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You’ve probably seen the many stories about Roger Ebert and his daily life, starting with Esquire’s article (featured in this month’s issue). If you don’t know, Roger has had many trials and tribulations since last you saw him reviewing movies from the balcony. Years have passed since Roger lost his ability to speak to cancer, and the many surgeries — some botched — that followed. These days you will find him burning up his keyboard on Twitter (follow him @ebertchicago) or at The Chicago Sun-Times for whom he still writes movie reviews and journals. Most of his tweets and journal entries are about different subjects other than movies, anything from childhood memories to current events, politics, religion and science. Today Roger was on The Oprah Winfrey Show and used his new old voice to talk with her. The details are beyond my understanding but simply- audio of Roger’s voice from old television programs and movie commentaries were used by a computer program Roger then types into his computer and out of the speakers comes his voice. This is special because robo-voices have been available for years but lack the tone and inflection of a real person, this new program has given Roger back his real voice. Hear it here:

It’s good to hear Roger and see him blessed with a new voice. In my life Ebert, and Gene Siskel were the first two people I ever heard talk about the movies. What’s your Siskel and Ebert story?