Last Friday as WonderCon 2024 kicked off in Anaheim, California, the first panel we attended was “Spotlight On Ashley Eckstein,” during which the Ahsoka Tano voice actress and Her Universe fashion label founder discussed her career with moderator (and Ashley’s own husband) ex-Major League Baseball player David Eckstein.
The famous couple started out the panel by talking about what made them attracted to each other. Then Ashley discussed how she first got interested in pursuing voice acting as a career. She talked about her recurring role as Muffy on the Disney Channel series That’s So Raven, and how she got voice auditions because she sounded younger than she was. She remembers being devastated by one instance in which she was replaced in a voice role she was extremely excited for, and how David “was very sweet” in consoling her. She returned the favor when Mr. Eckstein made three errors in one baseball game.
Ashley didn’t have a lot of time to prepare for her Ahsoka Tano audition, and she had five auditions in that same day. The Clone Wars was the last of those five. “I thought George Lucas was done making Star Wars,” she says. She was also initially told she would be auditioning for the role of Padmé Amidala, but had trouble mastering an impression of Natalie Portman’s voice. She also had no time to eat all day that day. “By the time I got to the audition I hadn’t eaten, and I was very very hangry.” The auditions were running an hour behind, and she was up against all the biggest voice actresses in Hollywood. She walked out angry and called her agent.
Her agent convinced her to stay at the audition. “You never know what could happen,” he said over the phone. Then in the actual audition, Star Wars: The Clone Wars showrunner Dave Filoni thought she sounded too young for Padmé, but had another role in mind for her. But there was a high level of confidentiality surrounding the series, so she couldn’t even tell her husband David about Ahsoka Tano. “I did not even want to have the chance to slip up,” said Mr. Eckstein in response. David remembered first seeing a figurine of Ahsoka when he visited Skywalker Ranch with Ashley. They also met George Lucas on that visit. “He was literally the kindest guy. Very humble, down to Earth,” said Ashley. During that meeting, Lucas admitted to David that he wasn’t a baseball fan.
Later during that visit to Skywalker Ranch, during a screening of The Clone Wars movie in George Lucas’s private screening room, David Eckstein fell asleep, and to this day Ashley won’t let him hear the end of it. Next the Ecksteins got into the origins of Her Universe, which happened during a trip to Toronto when Ashle couldn’t get a work visa. “My acting career was gone. I wasn’t counting on Ahsoka being a hit,” said Ashley, but an idea struck her during her downtime. “I wanted Star Wars clothes made for me, and I came up empty handed. I was told to be happy with a men’s size small. I knew that wasn’t right. I knew that 45% of sci-fi and fantasy fans were women and girls, so I went to David and I said, ‘I have this idea. I really think it’ll work.’ And David said, ‘I believe in you, but I want you to build the best team around you.’”
“I never did Her Universe by myself. It was a team,” confirmed Ashley. Then they talked about the definition of a “hype friend,” which is a term that she favors. “We are social creatures. We are meant to connect. We are meant to interact,” explained Ashley. ““A hype friend is someone who has your back, who hypes you up and says you are great at this. I truly believe that everyone is born with a different gift. We spend so much time trying to be like one another, when actually we should be the best version of ourselves.” At that point the Ecksteins asked members of the audience to share their specific gifts, and Ashley handed out pieces from the recent Ahsoka Tano Disney Parks / Her Universe merchandise collection as gifts to those who participated.
For additional coverage from WonderCon 2024, check right back here at LaughingPlace.com.