How Michael Keaton Discovered His Famous Batman Voice

As long as there have been Batman films, there have been outraged fans. Tim Burton kicked off the tradition of people getting unreasonably upset when casting 1989's "Batman." In fact, Burton had to fight for Michael Keaton after it was announced he would be playing the lead in the first live-action film based on the Dark Knight (the 1960s movie notwithstanding) and fans around the world threw a collective hissy fit.

In fairness, some of the outrage is understandable. Keaton was known for light-hearted comedies such as "Mr. Mom" and "Night Shift." His most recent role prior to "Batman" was "Beetlejuice," in which his carnivalesque, unhinged energy was on full display. And the man stood at a relatively underwhelming 5-foot 9-inches. None of which seemed like it would translate well to a character known for striking terror into the hearts of hardened criminals.

But Burton knew he was on to something, and not just because Keaton had already demonstrated his dramatic abilities by playing an addict in 1988's "Clean and Sober." Back when the director and his "Batman" star met to discuss the film for the first time, Keaton arrived with a fully-formed vision for Bruce Wayne that matched up with Burton's own ambitions to do something new with the character. As the "Birdman" star recalled it on the WTF podcast:

"Everything I said [Burton's] head was nodding [...] [Bruce Wayne is] ridiculously depressed, he's a vigilante, he's got this issue, it's so obvious you know [...] and then he goes 'yeah, that's what I want to do, it's exactly what I want to do.'"

And as things played out, those psychological issues that Keaton saw as so crucial to the character would prove useful in a more practical sense, especially when it came to developing the all-important Batman voice.

The Batman voice has become a crucial element of any on-screen depiction of the character. The great Kevin Conroy is, for many, the definitive Batman simply by virtue of his inimitable vocal performance. Then, there was Christian Bale's animalistic snarl, which became legendary after his rain-soaked interrogation of Mark Boone Junior's detective Arnold Flass in "Batman Begins" quickly became a meme. But the original Batman voice? That was Michael Keaton.

In a Q&A published by Empire, the Oscar nominee explained how he saw Bruce Wayne's unsteady psychological state as propelling him into donning the cape and cowl:

"He's got two personalities. The guy is not psychotic but not far from it. Controlled psychosis. In order for me to justify all this, I can't be changing the oil on the Batmobile and then saying, 'Well, I have to kill some people.' So he probably ends up going into some deep, deep trance, which is a scene that I don't think ever made it in."

Keaton previously referred to the "trance" scene on the In The Envelope podcast, saying:

"I asked [Burton] to shoot a scene where you see me kind of in the eyes, and you see me kind of go into this weird kind of meditation where i kind of disappear and lose myself in order to be Batman because that's the only way i could rationalize what he was about to go do."

And as he went on to explain in his Empire Q&A, it was this trance state that brought the now famous gravelly vocal tone to life: "I figured once he's in the trance, he doesn't think like he does like Bruce Wayne, doesn't act like he does. So the voice came out of that, it was a really practical thing."

Since Michael Keaton first delivered the now iconic line "I'm Batman," in "Batman" '89, the concept of the Batman voice has remained a constant in pop culture. And while everyone who came after Keaton has put their own spin on it, there really was something elemental about Keaton's gruff timbre.

Robert Pattinson previously explained how he found his Batman voice, telling Collider how he had around seven to eight months of prep time after being cast in "The Batman," which he used to "experiment with a lot of different things." But it was only after putting on the suit and performing that the voice solidified, with Pattinson saying, "The more you embody the suit, the more you embody the character, it just started to come out quite organically."

All of which is fascinating, and no one way is necessarily better than the other. But with Keaton, there was a cohesiveness to his portrayal that was so effective, mostly owing to his clear-cut vision for the character that had impressed Tim Burton in that first meeting. And the voice was part of that. There was an odd logic to Keaton's performance, in the sense that even though he wasn't the most physically intimidating and was known more for his comedic sensibilities, you believed that he was crazy enough to go out at night dressed as a bat and hunt criminals. And the voice made sense in that context. With Keaton returning as Batman for "The Flash," it'll be interesting to see how his unhinged Bruce Wayne fits into the world constructed by director Andy Muschietti, especially considering Keaton and Tim Burton were so aligned on their original vision for the character. That said, it'll be undeniably cool to hear the voice again.