Name Emma Clarke | ||
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Role Musical Artist · emmaclarke.com Profiles | ||
Emma clarke london underground spoof
Emma Clarke (born 1971) is a writer of comedy and drama scripts and an award-winning voice-over artist, best known as the voice of the automated messages on the Bakerloo and Central lines of the London Underground. Between 2009 and 2017 Clarke's voice was replaced on the District and Victoria lines by announcements voiced by Sarah Parnell. Most of Clarke's work has been used in television commercials and radio outside the United Kingdom, notably in the Netherlands, Australia, and the United States.
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Born and raised in Sale, Greater Manchester, she started a theatre company at age 17 which specialised in training for businesses and groups in both the public and private sector. On graduation she worked for BBC Light Entertainment, where she wrote and performed poetry, prose, and drama.
Her father spotted an advert looking for voice over artists in the Sale and Altrincham Messenger; after failing her first interview, she studied the art for two years before gaining her first paid work.
In 1998, she was approached by a media company representing one of the three companies that operated parts of the London Underground, who were looking for a replacement automated customer announcer. After 18 months of focus-group testing, in which her voice was dubbed "Marilyn", she was awarded a contract to produce announcements in 1999. In 2007, she achieved widespread public attention when, as a result of adding spoof announcements – cleared by London Underground – to her website, a Mail on Sunday newspaper reporter interviewed her and published an article which denigrated her employer. Despite rumours circulating that she had been dismissed from service, London Underground continues to record and use her voice.
Her other clients include the BBC, Gillette, Virgin, Classic FM, Homebase and "3" mobile phones. Along with her solo work, she is the managing director of Just Add Voice, a company which provides voice-over tracks.
In 2016, she voiced the starship Avalon in the Sony Pictures film Passengers, which starred Jennifer Lawrence and Chris Pratt.
Clarke, her husband, and their two children live in Altrincham.