Taking funny voices seriously.
I’ve written here before about my early voice-over influences – more specifically, the “funny voices” influences. They were, unequivocally, Beyond the Fringe and to a lesser extent Mike Nichols and Elaine May. These people were funny. Funny enough to attract the attention of a 9-year old and keep it for the next several decades & beyond. This attraction played a significant role in my eventual choice to leave my career as a biologist in favor of one as a voice artist specialising in character voices and accents (as well as medical/science & museum narration). Now that I’m getting more and more work doing accents, however, I’m finding my biggest challenge to be to get away from the humor and take the voices seriously. I have several humorous Hispanic characters in my personal acting troupe, but I had to send them away recently when I was hired for a serious and somewhat dramatic project for Oregon artist Daniel Dancer of ArtfortheSky.com. Mr. Dancer wanted a “light Spanish accent” to narrate a short film on his art. Although the project, in hindsight, went smoothly, there was a lot of hand-wringing on my part. I had to really throw myself into the role and try to take myself seriously –more accurately, I had to forget myself in order to do the job properly. Forgetting one’s self is key. And definitely, forgetting about being funny is a must.
Currently, I’m taking a university theatre course on dialects. Talk about bliss! When class starts we have to sit in a circle and speak to each other in the dialect that is currently under study. As Tito (Cheech Marin) said in Oliver & Company, “Man, if thees eez torture, chain me to dee wall!!!!” I had hoped to get away from humor at least some of the time in this class, particularly during our work on standard British, since I sometimes feel that Beyond the Fringe has destroyed my chances of ever doing a British accent for a serious performance. Alas, I ended up being required to memorise a speech by Lady Bracknell from The Importance of Being Earnest, so “serious” was not to be. We are currently studying American Southern accents and may yet be called upon not to be funny; we shall see.
I’ve written here before about my early voice-over influences – more specifically, the “funny voices” influences. They were, unequivocally, Beyond the Fringe and to a lesser extent Mike Nichols and Elaine May. These people were funny. Funny enough to attract the attention of a 9-year old and keep it for the next several decades & beyond. This attraction played a significant role in my eventual choice to leave my career as a biologist in favor of one as a voice artist specialising in character voices and accents (as well as medical/science & museum narration). Now that I’m getting more and more work doing accents, however, I’m finding my biggest challenge to be to get away from the humor and take the voices seriously. I have several humorous Hispanic characters in my personal acting troupe, but I had to send them away recently when I was hired for a serious and somewhat dramatic project for Oregon artist Daniel Dancer of ArtfortheSky.com. Mr. Dancer wanted a “light Spanish accent” to narrate a short film on his art. Although the project, in hindsight, went smoothly, there was a lot of hand-wringing on my part. I had to really throw myself into the role and try to take myself seriously –more accurately, I had to forget myself in order to do the job properly. Forgetting one’s self is key. And definitely, forgetting about being funny is a must.
Currently, I’m taking a university theatre course on dialects. Talk about bliss! When class starts we have to sit in a circle and speak to each other in the dialect that is currently under study. As Tito (Cheech Marin) said in Oliver & Company, “Man, if thees eez torture, chain me to dee wall!!!!” I had hoped to get away from humor at least some of the time in this class, particularly during our work on standard British, since I sometimes feel that Beyond the Fringe has destroyed my chances of ever doing a British accent for a serious performance. Alas, I ended up being required to memorise a speech by Lady Bracknell from The Importance of Being Earnest, so “serious” was not to be. We are currently studying American Southern accents and may yet be called upon not to be funny; we shall see.
Labels: character voices, dialects for actors
posted by MCM Voices at
2/24/2007
4 Comments:
'Funny voices' are my favorite in VO- as are children's voices. I recently recorded a project that was the voice of a 13 year old- but was dealing with the serious issue of alcoholism. Now, I thought I had the 'teen thing' down-, so imagine my surprise when the director said- 'I'm not believing it'. It then hit me that I was simply 'doing a young voice'-not 'becoming a teenager'. Oops! It was quickly remedied and the client was thrilled with the result. Sometimes being a character IS serious work!
Another great post- thanks Mary!
A number of voice over artists start with the mentality that they are vocal Chameleons only to discover some years later when a performance comes back to haunt them that the vocal dexterity exists only in their minds.
To create "real people" voice overs need to discover, the mood, setting and the ability to say NO. Interesting to note that for most the last criteria appears to be the hardest to learn and is the most important for a sustainable and successful career.
Nice post Mary, very character building.
Philip
Two thoughts Mary....
1. Your spot on in your charcater voice analysis. Don't tell Banks but his insights are right too.
2. Dogoneit woman! You're the second most popular voice over blog according to google! People want to read what you have to say....you best increase the frequency of the posts...we're going through MCM withdrawls :))
Mary,
It's always a delight reading your cogent thoughts. Thank you for sharing your experiences and insights with us. And Peter is right. We'd love to see more...when you have time.
Be well,
Bob
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