Erika Harlacher

Biography

Harlacher grew up in Camarillo, California, and started acting in school plays. When she was around 9–10 years old, she was inspired by an interview by Christy Carlson Romano who voiced Kim Possible, in which Romano said that with voice acting, you could go to work in your pajamas. Harlacher's mother responded that it was not a real job, and suggested she pursue acting only as a hobby. Her first exposure to anime was through Dragonball Z and Pokemon shows, which she considered more like cartoons, and that she really got into manga and anime in school when Fruits Basket was being published in English. At La Reina High School, she was active in the Speech and Mock Trial team, which was noted statewide and even attended a national event. She also competed on the school's diving team.

After graduating high school in 2008, she attended Cal Poly Pomona where she intended to major in graphic design. During her freshman year, she looked up some online forums regarding voice-over and attended Anime Expo, where she learned about and attended an Adventures in Voice Acting workshop conducted by Tony Oliver. On Oliver's suggestion that she was pretty good at it, she changed her major to theatre, and continued to take voice acting lessons and workshops while studying at school. She also did a production internship at Bang Zoom! Entertainment where she got to sit in on some of the recording sessions. Her first voice acting project was on K-On! where she voiced some incidental characters. Her first big voice-over role was for Battleship, based on the movie of the same name, where she got to voice a main character among many veteran voice actors. Video game reviewers, however, panned the game for having any actors from the film voicing in the game, and lack in the existing acting which was relegated to mostly radio chatter and mission updates. At one point in college, she had some health issues that led her to take an absence from school and acting, so she pursued production work, which her parents thought would make for a more practical career; she later dropped it as she was encouraged by Oliver to pursue acting and to finish school. It was then when she landed the lead role as Ayesha in the video game Atelier Ayesha: The Alchemist of Dusk. She described Ayesha as a bit airheaded and ditsy but relatable and resembles her personality at times. Video game reviewer Sean Madson of Diehardgamefan found the dub to be of decent qualify, but said Ayesha "sounded a bit too obnoxious with her airheadedness." Matt Sainsbury of Digitally Downloaded thought the dub was reasonable but disliked their American accents as not suiting the Japanese personality of the game. Vince Ingenito of IGN wrote that "both the writing and voice acting fail to lend any weight to her plight. Ayesha seems about as upset over her missing sister as I might be over a glass of spilled milk, making it really hard to care about the outcome of her quest." Harlacher also voiced Sadira, a spider-themed woman and new character to the Killer Instinct series.

In 2014, she voiced as Kyoko Kirigiri in Danganronpa: Trigger Happy Havoc. She described Kyoko as the most calm among the wacky characters and always on top of things. Video game reviewers thought the voice acting was okay., but some were annoyed by the lack of full voice acting and the frequent use of random outbursts of phrases as an alternative. She voiced Blood Leopard in Accel World, who was similar to Kyoko in showing little emotion. In Sword Art Online she voiced Sasha, whom she describes as being like a teacher/nun lady who is in charge of the kids who are lost in the game. In the second series, she voiced another character named Siune; both series were broadcast on the Toonami block on Adult Swim. She also began attending anime conventions as a guest panelist. In voicing Dunya in the Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic series, Harlacher found her character to be not your average princess, and that she was fun because she was unpredictable. Her biggest role that year was Ami Kawashima in the romantic comedy Toradora!, a classmate who harbors a mean and bratty personality behind a cheerful perfect-looking facade of a model. As it was one of NIS America's first dub productions, Harlacher said took a long time to call back from the audition, and that it also took more time than other studios in producing the show. She describes Ami's character as trying to act like she knows what she's doing but does not really have it together, and also she cannot cook. LB Bryant of Japanator said that Toradora dub release was a "must obtain" item and that "Ami Kawashima equals best girl." Travis Bruno of Capsule Computers said the English dub cast did impressively well and those who only listen to the Japanese tracks would be missing out. She also voices Mako's mother, Sukuyo Mankanshoku in Kill la Kill, which later ran on Adult Swim's Toonami block in 2015. She describes the series as crazy, the family as ridiculous, and that her character was very sweet and giving everyone food.

In 2015 she voiced Mimori Togo in Yuki Yuna is a Hero, one of the main heroines who are called to save their world by interacting in an alternate dimension where they have super powers. She describes Togo as going through a lot of emotional stuff, which helped her expand her acting range. Anime News Network reviewer Theron Martin said that the cast was "appropriately chosen for their roles in a vocal quality sense and handle the acting capably." She voices main character Princess Asseylum Vers Allusia in Aldnoah.Zero as well as Elizabeth in The Seven Deadly Sins, both of which had English dub premieres on Netflix. She attended Sac-Anime in Sacramento, California; the panel she was on was regarded as one of the highlights of the convention. Manga Entertainment listed Harlacher among their top 5 English voice actresses. In 2016, she landed the voice role of main character Kurapika in the Viz Media English dub of the 2011 anime adaptation of Hunter x Hunter, which premiered on the Toonami block in April. She was also announced to be voicing Ann Takamaki, one of the core player characters in the video game Persona 5.

Personal life

Harlacher lives in North Hollywood in the Los Angeles area. In 2014, she started a Let's Play video channel on YouTube, where she plays through various games, some of which she has starred in, and others just for fun. She has a sister two years younger. She also owns two dogs.