Over the Hedge

This movie opened last weekend and the family trooped out to see it. I had seen segments of it last spring at an event I attended at Lincoln Center called “Animation Now” – along with sneak previews of The Curse of the Wererabbit, Madagascar, and Jerry Seinfeld’s Bee Movie which is due out next year. Or maybe the year after that. Voice actors grumble a lot about the celebrity craze. Celebrities get the big parts in the animated feature films and the “real” voice actors get Townspersons 1-20. I don’t exactly think that celebrities are taking roles away from me. These are not huge numbers of roles, compared to what else is out there in the universe of roles. Plus, I’m not yet so well established as a character voice actor that I can think that way, and even if I were, it would still be a losing battle. The movie moguls want celebrities, they’re going to hire ‘em and there’s nothing anybody can do about it. I rather enjoy the celebrity thing, at least when the actors are good. Certain actors can definitely get me to the box office faster – Robin Williams is always well worth the price of admission, for example, even if the movie as a whole is not so good.

One of the most amazing animated features of recent years, in my opinion, is The Incredibles – the lead actors are well established and yet maybe not who you’d expect for a summer blockbuster. They gave truly wonderful performances, the acting was superb and there was a delightful surprise in there – Brad Bird’s debut as Edna.

And then there’s Madagascar. I read somewhere that Chris Rock was quoted as saying that he loved doing voiceovers because they’re “so easy” – you just go into the booth and talk. Maybe that’s why Madagascar was such a forgettable movie - the animation was fabulous but the actors didn’t bring a whole lot to it. Or Robots – quite a list of stars there – Ewan McGregor (no Scottish accent – I wanted my money back!), Mel Brooks, Paula Abdul, Halle Berry, Drew Carey, James Earl Jones, Jennifer Coolidge, Jay Leno and, of course, Robin Williams. That movie must have cost the earth to make. Was it worth it? Well, I suppose I shouldn’t fault the actors if they weren’t memorable (except for Robin Williams, who was). The script probably had something to do with it too – although in the case of The Incredibles I remember the acting and the voices more than anything and the actors deserve tremendous credit for that. Over the Hedge has an excellent script in addition to excellent actors – a simple plot but dialogue that is smart, funny and fast. I think this is one of Bruce Willis’ first voice acting roles apart from a dog in Rug Rats Go Wild (2003), and the first voice role for Nick Nolte. They definitely do a creditable job. Still, I can’t help wondering what these movies would be like if they were cast “blind”. No names, no faces, just voices auditioning for the roles. What incredible talent would be discovered? What memorable characters would be created with inspiration from the scripts and directors? If actors had to offer something different and unexpected in order to get the part? I mean, Wanda Sykes is sure funny as Stella the skunk in Over the Hedge. But she sounds EXACTLY like Wanda Sykes. Is that the point? Is that why adults go to see animated feature films these days? To see how many celebrities’ voices they can recognise? How different would those films be from what they are now if auditioning required great imagination?

Just asking.

Women in Animation

One hardly knows where to begin to review the weekend workshop I attended on Women in Animation, with the incredibly versatile Pat Fraley, the super talented audiobook narrator Hillary Huber, and the whacky and amazing Candi Milo. And as if that were not enough already, we also had a Q & A with casting director Leslie Zaslower of Nickelodeon. The event was organised by Susan Berkley of Great Voice – who took her place in the class with the rest of us students - and it was held at Edge Studio on 7th Avenue in New York. The participants were all from the East Coast if I’m not mistaken – New York, Boston, Maine, Atlanta – possibly Florida too. A few were beginners, the rest of us full time voice artists or on the verge of going full time. Most of us were looking to specialise in character voices and a few were hoping just to increase their flexibility. I have no doubt that all of us will meet our goals, such was the talent in that room and the support each of us received.

We did a lot of work in pairs or trios and had a lot of time in the booth. All of this was devoted to discovering the character voices we had inside us, bringing these voices out and giving them names and personalities and life. We approached this from many different angles – by taking bland copy and reading it in a character voice, by starting with verbal descriptions and producing a character voice, by starting with drawings and spontaneously coming up with a character voice to go with the picture. One of the most surprising discoveries for me was how easy it was to create a voice to go with a visual. I don’t think of myself as a very visual person – words have always meant more to me than pictures, and written directions have always been more effective for me than maps. One of my favorite exercises was when we went into the recording booth with a partner and took turns free-associating in any character voice we chose, and our partner had to match that voice and converse with us. Then we switched roles. A total of 6 voices came out of that exercise.

The afternoon with Candi Milo was heady, breath-taking, and so very rewarding! Candi is a hard-working character voice actor who is currently the voice of Dexter on Dexter’s Laboratory. She plays and has played many other roles in film and television – for a complete list you’ll have to IMDb her (I learned that verb this weekend – although I’ve used the site for a long time I didn’t know it was a verb! http://www.imdb.com/ ). She worked with each of us individually and although I personally was expecting to “blow it” I managed to put negative thinking out of my head and just go for it. I think that’s the key to success in this business. Not being afraid to make a fool of one’s self. And I’d say the high point of my weekend, if not my whole life, was watching Candi’s jaw drop when I read my first line. Yeah, she liked it. One of the other high points was Pat telling me that I was “really good at being stupid”. Perhaps that requires some context. He had told me earlier in the weekend that his experience with academic types like me (and he could include himself too, as he has an impressive academic background) was that we sometimes get tied-up in right-brain approaches and have a hard time letting go. That we need to let the left brain take over. So he was glad to see after all was said and done that that wasn’t going to be a problem for me.

Pat Fraley is a terrific teacher – he knows how to bring stuff out of people. Good stuff. He gave us just the right mix of “lecture”, how-to, and “now do it yerself”. He is also such fun to watch and listen to. It’s so interesting to see how the voices in his head support him in his life. Character voices are not just for the recording booth, not just for the gig or getting the gig. They are for all time. And life is so much richer for it.

Hillary Huber ran a tight ship, keeping Pat and the rest of us on schedule and offering wonderful insights and suggestions all weekend long. Her specialty is audiobooks and I saw this review of one of the books she narrated for Blackstone: “Hillary Huber's narration is lyrical enough to be set to music”. I will definitely be looking for her books from now on!

Golly, what a weekend. What voices. What people. What a journey of discovery, about other people, about one’s self. Some voices that have been with me most of my life burst their bonds and came out with personalities last weekend. Some fledgling voices took their first steps, and some brand new ones started coming out after I got home. All in all, it was a glorious weekend, so much learned, so many new friends made, goals clarified, plans made – I would not have missed it for anything and hope to work with some of these people again - the instructors AND the 11 other wonderful and talented women who attended as students. At the very least, I know I will stay in touch with them. I want them to be in my life always.

Women In Animation

I'm on my way to New York today for a two-day workshop with Pat Fraley on Women in Animation.

I will probably have a few words to say about it when I get back.

Installing Hardware - Don't Follow Directions!

In January my Epson EPL-8000 printer refused to power up after only 14 years of flawless service. The 1-yr old Epson CX5400 was low on ink. And MCM had not yet sprung for a 2nd monitor for the sound booth and is still reading from paper scripts.

The professionals don't fix laser printers any more. Burns my grits, since it probably just needs a power supply. The printer is now sitting on the "Hundred-Year Bench" where things go to get fixed around here. So I got a new cheap little HP 1020. The installation CD tells you how to do all the stuff you already know how to do, like remove the shipping tape and put in the paper and plug it in, but not the less easy stuff like getting it actually to work. The installer got into a loop and I finally had to X out, but not before being told that installation wasn't complete and did I really want to do that. The HP website was no help at all. I went to the Control Panel to install the printer that way. I did manage to get it "installed", at least to the point that when I tried to print something I could choose the new printer. But it didn’t actually print. So I finally just re-ran the set-up CD and this time it worked. Sure, after I did the work on my own of adding the printer through the control panel, NOW it gets off its lazy butt and installs it. Grumble. Or, to use the technical term, Bwah. By the way the new printer is wicked fast. I guess there has been some progress in 14 years.

Fast forward to May 2006.I've had to install this same HP 1020 printer several times lately, what with the Great System Crash of Easter 2006. I moved the printer to the general computer first. At the time I couldn't locate the installation disk, so when I was prompted to put it in "if this hardware came with an installation CD", I decided to interpret "if" to mean, if you can't find the durn thing, then don't put it in. The installation went flawlessly. So now it's becoming a little old, using sneakernet to get things printed so I decided I finally needed to move the printer back to my area and install it in my non-DAW computer. Since I now know where all my CDs are I thoughtlessly bunged the installation disk into the CD drive when prompted to do so. MISTAKE!! ERROR!! THE BIG E LIGHTS UP ON THE SCHAEFER SCORE BOARD!! "Installation did not complete. Your new hardware may not work properly". I then reached back into the 2-week old recesses of my memory to the previous flawless installation. Turn off printer. Disconnect. Remove CD from CD drive. Look for stuff to uninstall in list of Add/Remove. Not found. Perform system restore. Start over. Stare at ceiling when prompted for CD. Click on "Next". Installation proceeds flawlessly. "Your installation is complete. Your new hardware is ready to use." WTF, you know? Just plain, unmitigated ruddy WTF.

Grumble.