The Writers' Strike: You don’t know what you’ve got ‘til it’s gone.

I’ve been trying to keep up with the news about the WGA strike, and my best source of information has been Nikki Finke’s column, Deadline Hollywood Daily. I’ve been an avid reader since I don’t know when, but I’m especially grateful for her great connections and accurate reporting right now. Among the many columns she has devoted to the strike, she’s made several references to the blog written by the on-strike writers for the David Letterman show, which have provided numerous moments of levity during the weeks the strike has been ongoing. But today she has added something extraordinary – the first of a series of videos of actors and what their lives would be like without writers available to fix the problems that are constantly cropping up during rehearsals and filming of movies or shows. The inaugural video shows Holly Hunter trying to cope. Although I have understood the problems, conceptually, this video really brought it home. Check it out.

Una cosa rara.

A strange thing.

Lately I’ve been investing a fair bit of over-achieving energy in a presentation I was giving today on the geography, climate and natural history of the “Southern Cone” countries of South America - Chile, Argentina and Uruguay - in my Spanish class. I planned very carefully what I would say, and fretted because the words didn’t always come out perfectly in my rehearsals, making me worry endlessly about the future of my Spanish voice-over aspirations. I really enjoyed the preparation, though, because I was learning a lot about the region, which is a fascinating one, and the language is beautiful and I loved learning how to say things like “temperate rain forest” (bosque pluvial templado) and to describe the habits, in Spanish, of birds that I already knew well.

So, today was the day. I had my notes carefully typed up with cues to tell me when to change the slides. The time came to start my talk, and I set those notes down and never even looked at them except to double-check the name of a certain volcano. It was as if “the smell of the grease-paint” took over and I forgot all about mispronouncing words and just tried to make the subject as interesting as possible for my fellow students. It was more fun than I’ve had in quite a while and the words flowed effortlessly. I was so pleased when my professor told me afterwards that my experience as a teacher and public speaker showed!

So, there’s a lesson here – when you have an audience, whether they are right there in front of you or just in your imagination in the voice-over booth - get out of your own way and try to speak to them the way they would like to be spoken to. The strange thing is that I was not really conscious of doing this today – only in hindsight do I realise that it happened. Speaking to a live audience is a great way to remember how to do this. So many of you do it on a regular basis but it has been a while for me and I had forgotten how much I enjoy it. I recommend it!

Las focas de Patagonia

Western Voiceover.

This morning I drove west to the Berkshires for a recording session. For some reason, when I worked in the academic world, I always lived west of my university or college so I was always blindly driving or bicycling east into the rising sun and west into the sunset. I thought of that this morning and was very glad to be going in the sensible direction. And of course, any opportunity to visit the Berkshires is cause for great happiness as it is so beautiful there.

My destination this morning was a studio whose owner I had first contacted in January 2005 – just two days before my first email to Lorie Conway with whom I eventually worked on Forgotten Ellis Island – way back then I was following my voice-over coach (Charles Michel)’s advice and starting my marketing efforts in my own backyard, namely Massachusetts, and I branched out from there. Steve was conferring with his colleague Darrell last week, whose agency needed a commercial voice-over for a hospital in New Jersey. Steve suggested me, and Darrell called me. As it turned out I had worked with Darrell before, but never with Steve, and I didn’t know they knew each other. And I had never met either of them! So this was a very pleasant occasion for me. Steve has a beautiful studio in the mountains – it looks like a lovely vacation lodge and indeed I came away from there feeling as if I had been on holiday. The session lasted about an hour – nobody seemed to be in a big hurry – they got the script’s writer on the phone and we discovered that the spot was too long. The writer said in bewilderment “but I read it myself and it was 57 seconds” and Steve snorted, “you probably read it to yourself!” I was reading at a pretty good clip but it was still overstuffed with words, so the writer started slashing them away and by the end my script was quite a mess, and I played a game with myself to see how many edits I could read correctly –fortunately it was all of them. I must say I got huge (but unspoken) satisfaction from witnessing a writer realising that a) his script was too long 2) it wasn’t my fault and c) “I read it myself and it was just the right timing” does not necessarily mean that the script is the correct length – you won’t know until the professional voice talent steps in!! They also needed me to do a “humming track” which would be underneath part of the VO. It was quite funny to hum and then have the writer ask for various kinds of takes on the humming – a new experience for me.

Another new experience today was one that I know many of my colleagues are familiar with – “since you’re here would you mind doing another commercial for us”. Why no, I wouldn’t mind at all. So out came the script for the New York State Cerebral Palsy Association. A challenge – they pronounce it “sara-brul” which I had never said in my life before today.

Such a pleasant morning. I love to leave my studio coccoon and meet people in this business, and being directed live is so educational. And it doesn’t hurt to visit a recording studio with a view like this one!

Hitting the Ground Running.

Those of you who read my blog already know that I have a hard time with routine as I’ve always felt it boxed me in. I’ve changed my thinking and now see routine as liberating, because it can give me a framework for accomplishing everything I need to do and more. So, I’ve been taking steps towards establishing a routine and it hasn’t been working that well for me – about a month ago I started running a couple of miles a day with my dog. This has brought obvious health benefits for both me and Major including more energy to get things done, but what hasn’t worked so well is that we do this after the kids have left for school so we can help them get out the door (Major helps by announcing that their ride has arrived). So then we go out for our run around 7:30, get back around 8, get cleaned up, eat, and start the day. So, the official starting time of the day ends up being around 9 am, which is a bit on the late side.

This morning I woke up shortly before 6. I had a lot of stuff that needed to get done so I sprang from my bed with a glad cry (well, that’s a slight exaggeration but I’ve always loved that expression from P. G. Wodehouse) and hit the streets running. It was still dark and we encountered no cars for most of the duration of the run, so we didn’t have to breathe in exhaust fumes. There were no other people or dogs about, so Major was not obliged to try to pull my arms out of their sockets to express his disdain for his compatriots. I was showered and dressed by the time the kids got up, and had breakfast after they left. I then had time to do a 3-minute real estate narration for a client and take my car to be inspected – I was the second customer to arrive and the short wait gave me time to finish reading the story that had been assigned for Spanish class (since I had spent several hours yesterday writing the essay due in that class today and working on my report on the geography, climate and natural history of the Southern Cone region of South America that’s due next week – tried to read the story last night and ended up asleep). At least 4 other customers were awaiting auto inspections behind me, so I got there in the nick of time. That errand was complete by 9:40, which gave me enough time to return a call from a client to set up a voiceover recording session for Monday (for which I get to go to a new studio, in the Berkshires – hooray!) and get to Spanish class by 10 am.

When I get an early start to my day and get a significant amount accomplished before the sun is high in the sky, I feel exuberant – there is nothing like it! So this will be my new routine (I hope! and I need to work on that important voice-over exercise - the glad cry - as well). And now if you will excuse me – the rest of the day awaits!

My running partner