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Nicolas Cage as John Madden next to Frank Caliendo
There are probably not many people alive who have spent more time reverse-engineering John Madden’s voice than Frank Caliendo, which made him a fairly logical person for Hollywood to call while Nicolas Cage was preparing to play the NFL legend. Caliendo says the Madden production team did exactly that, but he refused to hand over his “vocal recipe” because he didn’t get the meet the actor in person.
Caliendo revealed the story again after the full Madden trailer produced plenty of online debate over Cage’s voice. In a response on X, Caliendo said the production asked him to participate in a Zoom call, but he turned it down and offered an alternative: let him actually hang out with Cage and he would share some of the secrets behind sounding like Madden.
They did ask me to do a zoom call with them. I said “no” … but if I could go hang out with Cage, I’d give away some of the vocal recipe. Ha ha ha. I never heard back.
— Frank Caliendo (@FrankCaliendo) September 25, 2026
Frank Caliendo Wanted The Full Nicolas Cage Experience
Honestly, his terms were pretty reasonable.
Caliendo has explained in previous interviews that he did not simply want to stare at Nicolas Cage through a laptop camera for 30 minutes and demonstrate where to put the rasp.
He wanted an experience.
The comedian joked about going to Las Vegas with Cage, riding in the sidecar of Ghost Rider, seeing whatever exotic animals Cage might have, and generally spending enough time together to actually work on the character.
If that happened, Caliendo was willing to give away some of the formula.
The call never happened.
Caliendo said he “never heard back,” meaning one of Hollywood’s most famously committed actors apparently had the cheat code to the John Madden voice available and lost it because everybody insisted on Microsoft Teams-level logistics.
There was actually an even stranger first chapter.
Caliendo has said the production initially asked him to audition for Howard Cosell, despite the tiny issue that Cosell is not one of the impressions Caliendo really does. He passed, joking that appearing in a John Madden movie doing a mediocre Cosell while somebody else played Madden might be the most absurd possible use of him.
Fair point.
Prime Video’s official description has Cage starring as Madden alongside Christian Bale as Al Davis, with David O. Russell directing. The film follows Madden from his Super Bowl-winning Raiders years through broadcasting and the creation of the video-game empire carrying his name.
It begins streaming Nov. 18.