The Legend of Zelda turned 40 years old this week — though Nintendo has sadly done little to mark the occaison. There are no new Zelda games on the horizon, no remakes or re-releases on Nintendo Switch Online, and no sniff of a trailer for next year's ambitious-looking live-action movie. It's a far cry from the array of announcements made for Mario's 40th birthday last year, or the anticipation for Pokémon's 30th celebrations which culminate tomorrow.
In order to mark the occaison ourselves, then, we tracked down the perfect person to talk about their own role in the Zelda series — the voice of Zelda herself, Patricia Summersett. You'll have heard her voice in Breath of the Wild, Tears of the Kingdom, plus their Hyrule Warriors spin-off games Age of Calamity and Age of Imprisonment. In total, her contributions to the franchise now stretch 10 years — meaning she has been the voice of its princess for a quarter of its life.
A fan of the series before her work on it, Summersett previously made headlines when her thoughts on the nature of Link and Zelda's relationship blew up online — a situation she's now said she found angering, while disputing any suggestion that Nintendo itself asked her to intervene and set the record straight. Read on for more about that, her hopes for the franchise's future, Zelda's British accent, and how she originally also auditioned for the Deku Tree.
You've spoken previously about initially auditioning for Princess Zelda without knowing the true identity of the role — but what were you told? What direction were you given?
Patricia Summersett: The best way to describe it was as a bleached script, which is when you have a certain amount of information about what the archetypes of the character are, the general world — for example, that it looks like an RPG fantasy — but you have no idea what the actual roles are going to be or what the game is. And there would've been no way of predicting that it was Zelda because she didn't have a voice before. I just would never have assumed that was the game that I was auditioning for.
There was the description of her being a younger teenage princess, but wise beyond her years, having the weight of the world on her. And those were key things I'd gone into when I looked at the script, when I started to play around with my voice and decide what to do for that particular character.
But I also auditioned for Zelda as well as some other roles — what ended up being Urbosa and I think probably the Deku Tree. There were a few.
Your portrayal of Zelda has a British accent, was that also a note from Nintendo?
Summersett: No, no, it was a really wide open spec. I schooled in London and so I thought something that sounds a little bit RP would make it heightened and put it into that kind of class system I was imagining for royalty. So I did that. I think in the game it's easier now, especially because it's evolved a bit over time and people's interpretations of the character and even the accent has evolved over time. It's a little more comfortable to say this is a Hylian accent versus just a particular version of a UK accent.
Clearly it struck a chord with Nintendo — and now a British actress has been cast as Zelda for the franchise's live-action movie, too.
Summersett: That's a great point. I mean, I don't know how those casting decisions ultimately get made, and it's like, what does portray that character the best? Obviously Bo Bragason is going to kill it, she's going to be amazing. I'm happy to have contributed in any way, without knowing where it's all headed, other than the fact that it's now been 10 years. I'm just floored by the fact I've been involved in this franchise for a quarter of it.
You've played the same incarnation of Zelda now in four games, which may be a record for the franchise. But do you feel like there's still more story in her to tell?
Summersett: I was surprised when Hyrule Warriors: Age of Imprisonment came to be! I only learn about these things when something is offered back to me and I'm told 'okay, it's time to come back and do this role.' And I go, 'oh my gosh, I get to do it again, that's amazing.' I'm not part of that decision making, and I just wait to see what Nintendo is cooking up.
As a fan of the franchise, but also someone who has portrayed Zelda, what are your hopes for the live-action movie?
Summersett: I guess I'm just curious to see what that iteration is. Obviously it is going to be a large collaboration between people who are new to the series and those deeply schooled in the series. [I think] you're going to see a strong Zelda. I'm sure you're going to see a powerful lead character in Zelda. And Link I have no idea, is he going to speak? They certainly haven't alluded to the fact that he does, yet.
Speaking of Link and Zelda, you've previously discussed the relationship between the two characters and your own thoughts on what kind of relationship they have. You've also said yourself that your comments there got misconstrued — I'd love to give you the space to lay out your thoughts on their relationship in full.
Summersett: I have to be so careful when I answer that question. Let me formulate this... I have all sorts of personal theories about what this might be, but I think there's something beautiful in the way that it's left ambiguous, it's left in a kind of — if there are romantic undertones, it's left in an unrequited state. There's obviously a deep friendship and a protectorship between the two of them. It's a gorgeous relationship and it continues to evolve and be left open in so many iterations of this.
And what that means for me, as somebody who represents the character at things like conventions, is that anybody can come up to me with their version of what they think Link and Zelda are. And a lot of it comes in the form of coupleship — people proposing to each other and getting engaged with Zelda as a theme, or they feel like it's something that they want to just celebrate with family or friends. It can mean kind of anything, and I love that it lives in that space.
Of course, Link and Zelda do appear to be cohabiting in Tears of the Kingdom, in a house with only one bed. Your thoughts on that?
Summersett: [Laughs] Hopefully it's a very comfortable bed. That's my thought on that.
And when you mentioned that it's left in an unrequited state, do you mean that there is something romantic there from one of the pair, but unreturned?
Summersett: I have to be careful with that word unrequited. That might be one interpretation of what their particular kind of relationship is — and relationship meaning that they could be friends, they could be warrior buddies, they could be a princess and a soldier, they could be a lovership, or people who are destined to be together even in a non-romantic way, but for their life they're going to have this lifelong friendship. It could be anything. And even for those who do put an obvious romantic tinge onto it, it would still be really on the nose to suddenly have Link and Zelda, because they have this deep relationship, having to get together in a romantic sense. Because that's not the way life works. I think that I prefer that it's not so on the nose as that, personally.
You've said previously that your comments on the subject were misconstrued, and I wondered at the time whether your clarification there came from a place of Nintendo itself saying, essentially, we need this to be a thing that remains ambiguous.
Summersett: No, nobody's ever said anything to me. I just needed to clarify what had happened with a particular article, where they'd isolated a sentence that I'd said, and highlighted it as 'Patricia has confirmed that Link and Zelda are in a relationship.' It's really tricky when you're trying to do these kinds of interviews and people take something completely out of context for the sake of clickbait. I was being used for clickbait and I'm like, 'this is precisely not what I said.' If you read the article further, I said that I liked that it's left open, that it's ambiguous.
Relationships come in all forms, and the fact that it was taken out of context and it was as if I was confirming that they were in a romantic relationship, I found that pretty angering to be honest. And I tried to deal with it as best I could, but it's hard when things blow up online. That's been an interesting thing to navigate in the last few years, just being a simple voice actor trying to stay in my lane and be open to anybody who might come to me to celebrate the series, representing a character but not representing the company.
You've represented Zelda in a few games now, but I'm keen to hear your favorites from the series. You can still say ones you're in though!
Summersett: I am partial to Breath of the Wild, but Ocarina of Time is really the ground zero of what the series means for me. And then maybe I'd say the original, though I was a child watching other people play that. And then I really liked Twilight Princess as well, just the art style of that one. So those are probably the top three.
Twilight Princess still has something of a mixed reception among fans, I feel like.
Summersett: I see a lot of cosplay from Twilight Princess at conventions, and I also write in Twilight Princess Hylian, so I feel a little more connected to that game when I'm writing that in notes to people.
Sorry, you write in Twilight Princess Hylian?
Summersett: It's something I did early on when I was recording [Breath of the Wild] and I was just starting to look through [series companion book] Hyrule Historia at the different versions of the languages from all the previous games. Obviously, Breath of the Wild wasn't out yet, so I didn't know what would be in that game. But I saw Twilight Princess Hylian and it's so beautiful. I thought I could probably learn those characters, which is essentially just the alphabet, and started practicing that over coffee. So now I can kind of write fluently and use it all the time.
And lastly, we've seen plenty of Zelda remakes already over the years, but do you have a particular game from the past you'd like to see return in a new form?
Summersett: I'm trying to think through what I've played recently. A few years ago, I played the original Zelda again on the mini NES console...
How about Ocarina of Time in the Breath of the Wild engine, with a fully-voiced Princess Zelda again?
Summersett: Oh! Can I say I would like that too? It's a great idea. Yeah. You'd have two of the most innovative games coming together with a wild sense of humor and a wonderful soundtrack. So what's not to love about that?
Image credit: Randy Shropshire/Getty Images for Alienware
Tom Phillips is IGN's News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
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