to dip her toes into this fast growing medium. So, her rep sent Livingstone a recording… which featured the beat poet rendition of Smack That.
Black would go on to play Chloe Frazer in the Uncharted series.
Gaider, already a fan of Black’s work, says that he “lost [his] goddamn mind” and cast her immediately. To this day, he still has the recording, a vital piece of Dragon Age history, but we can’t have it.
Claudia Black Sounds Like She Might Just Be Morrigan In Real Life
Another fun anecdote Gaider shares is that he was warned not to compare celebrities to other celebrities, but the first thing he said when meeting Claudia Black was, “Well, when I started writing Morrigan, the voice in my head was Helena Bonham Carter”.
Immediately, Claudia snapped back, “So what you’re saying is… I’m a very cheap version of Helana Bonham Carter.” Gaider, who by this point was fumbling on his own words worse than Alistair, spends 30 seconds trying to salvage the meeting before Black “throws her head back and LAUGHS”.
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Morrigan Voted The Most Popular Dragon Age: Origins Romance
Surprising none, Morrigan is the most popular Dragon Age: Origins romance all these years later.
“For the next several days, whenever she’s in the booth and I make a comment to Caroline – which she can’t hear, because the booth is sound-proof – she’d say, ‘Oh, does he want it more like Helena?’ And I’d melt into the desk in renewed mortification and she’d LAUGH.”
Y’know, Black might just be Morrigan in real-life.
In BioWare’s Dragon Age: Origins, the kingdom of Ferelden is deep in the midst of an onslaught by the violent Darkspawn. You must join the Grey Wardens, an ancient order, and help put an end to the invasion.