Grand Theft Auto 
Jay Klaitz, the actor who voiced and portrayed Lester Crest in Grand Theft Auto V, has poured cold water on fan theories that he is set to return this year as Rockstar releases the hotly-anticipated Grand Theft Auto VI.
Speaking to Eldorado.gg as excitement builds around the series and its return to Vice City, Rockstar’s reimagined vision of Miami, Klaitz also talked about why GTA VI could struggle with satire.
GTA VI might take place in “a separate world”
Q: We didn’t see too many characters from GTA IV appear in GTA V, at least not main characters. Is the expectation among you and your fellow GTA V cast members that it’ll be another clean break for GTA VI, and you’re not waiting on some cameos or callouts in the new game?
As far as I know, it’s a clean break with a separate world, a different jam, but also what the hell do I know? Nothing is the answer.
Q: Have you and the other voice actors from Grand Theft Auto V reached out to the cast for Grand Theft Auto VI to give any advice or guidance on what to expect?
I don’t know that we’ve discussed it among ourselves exactly, but if they were asking me, then the advice I would give is that probably the most important thing is to have fun with it because if you’re doing that, the ‘camera’ will feel it.
You know it’ll get into some serious moments and it can be long days. It’s pretty arduous work but if you can remember to have fun and never take yourself too seriously, I think that is the best way of executing the work, in my opinion.
As for everything besides the work, for my part, thankfully, I’ve not had to deal with a lot of that, but I know Ned [Luke] has had to actually deal with some very serious stuff, the poor guy. And I guess the lesson is to keep your shit private. Make sure that your address and personal information and all those kinds of things are kept confidential, which is harder to do every day in the world we live in now.
It is increasingly difficult to hide yourself but that is something, especially for whoever is playing the characters who can actually play, that is going to be a thing and you’ve got to maintain your privacy somehow.
Q: Who was your favorite person you ever worked with at Rockstar?
Obviously the camaraderie with Ned and Solo and Ogg can’t be beaten. We spent a lot of hours together. On screen and off screen we all became so embedded in a friendship.
But also Rod Edge who is probably one of my favorite humans ever. That guy as a director is like just so fucking cool, such a good dude, and a punk rocker, and he handles his business. He does the job and does it right. I couldn’t say enough good things about him. The people on the ground, in the room, making that game day to day are solid people. There’s always good people all around, especially Rod though. When he’s at the helm, good things happen, because good things come from him.
The longer Rockstar take to make GTA VI and give guys like Rod the time they need, the cooler it’s going to be. It could have been another month or another five months or six months or whatever. It’s going to be cool.
GTA’s signature satire could not be as impactful as in previous games
Q: In the Doomsday Heist DLC we saw the return of flying cars and jetpacks. Would you like to see more of that fantastical stuff return to the base game?
Actually, I’m going to say no on that. As much as I would like to have my Professor X chair, I think there has to be this deeply satirical element to the game and if you remove the groundedness, I think you would risk losing the impact of that satire. GTA needs to be more HBO, less SyFy.
Q: Can GTA VI even work as a satire these days given how weird the real world is becoming?
No, that’s a really interesting question. I wouldn’t be surprised if a bit of the impact is taken out of GTA VI’s initial landing. Don’t get me wrong. It’s still fucking GTA. It’s going to be massive. People will lose their shit. It’s going to be huge, obviously. But it’s a different world to the one 13 years ago when the last one came out. I mean, it’s a very different world than it was even a year ago.
What seemed so far-fetched and insane just a short while ago now feels like just another day, so maybe GTA VI can’t make that same splash as previous games. That said, I don’t know. Maybe that’s bullshit. I know there will be plenty of commentary and satire woven into it. There’s a lot of the Florida Man stuff and lots of territory like that still to cover.
The political spotlight often veers over toward Florida and maybe for that reason it’ll still sink its hooks into people, but what we see happening in the real world is definitely going to make it harder for a GTA game to work those angles.
Q: There’s a lot of talk about how GTA VI is going to go hard on the Florida Man meme with some of its characters and missions but didn’t Rockstar already create the ultimate Florida Man in Trevor Philips?
It is going to be a tall order because Trevor is very deeply a Florida Man kind of guy.
Listen, maybe Trevor’s the one with the cousin in Florida? Maybe that is Rockstar’s only hope of actually topping what they already created in Trevor Philips. I think we’ll have to hope for that.
But you know what? That actually downplays the power of the Florida Man which is real and potent and I should know because I don’t know if you know this but I actually grew up in Florida.
Q: Having grown up in Florida, and knowing what it takes to make a GTA game as you do, what do Rockstar have to get right beyond nailing Miami’s beachfront all over again?
Well, Florida is a state with many worlds contained within one state. You go from Miami to Jacksonville and they are two completely different places. Orlando is different again. It’s a weird mix. There are different territories almost within the state you’ve got to cross or cross through.
Obviously they need the neon lights of Miami with the beaches and the cars with the tops down and all that but we also need the swamps. Gator country. There is so much of Florida that’s just backwoods full of swamp-ass, redneck motherfuckers and I can say that because I’m from Florida. It’s true. That is certainly the sort of environment you need to put in a GTA game.
The other big one is tourism. I wonder if they’ll have some insane GTA version of Disney in there. Come on down to Psycho Park or whatever the hell it would be. That would be interesting too if they sort of delve into that environment.
GTA VI should be accessible, but “that’s not the reality of what will happen”
Q: Given the continued debate around the price of a new game like GTA VI going up to $100, is the smarter move to cut the price in order for Rockstar to maximize their returns on the upside with GTA: Online?
I think that would probably be the Lester way. I think that’d be the Lester move. Reel them in first, get them hooked.
The Jay Klaitz move would probably be to keep prices at a level where the game is accessible to all players, but that’s the romantic in me. I also realize that’s not the reality of what will happen.
Q: Would you pay $100 for GTA VI or any game for that matter if you were speaking about your own personal spending habits?
No, I wouldn’t. I’m chasing my two kids around. You know I’m thrilled if even once a week I get to sit down and jam one evening, but not for an evening. I might only get an hour at a time. It’s hard as you get older, brother. It’s harder and harder to find time for this shit.
Screw it, I’ll download it and screw around for the 10 minutes of free time I get here and there if it’s 20 bucks, but the reality is I don’t have enough time to give a game to warrant dropping 100 bills on it.
Lester would still be a great fit for GTA VI, with some changes
Q: If Lester is going to feature in GTA VI, what would be your dream role if Rockstar offered you something new?
I would say I would be most interested in being a proper ‘villain’ villain.
Lester lived in this sort of middle ground where he is this villain with the heart of gold sort of thing, living in the gray areas in terms of his morality, but he was still kind of a good guy and watched out for his people.
It would be fun to lean harder into being an out-and-out villain or actually, now I say it out loud, maybe it’d be fun to be a super good guy too. Just lean all the way one way or the other since with Lester I have always been in that kind of middle ground.
Q: Would he be into in 2026 given where technology has gone with drones, AI, crypto and other trends like that?
I’d like to think Lester was ahead of the curve on AI and that he probably sits in a wheelchair that floats around and knows where he wants it to go, and he’s got a couple of little robots either side of him to fight off the bad guys. He’s probably got an AI companion. Maybe a romantic one. He’s just one of the guys, falling in love with his AI.
Lester would be Grand Theft Auto’s Professor X. That’s exactly what I’m talking about.
Q: Could Lester have a cousin out in Rockstar’s version of Florida?
Yes, Lester must have a cousin in Vice City I can play, and he’s a great guy.
Q: And what would Lester’s advice be to the two new protagonists, Lucia and Jason?
Lester’s advice? Bring Lester back! That’s the advice.
But for real, Lester would say slow is fast, fast is slow. People want to go in there, guns blazing, going crazy, hitting the gas pedal, but you’ve got to have a plan. You’ve got to keep moving steadily. Don’t rush because that’s going to screw you up, and it’ll actually end up taking longer.
Q: Are there any other Lester secrets or Easter eggs in GTA V that players are yet to find?
If there are then the online community would know much better than me.
I’m sure there’s probably some you know electric box on the side of a random house somewhere in Los Santos that if you open it up there’s like a secret message from Lester that flies you to hell. You know, I would guess there is actually
Everybody, find the box on the side of a house in Los Santos. Don’t stop looking, whatever you do. Leave your families. Find the box.
Somebody’s gonna take me seriously and go look for that.
Q: There’s a fan theory doing the rounds that you are voicing a character called Carl Hampton. Is there anything you can tell us about that?
No, that’s not me. I’ll just tell you straight, it is not me. I’m not allowed to talk about things I’m not allowed to talk about but I can say that something is not me and it’s not me.
