Tasty takes and dulcet tones: How Clevelander Stefan Johnson became a TikTok star

TikTok — one of the vital fashionable social media and video platforms on the web — has turn into a spot for folks to indicate off their abilities. Cleveland native Stefan Johnson used TikTok to assist speed up his profession as a voiceover artist.

Johnson has Lou Rawls-esque dulcet tones and he considers himself a “foodie.” Put the 2 collectively and he could make easy bar meals sound gourmand.

“They’re crispy. They’re crunchy. You’ll be able to fill it with bacon, bitter cream, cheese, chives. The probabilities are infinite and I by no means need this taste experience to finish,” Johnson mentioned emphatically over dramatic music a couple of potato pores and skin in considered one of his TikTok movies.

Johnson will fee meals, rank meals and typically he’ll document himself attempting meals for the primary time. He’ll discuss meals he loves and meals he doesn’t love. Typically his culinary takes will trigger a stir amongst his 7.5 million TikTok followers.

“Meals creates quite a lot of robust opinions. I simply love seeing the dialog,” Johnson mentioned. “Anytime I discuss my apparently distinctive tackle pouring the milk earlier than the cereal … folks go ballistic.”

In his first viral TikTok video, he rated french fries from totally different quick meals eating places.

“At some point after posting it, not considering something of it, that video had like 100,000 views. And that was simply 24 hours,” Johnson mentioned.

Johnson wished to be a voiceover artist since he was a younger teenager — across the time his voice began getting deeper. He made voiceover work his full-time profession about three years in the past, however the gigs and job presents actually began to select up after his TikTok movies began going viral in 2020.

“I might attest a part of it to getting eyes on myself through the TikTok clout and the TikTok notoriety,” he mentioned. “However I might hope that it’s my character and expertise that makes them say, ‘Oh, yeah, we actually need this man.’”

Johnson’s voice is in commercials and promotional movies for giant firms, reminiscent of McDonald’s, Gillette and Bally Sports activities. He’s in motion pictures. He has partnerships with some big-time manufacturers, together with Planters, Buffalo Wild Wings and Meta. Whether or not he likes it or not, he’s turn into a star.

“That phrase makes me cringe. I don’t consider myself as a star in any respect. Once I go outdoors and other people acknowledge me … I’m like, ‘Oh, I’m only a man,’” Johnson mentioned. “It’s simply very jarring, however in a great way.”

Maybe the one who will get most excited to listen to a Stefan Johnson-voiced industrial is his spouse, Rica Johnson.

“Seeing him simply going from the place he began to now, it’s actually wonderful. Simply final week I heard him on the radio truly and I’m like, ‘That’s you,’” Rica Johnson mentioned with amusing.

Stefan Johnson credit his spouse with giving him the power to take an opportunity on this profession path years in the past.

“She has been by North Star with all of this. A part of the explanation why I used to be even in a position to do what I did going full time with any of it is because I knew she had my again. As a result of I might have jumped off that cliff and fell flat on my face and he or she would have picked me up,” Stefan Johnson mentioned.

Stefan Johnson grew up in Hough, a predominately Black East Aspect Cleveland neighborhood that, for many years, has struggled towards the consequences of white flight, redlining and poverty.

“There’s quite a lot of expertise within the neighborhood. There’s quite a lot of people which have a lot potential, however typically are restricted by the assets. I’ve people that may come as much as me like, ‘I heard you grew up on Hough. I’m on Hough proper now and seeing what you’re doing, it lets me know that there’s a manner out of right here,’” Johnson mentioned. “To listen to that I could doubtlessly encourage somebody to make these strikes, I’ve actually introduced myself to tears eager about that typically.”

Many of the work Johnson does – even for the nationally aired productions – he can do proper from the audio and video studios he inbuilt his Cleveland house.

“Persons are like, ‘Oh my god you’re from Cleveland. I really feel dangerous for you. Why are you not in LA? Why are you not in New York? Why didn’t you progress?’ And I get offended,” Johnson mentioned.

Johnson usually proudly wears Cleveland garb or eats at Ohio particular eating places in his TikTok movies.

“I could go to Vegas or New York or ATL each every now and then, however no, my house base is Cleveland, Ohio and I don’t plan on going anyplace,” Johnson mentioned. “This metropolis has so many gifted musicians, actresses, medical doctors, historians, cooks, beauticians, athletes … mega stars are constructed right here.”

And the most recent mega star is a voiceover artist who spends quite a lot of time debating cereals and french fries on TikTok.