Chatting with the Vancouver-raised star of Apex Legends and Silent Hill f

You might not know it, but one of the Apex Legends characters has a big Canadian connection.

Support Legend Conduit is voiced by Frankie Kevich, an actress who was born and raised in Vancouver until her family moved to Southern California when she was in high school. In addition to Apex, she’s had roles in shows like Rainbow High and Suits LA and such video games as Fire Emblem Heroes and Arknights.

MobileSyrup sat down with Kevich to discuss the experience of playing Conduit in the massively popular Apex and how it relates to her biracial identity as a “Polipina” (Polish and Filipina), as well as her just-announced role in Silent Hill f, the first brand-new mainline entry in the iconic Konami survival horror series since 2012’s Downpour.

What are your fondest memories of growing up in Vancouver?

Frankie Kevich: I miss it so much. Honestly, one of the things [since] living in Los Angeles that I miss the most is the rain. You get so, so tired of it when it’s 10 months of the year, but when it’s maybe three weeks of the year over here, I definitely miss that aspect of it. I was always a real mallrat, too, because of that. So between me and my brother, some of our favourite memories are always going to the mall and doing our laps around the arcade, and then the GameStop, and then all the different stores to get your anime figurines, and going to movie theatres. It was our special time to just bum around the mall. But everything’s outside here; you don’t get an indoor space in LA.

You’ve done different kinds of acting. What’s it like working in games versus other media?

Kevich: Working on games, honestly, there’s so much different excitement that you feel whether you’re on set or whether you’re working on a really cool video game. I personally grew up on so many video games, and I feel like, especially in my adult time, I tend to binge-watch a lot of shows that I’ve already watched like 30 times. [laughs] But video games, that’s something that I’m always like, “I can try out something new! I can sink 100 hours into a new game.” And I feel like it’s the world-building, and the different types of genres that they explore in video games that I’ve always been more drawn to. So I get really, really excited when I’m on a new game.

And there is a little bit less of the pressure of being perfect with a billion people staring at you. There’s still definitely that in video games, especially if you have people coming in from Japan or Finland that are all staring at you and being like, “Okay, I hope we picked the right person!” [laughs] But I definitely think that I feel a little more free to play in video games. And that’s definitely the area in my career where I’ve excelled faster. So personally, it’s been a dream come true getting to work in video games.

But on camera, too, is its own separate piece of my heart, and its own separate challenges and everything that I still really love, and I would love to do more of. And honestly, I’m also realizing in my artistic career that I do like the idea of directing, and I’ve been dipping my toes in that and starting new projects where I am more in the driver’s seat and get to control a little bit more of those aspects. Maybe it’s just as a control thing for myself. I’m a very nitpicking perfectionist. But on camera is definitely very special in its own way.

It’s very interesting that you mentioned not necessarily having all eyes on you at once. I think on the flip side of that, what’s interesting about games is that players will obviously have that deep connection to a character just by virtue of spending so much time with them. And obviously, that’s a big thing with Apex Legends, especially. These are characters that they’re playing as for hundreds and hundreds of hours. So I’m curious when you approach a character like Conduit — when you’re voicing those lines, how cognizant are you of the fact that they’re going to be heard so many times? Is that right in the back of your head? Do you try to put a little different “oomph” on lines? What’s the sort of thought process behind that as you’re going into it?

Kevich: Oh, 100 per cent, especially when it came to Apex! Oh, man, some of those opening lines, and especially some of the chirps that I’m like, “Oh, I know they’re going to hear this a billion times over and over again…” [As Conduit] “Over there!” When I started working on Conduit, I remember having that discussion with the writer and with the director as well. “So she’s a fangirl, but we don’t want to lean too far into her just being a fan of the Apex games, but we want her to also have that strength, have that oomph and really prove that she deserves to be there, too. That while she also admires these people, she definitely deserves to be there.” And so we don’t want to lean too hard into the fangirl and too hard into the like, “Oh my gosh, it’s so cool to be here!” But to also add a little bit of that like energy and badass-ness that got her there.

And so especially with the chirps and everything that we do, I try to kind of even it out, maybe for every five where she’s really on top of it, and really determined and knows what she’s doing and really in control of the situation… For every five of those, maybe I’ll add in one where she loses herself a little bit and is like, “Oh my god, I can’t believe I’m here!” And she’s allowed to get a little flustered and a little excited. But I knew that if [players] were going to hear that all the time, it could get a little grating. It could get a little like, “Oh my gosh, we get it, that’s your gimmick, that’s your bit!” So I definitely didn’t want to become a trope or anything with Conduit. So it was definitely trying to be cognizant of that in the recording studio of finding moments to add in these little bits of her personality.

Another thing that is so cool about Apex — there aren’t a lot of multiplayer games that last this long and have this enduring popularity. Now that it’s been a couple of years since Conduit’s been in the game, and you’ve been a part of the fandom, what have been some of your favourite parts of getting to be a part of this massive property?

Kevich: Yeah! Oh, man. Nothing will ever compare to that first week when she came out, because I had no idea that they were already ready for her. But I was already following the Apex page on Instagram and everything, and once they started dropping teasers, I was like, “That’s Tagalog! I think she’s coming!”  It was so exciting. And just they really took care with her trailers and everything and introducing her. I felt so much love and welcome from all the other Apex Legends [actors] out there that found me on socials and congratulated me and welcomed me with all of the fans. Those first couple weeks is when I saw just so much fan art for her. And especially with the trailer just being so funny and weird with like, “Is she singing?” It was a really shocking moment for everybody. [laughs]

Yeah, that was a really exciting week for me. It’s definitely a career-changing, life-changing game to get. So it was a huge deal for me, and that was just a really cathartic moment. I don’t feel like in this industry you ever feel like, “Man, I really made it!” But it’s that one moment of, “Oh, this is something that I grew up on. This is the type of game that I love to watch and to play and to bond [over] with other people.” So it was really a rewarding moment when she first came out.

But since then, honestly, it’s been so great hearing every once in a while on social media updates from players that are real Conduit mains and showing off how many kills they’ve gotten with Conduit. And I’m like, “Man, people are dedicated to her!” And it’s so amazing to see that she’s still serving her purpose. And then also the little, sometimes really funny lines that we record as we update the game, it’s one single silly line that sometimes I even forget, and then I will hear somebody quoting it back to people or tagging me on the thing of like, “This was so silly.” I was like, “I forgot that was in there, but I’m so glad you found that Easter egg!” That’s been a really fun part of the process, too.

Of course, another element of Conduit is her Filipina background, which you share. I think that’s really cool. I’m biracial myself — I’m half-Indian, half-Scottish. And I know you’ve been very open about being half-Filipina and half-Polish, and I think that’s really cool. Growing up, we didn’t really see a lot of mixed representation. I’m sure you could speak to that as well. So I’m curious, what is it like for you to be able to be visible about those two different backgrounds and then get to play in that sandbox and that representation with a character like Conduit, or whatever else you might be doing?

 

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Kevich: Yeah, it’s really beautiful. It’s also very terrifying. I feel like, in so many ways, you have this pressure on yourself to really represent for your own culture and for your people, and especially with Conduit, it was so amazing. Especially for my parents, they don’t really get video games that much. They were always supportive. They knew that it was something me and my brother loved. So growing up, they were like, “Alright, alright, we’ll get you the new console.” They always let us have the new consoles. If we begged for a game, they were pretty understanding about that. But they still were just like, “What are you doing? You’re wasting your time.” So it’s been really nice to get to show them as an adult, “Hey, my passion has turned into a real career here, and also has turned into a way for me to reconnect with you guys and ask you about this!”

Because growing up, especially in Vancouver, there’s such a big immigrant population there, and it was really beautiful. And it was great. I had so many other Filipino friends there, but there wasn’t a ton of other biracial people that I met. So I was definitely caught in these two worlds where there were some people that were so connected to their culture and to their heritage and knew the language so fluently, and then had family that all lived there with them. But we were disconnected; none of my Filipino family lived out there in Vancouver, and my dad’s an only child, so really, my biggest connections to the Philippines and to Poland are through my parents, because they are very much connected to their own heritage, and they’ve tried to bring that to us. But when they tried teaching my brother Polish and Filipino and English growing up, he didn’t speak English too well. [laughs] And so they basically gave up trying. Which is definitely a bummer for me, because I would have, when I was younger, tried learning, but it’s hard. They’re working full-time jobs, and there’s three languages in the house. It all gets confusing.

So they weren’t really able to teach me Polish or Tagalog growing up, but I picked up a lot of stuff. I’ve always listened to my mom when she’s talking to her friends and to my grandma and I’ve been trying to slowly learn it on my own as well. And especially when it came to Conduit, I had to do my best to learn Tagalog. I know when they asked for the audition, they said it wasn’t necessary, but when I looked at the audition material, I was like, “I’ve heard my mom say all of these! I know how to pronounce these. I know what they mean because it’s only bits and pieces here and there.” So I gave it a shot, and they brought me in, and they were like, “Okay, yeah, you definitely do the job!”

And when it finally came out, I was very nervous. I know my Tagalog is not perfect, but in a way, I also kind of own that for Conduit. I remember in the callback process, they asked me if I would feel comfortable and only if it’s authentic to me. It was really up to my discretion if I was willing to do a Filipino accent for Conduit. And I was like, “It really isn’t authentic to me. I don’t think I could tell that story. If that is the character that you’re looking for that is that ingrained in the Filipino culture, then it’s probably not me that you’re looking for.” So I really thought I was giving away the role at that moment. I basically told myself, “I can cry about it for like a week, but then I have to just let it go.” And then two weeks later, I got the call that I booked the role. But in a way, I know that there’s a lot of Filipinos also that live here in North America that don’t speak Tagalog, and for them they feel like they’re missing a piece of that experience. But I think that, in itself, is its own experience, of being this mixture of Western but then also having a lot of these family values that you bring you get from your Filipino side.

That’s a great point. That’s actually how I learned about you and Conduit at first — I’m friendly with the people who run AAPI in Gaming [shoutout to their amazing social media manager, Kimi Arquines], and for Filipino American History Month, they were showcasing some Filipino video game characters. I remember seeing you and Conduit, and it was so cool seeing everyone talk about how much they love that character and that representation. But moving away from Apex a little bit… You have a role in Silent Hill f. What can you tell us about it?

Kevich: Yeah! The Konami team has come back — they have really been promoting Silent Hill f and it’s been really exciting to see all of the gameplay. It looks absolutely beautiful. And it’s funny, we did this over a year ago, all of the recording, and it was really quite a quick recording period, but I just knew being in the booth that, “Oh, this is something really special.” So it’s really great to see all of the feedback that people have been giving on it, seeing how excited everybody is to see a new big Silent Hill game after the Silent Hill 2 remake did so well. I think people are just looking for more of it. Yeah, that was a really fun experience.

My character is Rinko, and she is one of the close friends of our main character, the protagonist, Hinako. As Hinako goes on her very Silent Hill journey that’s very psychological and very dark but also very self-reflective, it’s cool getting to not be the person that has to be grounded in reality. Because Hinako’s reality does get so blurred and so kind of confusing that I get to kind of be on the outside and be kind of like a twisted form of myself. So that was a really fun experience, because I got to go through a whole range of emotions from being this really prim and proper friend of hers to then devolving into something else. It was a lot of twisted, dark fun […]

They’re not relying on so much of the gore. There is that, obviously, but they’re not relying on just the physical messiness of horror; they’re also really diving deep into some really heavy subjects that are genuinely terrifying, but not so much in the “Boo! scary way.” And so I was like, “This is so cool — what a legacy I’m getting to be part of.” Because you don’t see that too much, I feel, in Western movies and stuff like that. This is a really cool, unique experience.

This interview has been edited for language, clarity and length.

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Apex Legends is free-to-play on all platforms. Silent Hill f launches on September 25 on PS5, Xbox Series X/S and PC.

Image credit: EA/Konami