Brow Beat

Mae Whitman Goes From “Her?” to Her in the Trailer for Operator

Mae Whitman (also known as Arrested Development’s Ann Veal) is in a love triangle with her husband and her own voice in the trailer for Operator. Joe (Martin Starr) is a data-driven, anxiety-riddled programmer who tracks everything in his life with meticulous attention to detail. When a robocall recording for a client turns out to be a flop, Joe recruits his wife (Whitman), a hotel operator, to lend her soothing voice to the call center instead—and then finds himself obsessing over the recordings instead of the actual person he married in the first place.

The film, directed by Logan Kibens, has been hailed as a hidden gem of South by Southwest, and Whitman, an experienced voice actor, is a perfect choice for the part, having already lent her voice to everything from Avatar: the Last Airbender to Disney’s Tinker Bell. Operator co-stars Nat Faxon, Cameron Esposito, and Retta.