Exactly 20 years ago, a dysfunctional family of secret superheroes hit the big screen and changed animated cinema forever.
Pixar classic The Incredibles, directed by Brad Bird, followed the Parr family – Helen, Bob, Dash, Violet, and Jack-Jack – as they tried to keep their unique superhuman abilities hidden from the world.
Boasting a voice cast of Samuel L. Jackson, Holly Hunter, and Craig T. Nelson, The Incredibles was a major success and spent three weeks atop the UK box office over Christmas and New Year in 2004 and 2005.
One of the lesser-known names among the list of Hollywood stars was Spencer Fox, a 10-year-old boy who’d landed the role of a lifetime before he’d even finished school. Because what 10-year-old boy in 2005 didn’t want to be as superfast as Dash?
When The Incredibles was released, Spencer had recently celebrated his 11th birthday. By the time he was 16, however, he’d already left the movie industry for good.
caught up with the original Dash Parr to find out what happened when he turned away from Tinsel Town as a teenager and turned towards a surprising new career.
‘There was zero nepotism…’
So-called ‘nepo babies’ are no secret these days, with the children of Hollywood stars walking into roles from a very young age – but Spencer got no such leg-up when auditioning for executives at Pixar.
‘There was zero nepotism. No inroads. I was just signed to an agency. Pixar had an open casting call – it’s crazy that Pixar would hold one of those – and I guess it went well!’
The Incredibles was an immediate smash, and Spencer was thrust into a new life of parties and red carpets. On YouTube, there’s an adorable interview with him and Conan O’Brien. But how did he adjust to his new reality?
‘I’m grateful it happened [at age 11] because I didn’t have anxiety or intrusive thoughts yet. That was a massive benefit to being so young. Had I been 13 or 14, with hormones flowing through my body, that would have been a nightmare. I dodged a bullet.’
Despite being too young to let it affect him too much, things did quickly change in his personal life: ‘People definitely interacted with me differently. It was part of my identity whether I liked it or not.’
After voicing Dash, Spencer looked to TV – specifically the Disney Channel. He joined the cast of animated series Kim Possible, playing Kim’s twin brothers Jim and Tim.
It was 2008, though, at just 14 years old, that he made a crucial decision: ‘I was told that if I wanted to make it as an actor, a lot of things would have to change.
‘I’d have to double the number of auditions I went to and spend half my year in Los Angeles. I talked with my family and I could tell it was the wrong thing for me.’
‘Everything snapped into place’
Three years after leaving Hollywood behind, Spencer turned to music. In that Conan O’Brien interview, he’d already revealed a love of playing guitar, and he put those skills to the forefront of his thinking instead.
After striking up a friendship with singer Eva Hendricks, the band Charly Bliss was born. Eva’s brother Sam took up the drums, and bassist Dan Shure joined in 2014. The final lineup was complete, and Charly Bliss was ready.
‘From the start, Charly Bliss was what I wanted to do,’ Spencer beams. ‘Even at the beginning it felt special and knew it was more than just a hobby. Even before we started making music that sounded like us, we loved the way we interacted with each other.’
He continued: ‘Once we figured out how to be Charly Bliss, we knew to make it the emphasis in our lives. Everything snapped into place – it felt like the most obvious thing in the world.’
In 2017, their debut album Guppy was released to critical acclaim in America. Their Spotify monthly listeners were climbing into the thousands, and international tours were scheduled. Spencer confesses that some anxiety about his past work crept into his mind.
‘I was worried that my identity in the band was just gonna be “Oh, the guy who did the Pixar thing,” which sounded like Hell. I was very wary of that. But the relationship between me being Dash and being the guitarist in Charly Bliss is in a good place.’
From there, 2019 follow-up Young Enough hit the indie charts on both sides of the Atlantic, and the band supported the likes of CHVRCHES and Jimmy Eat World. In recent months, their latest album, Forever, has seen them achieve their best-ever chart position in the UK.
‘English fanaticism is a different breed!’
We speak five days before Spencer, Eva, Dan and Sam play Islington’s Garage on November 6, where they’re headlining the Pitchfork Music Festival. It’s the band’s first London show in five years and their first visit to the UK since the Covid pandemic.
In that time, Eva has moved her life to Australia and Sam has started a family. 24 hours before our chat, Spencer had only just touched back down in the USA after crossing the globe twice for Eva’s wedding Down Under.
But he’ll happily fight jet lag to play for British crowds again: ‘From the very first UK tour [in 2017], we knew it was special. It blindsided us. We weren’t prepared for how amazing you guys are. English fanaticism is just a different breed.’
The band will regrettably only be in London for ‘two seconds’ this week, Spencer laments, but there’s one place the band will make sure to stop by: Dishoom. A particular favourite for the band is the restaurant’s famous black daal.
Once the show is over – where next? ‘I had this masterplan to stick around and see some of Europe after London, but the jet lag from Australia will make that impossible. So, I’m just gonna go home.’
The tour has also been cut short because of the unfortunate reality facing bands of Charly Bliss’ size in a post-Brexit and post-Covid world: unless you’re selling out stadiums and festival parks with £150 tickets, you have to prepare to lose money from any tour.
‘We’d love to extend the tour, but it’s staggering how much it all costs now – to get to Europe and come back, American bands expect to make a loss these days.’
Despite the financial hurdles of performing in a band in 2024, Spencer insists he wouldn’t have it any other way. Starting out as self-confessed ’90s rock revivalists,’ Charly Bliss have received more and more comparisons to the likes of Taylor Swift and Lorde, as well as 1970s new wave acts such as Blondie and The Cars.
‘[Forever] is explosive, large in scope,’ Spencer says of the new album. ‘There are so many references to different sounds. There’s an elevated sense of fun and lightness and emotional richness. When I listen back to it, I hear everything we wanted it to be.’
After Spencer mentions that he listens back to Forever, I ask if he ever does the same with The Incredibles. Does he ever reminisce over his whirlwind childhood of playing the world’s youngest and fastest superhero?
‘Around the time of Incredibles 2, I did an interview [alongside] the new voice actor for Dash – a kid named Huck Milner. I watched both films then, actually. But [as of 2024], that’s the last time.’