January 29th, 2010
My first acting coach used to get so mad at me — and at first, sweet, innocent, hard-working me just couldn’t understand why. That being so, he felt it necessary to have the following conversation during one of my lessons…
“David, you aren’t recording your practice sessions are you?” he asked me on that particular day.
“Of course I am!” I defended myself.
He countered with “But are you actually LISTENING to them?”
“Um… Well… Ah… Sorta” came my barely audible reply.
Shadows of disappointment crossed his face. He then said “Here’s your homework. Go home and listen to your latest practice session. I want you to write down the word that sounds out of place.”
“Sounds ‘out of place’? What do you mean?”
“You’ll know what I’m talking about when you hear it” he chided.
This is what he was talking about…
The word was “draperies”, and it was part of a simple 15 second spot for a furniture store. As I diligently listened back to my most recent practice session I heard the fumble. The pacing of the other words was fine. But when I said the word “draperies” I kinda flew through it, just like I normally say it when speaking naturally.
In the past, my coach had told me that my reads sound natural, but sometimes too natural. And that’s what he wanted me to hear for myself. Those times when I’m sounding so natural that I slur certain words too much. And so, in order to improve, I needed to listen carefully to my practice sessions to discover which words I “naturally” fumble or slur so I can clean them up.
All voice acting coaches will tell you to record and listen back to your practice sessions. Take that advice to heart and do it — religiously. Listen not only for believability, but also for clean pronunciation of every single word.
Afterword:
When I told my coach what I had discovered he patted me on the back and said, “Good job! Now don’t slack off again. Got it?” 