Erika Harlacher is a popular voice actress who often lends her voice in anime series and video games. She is based in Los Angeles and only voices English dubbed versions of Japanese anime shows. She has featured in Japanese animes where she played major roles such as The Seven Deadly Sins, The Asterisk War, Hunter × Hunter, Toradora!, Yuki Yuna is a Hero, Aldnoah.Zero, Violet Evergarden, among others. Video games are also part of her forte and she has voiced in some such as Persona 5, Danganronpa, Killer Instinct, and Atelier Ayesha.
Who is Erika Harlacher, The Voice Actress?
She was born Erika Lynn Harlacher in California on August 29, 1990. She grew up in Camarillo and was raised by her parents – whose names and occupations are not known. However, she has one known sibling, a sister – Natalie Ann Harlacher – who was born in 1992.
Erika became interested in acting at a very young age. While in elementary school, she began acting in school plays and wowed her audience. She was definitely a born talent who began to manifest her skills at a very young age. Erika Harlacher was also interested in Japanese animation, popularly known as anime. She regarded anime as cartoons which they actually are and was first involved with it in elementary school. In addition to this, she was interested in Japanese comic novels popularly called manga and was also involved with them in school.
She attended La Reina High School, a private, independent Catholic college preparatory high school and middle school for young women in Thousand Oaks, Ventura County, California. Her school allowed Speech and Mock Trials teams to exist and compete. She was active in the team and represented them in state and national events.
Upon graduating from high school in 2008, Erika Harlacher majored in graphics design at the California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, one of the two polytechnics in the California University System. In the first year, she began taking voice acting lessons and attending voice training workshops and seminars. She attended the Adventures in Voice Acting workshop, where she met Tony Oliver who was convinced that she had a chance of being a great voice actress and encouraged her.
Erika Harlacher voiced her first anime soon after in the English dubbed animation, K-on!. She voiced the character, Keiko Ida which was a minor role. Her first big voice-over role was in the movie-like video game Battleship produced in 2012. Grace Harland was the main character which Erika voiced. Reviews on her voice acting in this video game were not encouraging. She, however, didn’t give up but continued to take voice acting roles while also undergoing some form of training at workshops.
Her next voice-over role was in Atelier Ayesha: The Alchemist of Dusk, where she played Ayesha. Her role was negatively criticized and her American accent judged as it didn’t blend with the Japanese character she voiced. Prior to this, she pursued production but was deterred by Tony Oliver who told her to go back to voice acting.
Her biggest role and the most critically acclaimed character was that of Ami Kawashima in the romantic comedy Toradora! This role shot her into the spotlight and expanded her fame. As the years went by, Erika Harlacher took other voice acting roles and is still active to date.
5 Facts You Should Know About Erika Harlacher
1. Her Mother Thought Voice Acting was a Joke
When she began showing interests in anime, manga and video games voicing in her childhood days, her mother didn’t regard it as a real job or career and tried to dissuade her from pursuing it. Erika, however, ignored her mother’s advice and pursued her passion instead.
Also, even when Erika had health issues while in the polytechnic and dropped voice acting to pursue production, her mother reinstated her disdain for voice acting and voiced that production was a more reasonable career path.
2. Mentors and Motivation
Erika Harlacher had people she looked up to and who motivated her to join voice acting. One of such people was Christy Carlson Romano. She was particularly interested in a statement made by Christy about the ease of being a voice actor. She remarked that one could work with his or her pajamas and this spurred Erika on as she pursued her career.
3. She Majored in Graphics Design at the University
Graphics design was Erika’s first choice at the Polytechnic. She began studying it first but later changed to Theatre after discovering her interest in voice acting and encouragements from Tony Oliver.
4. She is Getting Married
Erika has been in a relationship for a while now and the couple seems to have been growing stronger. She is currently engaged to her longtime boyfriend Luka Stone. She announced their engagement on October 30, 2018. It is, however, not known exactly when they began dating.
5. Her Net Worth
Erika Harlacher’s assets and salaries are not public information at the moment. However, she has been active in the voice acting scene since 2011 and has carved a name for herself in the field. Currently, Erika lives in North Hollywood, California but it is not known if her apartment is self-owned. As at 2018, Erika was worth a whopping $1.6 million
Also Read: Top 10 Richest People in the world with full biography and details.
