After taking on the challenge of her first voice acting project via the new animated series Trese which is based on the popular Pinoy graphic novel series, Liza Soberano said she is proud to have pulled it off.

“I was most excited just to be able to be part of a project that’s so big but is also still full of Filipino pride but it’s presented on an international platform such as Netflix and I’m just so happy that I still get kilig every time I see the trailer and I see my name next to Shay Mitchell. Because I never in a million years ever thought that I’d be in the same billing as some Hollywood actor or actress and it’s still amazes me. I’m super honored and happy to be representing the Philippines in a way,” she explained.

READ: Liza Soberano on starring in ‘Trese’: ‘I’m finally getting to play a superhero’

Having struggled with the acting in Tagalog because it is not her first language, Liza credits boyfriend Enrique Gil and her family for helping her prepare for her role as Alexandra Trese.

“Through the years, because of acting, I got to practice it more and more. But honestly, throughout this pandemic, I was mostly talking to Enrique, my family, most of them speak in English so I kind of went back to my old ways, like I kind of got my accent back. So like two weeks before Trese, I really made sure that I practiced my Tagalog again and that I spoke to my parents and to Quen in Tagalog or mostly in Tagalog as much as possible because I needed to get used to speaking in Tagalog every so often and I also tried to sing songs in Tagalog as well,” she explained.

READ: Liza Soberano on becoming a voice actor for ‘Trese’: ‘I was kind of doubting myself’

Another way Liza was able to prepare for the role was to go online while doing home quarantine.

“I did my own little research on YouTube on voice acting and how to modulate my voice, what warm ups I’m supposed to do in preparation for dubbing and other things related to voice acting.

“I also asked for a workshop from my voice coach sir Rudolph. And that was very helpful for me because there were a lot of things that he taught me from his years of experience that I did not pick up from YouTube and I’m just so happy that I got to do this because it really was a challenge for me because I’ve never done voice acting before aside from dubbing my own movies and commercials.

“It’s completely different because even though when you’re voice acting you still have to be there in the scene, you have to feel the emotion that your character is feeling, it’s still hard to bring that emotion out through your voice especially because they’re not seeing my face. My voice is pretty mahinhin as it is so I had to learn to add more layers and more depth to my voice so that each emotion is conveyed properly,” she said.

READ: Netflix releases teaser for ‘Trese’ featuring the voice of Liza Soberano

The Trese actress said she finally got her groove with voice acting halfway through her sessions.

“When I became more comfortable, I then had to start bringing more of the character in. It was my first time so nangangapa pa ako and the thought process that I had pretty much was don’t mess up, you have to pronounce it this way, you have to deliver it this way. So there wasn’t really much room for the emotions that I was supposed to be feeling for whatever it was that I needed to convey those emotions through my voice. But when I got more comfortable, that’s when it felt more like acting to me because the voice became secondary. I felt like I was in the show itself even though it’s an animation and that’s when I became more at ease with dubbing and I felt like I was Alexandra,” she added.

Stream all six episodes of Trese on Netflix starting June 11. For more updates, visit https://www.netflix.com/trese.