Actor Gary L. Gray Reminisces on Impact of Voicing The Fairly OddParents' A.J.
When the cartoon show, The Fairly OddParents aired on Nickelodeon in 2001, it made us all wish we had our own fairy parents who could grant our every wish. Timmy Turner may have been the main character but his best friend A.J. played a big role in many Black children’s lives during the early 2000’s.
Even though he was a side character, A.J.’s intelligence surpassed every other character on the show. Along with being smart, he was also rich which was an anomaly back then when it came to Black cartoon characters.
Actor Gary L. Gray started voicing A.J. around 12-13 years old after doing voice work on Rocket Power as Sam Dullard and Charley on Clifford the Big Red Dog. In a recent tweet on A.J.’s “birthday,” Gray stated how proud he is to have played him. Out of all of his characters, A.J. is the most influential to Gray.
“The characters I’m playing impact me,” said Gray. “I was trying to make them be a representation in some type of way or form.”
A.J. was the first voice role that Gray felt, “okay, this is me.” Gray remembers growing up with some of the other voice actors who he used to spend time with in the booths.
Gray didn’t start off as a voice actor, instead he was on a runway as a child model. By the age of three, Gray could speak, read and write very well and expressed to his parents that he wanted to be on TV. While at a modeling show in New York, Gray met a producer of The Cosby Show, who wanted Gray to join the show. Gray’s mother didn’t believe the man at first until he flew them from Chicago to the studio. From there, Gray has acted on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Living Single, Family Matters, The Even Stevens and more.
“I would watch television and be like, ‘I want to do that. I want to tell people about that toy,’” he said.
Gary Gray played the role of Nelson on The Cosby Show. (Picture by AP Photo)
According to Gray, since he comes from a family of workers (lawyers, teachers, nurses, etc.), he had a pretty normal childhood. Unlike most childhood actors, Gray went to regular school when he wasn’t working or was on set. He did state that when child actors are on set, they have mandatory school every day for a set amount of times. While on The Even Stevens set, they had an actual classroom that they came to daily.
“They didn’t take away from normal experiences, they just added to it,” Gray said about his family and growing up in the spotlight.
As Gray grew into an adult, he noticed he was being typecast into certain roles. To avoid playing the same roles over and over, he started denying the roles. Gray considers his first “adult” role to be Brandon in the movie Noah's Arc: Jumping the Broom.
Looking back on his work, Gray is proud to have brought representation to the table. He advices other Black creatives, workers, entrepreneurs, etc. to be the representation that they want to see.
“Make a way because there is a way for everyone,” he said.