(Warning: This post contains spoilers for Wednesday’s “The Masked Singer.”)
Team Bad’s numbers are dwindling. Hydra said goodbye to the competition during Wednesday’s episode of “The Masked Singer” on Fox.
For the second week in a row, the judges were able to guess who was behind the mask before they were unveiled. This time, guest judge Nicole Byer was the one to successfully deduce that Penn and Teller were the contestants hidden inside the Hydra costume.
Other guesses that were thrown out included Bert and Ernie, Will Ferrell and John C. Reilly, and Martin Short and Steve Martin. Penn told TheWrap that the latter was quite flattering.
“They’re friends of ours and two of the most talented people on the planet. So we were thrilled to pieces with that guess,” he said, adding that he wasn’t all that surprised the judges were able to figure it out in the end. “We actually did a little better than I expected. I chose the music to try to throw people off. Most people do stuff from their youth or stuff that’s contemporary, and I tried to pick a pocket of things that really were not from a time that you picture us.”
Teller has maintained a vow of silence in his performances, meaning that he did not participate in this interview with TheWrap, nor did he speak on stage once their identity was revealed. However, Penn said that this gave his counterpart the perfect opportunity to throw off the audience and the judges during the competition.
Since Hydra was a three-headed dragon, Penn said that the tricksters decided that to deceptively add another voice into the mix — which required Teller to do a bit of heavy lifting.
“I have done so much damage to my voice being carny trash and working the carnival, that this is the only voice I have. I have no ability to change my voice at all,” he explained. “But we have the fact that people have not heard Teller talk. People have not heard Teller’s voice. So, Teller did all the hard work on this. He was really the star because he had to do two voices.”
In addition to his typical voice, Teller also strived for an impersonation of “My Fair Lady” actor Rex Harrison.
“Teller had to change what voice he was doing sometimes in the middle of lines, and he did a brilliant job,” Penn said. “You wouldn’t think that the vocal gymnastics in a show would be done by a person who doesn’t speak on stage.”
The magicians hadn’t necessarily been fans of the show before they were selected to be contestants, but it was certainly on their radar since this isn’t the first time that the judges have suspected Penn and Teller were behind a mask.
Their names have been thrown around multiple times, including in Season 2 when the judges suspected that Teller might have been the voice of Skeleton (who was actually David Letterman’s former bandleader and Blues Brothers co-creator Paul Shaffer).
So, what did Penn think of his time on “The Masked Singer”?
“Well, it’s all fun. We have a culture that so many of our shows have become mean-spirited and hateful, and I really despair of that in the U.S. This is a show that is sweet and kind and nothing but joy,” he said. “All of them really have this love of life and this focus on gentleness and kindness, which permeates the whole show. I’m very proud to be involved in a show that the underlying tone is sweetness, kindness and love. Because we’ve got enough of that other f—ing shit.”
“The Masked Singer” airs Wednesdays at 8 p.m. ET/PT on Fox.