When the One Piece live-action series returns in 2026, fans will have plenty of new characters to meet. However, one of the most highly anticipated arrivals in the series is Tony Tony Chopper, who is set to integrate the group of the Straw Hats. Due to Chopper’s non-human form, he will be a CGI character voiced by Mikaela Hoover. During an interview with Perri Nemiroff for an upcoming episode of Collider Ladies Night while promoting her new blockbuster Superman, the actor revealed that the match made in heaven almost didn’t happen because she had a Beef to attend to.
“So when I got the audition for One Piece, I was filming [Netflix’s] ‘Beef,’ and I really just wanted to focus on ‘Beef.’ I got an audition from my voice-over agent, Stephanie, who was so nice through all of this, and I said, ‘I’m passing on this, Stephanie. I need to really be focused on ‘Beef.’ It’s crazy to think about now, but they don’t have a breakdown of what it’s for. When they give you those things, they don’t give you, like, ‘This is for One Piece and Chopper,’ so I had no idea what it was for, and I just wanted to really focus on ‘Beef.'”
And that was it. The story would have ended right then and there, but the One Piece casting team was determined to get Hoover. Just a couple of years ago, the actor had demonstrated immense talent for voice acting when she brought to life Floor, the adorable talking rabbit who is part of Rocket Raccoon’s (Bradley Cooper) story in Guardians of the Galaxy Vol.3. So One Piece wouldn’t just let go of her — that’s why she received a surprising message a week and a half later:
“Stephanie said, ‘Hey, casting specifically asked for you for your voice for this.’ And I was like, ‘Okay. I’ll take a look.’ And again, it didn’t have the breakdown. I mean, it had a breakdown of the character, but it didn’t say where the character was, it didn’t say what it was for. But when I read the sides for him, I was like, ‘Oh, this is me.’ I felt so connected to this character, so that when I was auditioning for it, I was having so much fun. And again, that was coming alive in me again, of why I did this in the first place and why I chose this to be my career path. So, I was having so much fun auditioning for him.”
The only problem with this whole adventure was that, despite getting involved in the audition process, Hoover still didn’t know who she was auditioning for. Since the team probably didn’t want the information that Chopper was being cast to leak, they only revealed who she was at a very late stage of the casting process. So she had to audition with just a general idea of who she was going to play.
Chopper Is Finally Coming To ‘One Piece’
According to the actor, all she remembers from the character breakdown was that it described him as “a little strange forest creature that had been kind of picked on his whole life.” His name was finally revealed when Hoover got a callback, and one of the “teary-eyed” producers told her over a Zoom call that fans “are going to love Chopper so much.”
Last month, the finalized version of Chopper was unveiled in the first One Piece Season 2 trailer, and long-time fans have to deal with the realization that this is the character that they know and love from the anime series, but with a different interpretation. To cap off the One Piece conversation, Hoover underscored that she is doing much more than just voicing the beloved character:
“[P]eople want you to sound like the anime version. They have an idea of what they want you to sound like, and I just took my own spin, clearly, from the audition and from the session of how I felt he would be. I’m also, as you know, acting him out. All the the facial expressions, all the movement, everything is me. So, I just took a bit of who I am, circling back to the beginning and my experiences, and putting that into Chopper.”
Netflix debuts the highly anticipated Season 2 of One Piece in 2026. Season 3 of the hit series is already in the works. Superman is in theaters now. Stay tuned to Collider for future updates and check out the Collider Ladies Night episode this weekend.
