Marisha Ray

Marisha Ray Huber^{[Note 1]} was born in Mount Washington, Kentucky,^[2] the daughter of a dog groomer mother and truck tire salesman father. She hails from an extended family of Louisville farmers, having helped her grandfather on his tobacco farm from the age of six.^{[Note 2]} At the age of 12, she began acting at the Actors Theatre of Louisville.^[3] She decided not to pursue dancing as a career, instead focusing on acting. Reflecting on this decision in the book The World of Critical Role, she said, "I knew it wasn't the lifestyle that I wanted, because that dancer lifestyle is brutal. Getting into a studio or a company is near impossible, and then you're just destroying your body. So I knew that I wasn't up for that, but I'd really fallen in love with acting."^[4] She received an offer of representation from an agent in Los Angeles in the summer of 2008, and moved there at the age of 19.^[5] Her parents supported the decision and drove her there.^{[Note 3]}

Ray arrived in Los Angeles during the Writers Guild strike, causing her difficulty in finding auditions and leading her to support herself financially by canvassing for that year's presidential election.^{[Note 4]} After the election, she took up street performing as a tap dancer on Hollywood Boulevard. On the advice of a nearby Batman performer, she switched to wearing a Poison Ivy costume and charging for photos, but had difficulty with members of the public not recognising the character; when a little girl mistook her for Tinker Bell, she realized that Disneytoon Studios' Tinker Bell film series was currently in production, and switched to dressing as Tinker Bell for the next three years. She joined an improv club, where a friend provided her with the connection she needed to get involved in producing web media.^{[6][Note 5]}

Ray produced a Batgirl fan series called Batgirl: Spoiled (2012), in which she played the title character.^[7][8][9] Ray's future husband Matthew Mercer assisted on the project,^[10] which also featured Taliesin Jaffe as The Riddler.^[11] Ray later described the series as her big break, as it drew a large audience due to the lack of Batgirl media at the time.^{[Note 6]} She also hosted the web series Super Power Beat Down which began that year with a race between two incarnations of the Batmobile.^[12][13][14] She continued to host it until 2016.^{[15][unreliable source]}

She joined Mercer's home Dungeons & Dragons campaign in 2012 as Keyleth, a half-elf druid. In 2015 the campaign began to air on Geek & Sundry as the web series Critical Role.^[16][17][18] Her character for the second campaign was Beauregard, a human monk.^[19] Geek & Sundry hosted the show until it went independent in 2019, part way through the second campaign. Ray was involved in many of Geek & Sundry's other productions during the period, including co-hosting Key Questions,^[20][21] acting in Sagas of Sundry,^[22] and producing Signal Boost!^[23] She announced her appointment to the post of creative director for Geek & Sundry on July 28, 2017;^[24] and her tenure saw the company reach its Twitch subscription peak in January 2018.^[25] She stepped down from the position that June, when Critical Role began preparations to become independent.^[26][27] Critical Role was both the Webby Winner and the People's Voice Winner in the "Games (Video Series & Channels)" category at the 2019 Webby Awards;^[28] the show was also both a Finalist and the Audience Honor Winner at the 2019 Shorty Awards.^[29]

After becoming hugely successful, the Critical Role cast left the Geek & Sundry network in early 2019 and set up their own company called Critical Role Productions.^{[30][31][32][33]} Ray became the creative director for the company.^[26][27] In February 2019, Critical Role began to air on its own channel and was no longer broadcast by Geek & Sundry.^[34] Soon after, Critical Role Productions aimed to raise $750,000 on Kickstarter to create an animated series of their first campaign, but ended up raising over $11 million.^[35] In November 2019, Amazon Prime Video announced that they had acquired the streaming rights to this animated series, now titled The Legend of Vox Machina;^[36] Ray reprised her role as Keyleth.^[37] Ahead of the series premiere in January 2022, Amazon renewed the series for a second season^[38] which premiered in January 2023.^[39] On October 6, 2022, Amazon renewed the series for a third season.^[40][41] The third campaign of the web series began airing in 2021, with Ray as the multiclassed warlock/sorcerer Laudna.^[42][43]

Madison Durham, for Polygon in February 2022, commented that "Ray has been instrumental in making Critical Role into the sprawling multimedia company that it is today, contributing as the creative lead for shows like All Work No Play, Exandria Unlimited, and more. In interviews and media appearances, the persona she presents behind the scenes is distinctly different from Keyleth's brand of awkward deference. Ray appears to command the room, regularly making difficult decisions that impact the entire organization".^[44]

A Familiar Problem, a one-page RPG co-written by Ray and Grant Howitt, was released in June 2022; it was published by the Critical Role Productions imprint Darrington Press.^[45] Also in June 2022, Critical Role Productions launched a new record label, Scanlan Shorthalt Music, to release original music inspired by Critical Role and the Exandria setting. Along with the label announcement, they released their first album titled Welcome to Tal'Dorei. The new project is led by Ray and Senior Producer Maxwell James.^[46][47][48] In November 2022, the label released a second album titled Welcome to Wildemount.^[49]

Ray began dating fellow voice actor and Critical Role co-star Matthew Mercer in 2011, and they were engaged in 2016 before marrying on October 21, 2017.^[50][51][52] They reside in Los Angeles and have a pet corgi named Omar.^[53]

Ray took part in the charity boxing event Creator Clash 2 on April 15, 2023, losing to Haley Sharpe by unanimous decision.^[54][55]

• Marisha Ray at IMDb