Who are the voice actors for the GTA 5 protagonists?

The voice actors for the GTA 5 protagonists are among the most recognizable voices in the video game industry today.

GTA 5's most notable voice actors are for their protagonists, who include:

• Franklin Clinton: Shawn Fonteno
• Michael De Santa: Ned Luke
• Trevor Philips: Steven Ogg

GTA 5 is the best-selling Grand Theft Auto game of all time, having sold well over 155M copies. Shawn Fonteno, Ned Luke, and Steven Ogg voice's have become iconic over the game's nearly 10 year long lifecycle. Here's a look at their backgrounds and what made their performances so memorable.

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Meet the voice actors of the iconic GTA 5 protagonists

The three iconic protagonists (Image via Rockstar Games)

Shawn Fonteno, Ned Luke, and Steven Ogg have had completely different career trajectories, yet they all ended up together for GTA 5. All three of them did films before their iconic roles, yet the popularity and scale of these films varied from actor to actor.

Amusingly, their roles in the video game industry prior to voicing the three protagonists were largely minimal to non-existent.

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Shawn Fonteno

Funnily enough, Shawn Fonteno has voiced a character for the Grand Theft Auto series in the past. He voiced a random Grove Street Families NPC in GTA San Andreas, which was far more minor than fans would know him for nearly nine years later.

On a related note, he's also the cousin of Young Maylay, who was the voice actor for Carl Johnson.

Shawn Fonteno was also a rapper who performed under the name Solo. The above music video is an example of one of his works, where players can recognise him right off the bat. Unfortunately, this song is not in any Grand Theft Auto game's radio stations.

He also acted in three movies, two of which took place before he voiced Franklin. Those two films are:

• 3 Strikes (As Big Mo)
• The Wash (As Face)

The Contract features Shawn Fonteno once more (Image via Rockstar Games)

With all of that in the past, Shawn Fonteno would later go on to voice Franklin Clinton in GTA 5. He didn't just voice the iconic protagonist, he would also end up doing the motion capture for him, much like Ned Luke and Steven Ogg did for their characters.

He would also reprise his role as the memorable character in GTA Online's The Contract DLC.

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Ned Luke

Ned Luke, next to a screen with Michael De Santa on it (Image via Pinterest)

Michael De Santa's voice actor has had a more in-depth acting career than Shawn Fonteno. His voice acting career for video games started with GTA 5, as he was primarily a live action actor beforehand.

His first voice acting role was for a dog named Raffles in 1991's Rover Dangerfield. The movie garnered a rating of 40% on Rotten Tomatoes and 6/10 on IMDb, making it far less critically acclaimed than GTA 5.

Michael De Santa has yet to make an appearance in GTA Online making him the only primary protagonist to not star in the online component.

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Steven Ogg

Trevor Philips' voice actor is similar to Michael's in that he was primarily known for acting outside of video games before GTA 5. Before Steven Ogg voiced Trevor Philips, he voice acted for two other games unrelated to the series:

• Vinnie from Alone in the Dark
• Alex from Cursed Mountain

His performance for Trevor Philips was downright legendary, which unsurprisingly got him several nominations related to voice acting. The main award he managed to win was the New York Videogame Critics Circle Award for Best Overall Acting in a Game.

Steven Ogg would also go on to voice Trevor Philips in GTA Online for a few appearances.