Voiceover acting contains the challenge of finding authenticity where there is seemingly very little.
I pose to you the possibility that the way you approach a voiceover is not that different from the way you approach. You’re projecting!!
I skipped a line to let that sink in. For those of you who skipped an English class or two (I skipped the math class), projecting means not looking at something for exactly what it is but through your filter, through your previous thoughts and feelings and experiences, through your “idea” about that product….
When we project, a rose isn’t a rose anymore. Now it’s a lily or a daisy. But the writer wants a ROSE. We need to learn how to see what IS and not what we have “made it out to be.” To some degree, coming from a unique perspective is what can make your read stand out from the pack. What that looks like from a winning place, however, is adding sprinkles onto the top of the sundae – not changing the sundae into a brownie. The writer wants a sundae. Give the writer a sundae! Just make it the best gosh darn sundae he’s ever had and you both win. How to do this? Go back to every single voiceover script analysis article in this blog. Another way: Notice where you are projecting in your own life. Distinguish between what’s there and what possible way you wrote your own story around it. I noticed that when my husband interrupted me a few times early on that I thought he didn’t love me or respect me. Well, all that happened was he interrupted me! I turned it into an Oprah Winfrey episode. My husband grew up in large household where there was a lot of distraction and competition. It’s just a rose. I turned it into a cigarette butt. Keep things simple and look very clearly and carefully at things. Keep it to WHAT IS THERE and you’ll be off to a great start. Not only will you find the truth in the voiceover script more easily but you might even stop piling up those cigarette butts in your own life.
To fully maintain authenticity with a script is two-fold. You must find the truth in the writing and not project. You must also listen to your body. When you embrace “what’s there” in the script, does it feel fake to you? There’s some inauthenticity there. Put yourself in the shoes of the writer. Grasp the personality that shines through that writer in the script and collaborate with that writer by bringing his truth to life. This is now a human creative collaboration and not just an empty product sell – which is where I’m guessing some of the inauthenticity might stem from. When you nail this, we can talk about adding the sprinkles.