Opera Singer Lends Her Voice to Cartoons : B. J. Ward reaches for C-notes in lucrative work reading lines for Betty Rubble and Wonder Woman, but her heart is in arias

She does cartoons and “Carmen.” Betty Rubble and “Madame Butterfly.” The Smurfs and Puccini.

She iJ. Ward, voice-over artist by day, opera singer by night. These days, as the funnies fatten her wallet, the arias fill her soul. Ward appears late Sunday afternoons at Tom Rolla’s Gardenia in Los Angeles in “Opera and Omelettes,” a one-hour journey through hundreds of years. Between arias, she delivers anecdotes, adding humor to the heroes and heroines who live forever in the songs.

“I’m not professing to be the greatest opera singer in the world,” Ward said, “or the funniest person in the world. I just want to introduce people to opera.”

Ward was introduced to opera at 14, but it was hardly love at first sound. Instead, she gravitated toward more popular music. She moved to Los Angeles in the late 1960s and, when her singing and acting career stalled, she found peace--and prosperity--in the land of make-believe. Sometimes she will make as much as $1,000 for a couple of hours of work. Over the years, she became quite good, assuming the roles of Thelma, Daffy Duck’s girlfriend; Betty Rubble in “The Flintstone Kids”; Wonder Woman in “Super Friends,” and the voice at Disneyland instructing tourists to “Please step off the moving platform carefully.” She also did a lot of commercials.

“Voice-overs were never a goal,” said Ward, who is in her early 40s. “It was just something that I fell into. I realized how hard it was to get into it and when I did, I wanted all the jobs.”

But all the fictitious voices couldn’t silence her own, which cried out for a bigger stage. Eight years ago, she started a nightclub act, which ran the gamut--from Stephen Sondheim to Hank Williams. She poured the earnings from voice-overs, her day job, into her act, which ran for four or five weeks a year in small clubs in Los Angeles and New York. Still it wasn’t enough, and while voice-overs kept paying the bills, she wasn’t satisfied.

“You make so much money in voice-overs and it can be a bit of a trap,” Ward said. “I was like the hamster in the cage. You are making money, but how much is enough? How much do you need? How are you contributing?”

Ward began sacrificing voice-over work for a chance on Broadway. She worked with such legends as Sondheim and James Lapine in the revival of “Merrily We Roll Along,” and the original workshop of “Into the Woods.” Ward also sang backup for Ann-Margret and Raquel Welch in Las Vegas, as well as appearing in episodes of TV’s “Dallas,” “Days of Our Lives” and “St. Elsewhere.”

Clearly, though, the most dramatic change in Ward’s career became her growing love affair with opera. About two years ago, something clicked in her that she can’t even describe. “It’s definitely something bigger than me,” she said. “I just don’t know what.”

She asked her longtime voice instructor, Lee Sweetland of North Hollywood, to help with her new fascination. Ward was scared.

“It was like going back to music school or learning another language,” she said. “I wanted to adapt my voice to the music, not try to adapt the music to my voice. Otherwise, it would be like trying to paraphrase Shakespeare. It’s done fine without your interpretation for 200 years.”

She practiced and practiced, singing for hours at her Sherman Oaks residence. She also started exercising more and doing yoga.

The gardeners would mimic her, she said, but slowly she began to get it. She only needed a forum.

Her boyfriend, Gordon Hunt, gave her the idea. Hunt, who directs “Opera and Omelettes,” had suggested that she sing opera to friends at her house while he made omelets. It became a monthly ritual, “but Gordon said, ‘I can’t make another omelet,’ and we realized we had to find somewhere else to do it.”

They soon found Tom Rolla as a willing host. She began her run in October, and it’s been extended through at least the end of this month.

“It’s been phenomenal how quickly she’s built her voice,” Sweetland said. “Usually, it takes five to 10 years; she’s taken two. So few people understand the two sides of the female voice, and B. J. has been one of the ones who has been able to do both. Many pop singers can’t sing classical, and many classical singers can’t sing pop. She can do both equally well.”

During “Opera and Omelettes,” Ward mixes her high notes with a little stand-up. The history of each song is explained. At a recent performance, Ward joked about the fact that opera heroines never survive.

“This is the only heroine alive at the end of the aria,” she said, referring to “I Puritani.” “Unfortunately, she does go insane, although this is considered a happy ending.”

Ward continues to make sacrifices. She will no longer accept voice-over jobs that require harsh, raspy sounds, such as witches in cartoons. “I don’t want to bear down on my voice that much when I know I’m going to be singing later that day,” she said. “I’m sorry I might not get certain jobs because of that, but it’s not healthy for me now. Opera is a very physical kind of singing.”

She no longer panics if her time isn’t filled with voice-over jobs.

“Now I’m glad when I don’t work, because I have time to sing. I have something of my own to do.”

Ward, however, isn’t ready to give up her voice-over career, although the competition has become tighter as famous stars flood the market. “There’s more competition than ever,” she said. “You don’t have to be seen selling a product, and you can make a lot of money in a little time.

“I’ve enjoyed voice-overs, and I don’t expect anyone to hire me to sing opera. I know this is going somewhere. I just don’t know where. I almost feel like it’s something I’ve done before.”

B.J. Ward appears in “Opera and Omelettes” at 5 p.m. Sundays at Tom Rolla’s Gardenia in Los Angeles. Admission is $15 and includes food. Ward presents an hour of arias and anecdotes, adding humor to the heroes and heroines of opera. (213) 467-7444.