Children's Story:
My original ideas for my story were children's TV shows which had narrators such as "Grizzly Tales for Gruesome Kids" and "Thomas the Tank Engine". They were stories I was familiar with and they had a large variety of characters and are narrated in a similar manner to how a children's audio book would be read. So it seemed to have the potential to show off quite a few voices and suggest every detail in the text. This turned out not to be the case however. I watched them with the visuals and then without and they seemed to embrace the fact they were working with a visual medium, so some of the adapted text has been lost to add it in with the animation since something can be shown rather than explained through narration. So this means that just as audio it didn't work despite their style of presentation so well and that meant it wouldn't be ideal.
Another reason I decided not to go with them was that since I watched them religiously during my childhood, I realised that when performing, I'm very likely to copy the narrator of the TV shows and not really present my own performance or interpretation, it would just be an impression. So I looked for a story that I was aware of but had never heard anyone read before. I looked for a while and found "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" by Lewis Carroll. This is known for having many varied and strange characters for Alice to interact with. The character who I wanted to portray the most was the Cheshire Cat since he's a character that is so crazy but is also very comfortable with the fact he's crazy to the point where h can be described as mellow. He's just so delightfully weird and any version of him I see he's generally fun. So I want to be=ring across the calm yet crazy demeanour and just have the chapter be fun. So I went with a segment of chapter 6.
Something that I wanted to keep in mind is what I learnt from listening to Stephen Fry and Jim Dale read "Harry potter". I have to keep the tone of the chapter and individual moments in mind and use that for my delivery. The atmosphere of this book is very surreal so I The narration will done with a hint of uncertainty, almost as if everything Alice is seeing is being questioned and it's all unfamiliar.
The other thing I learnt from not just the book reading but other shows like "Knowing Me, Knowing You" was to try and vary characters as much as possible. For this I only have two character voices and a third voice for my narration. My ideas for character voices are as follows; Alice will be a rather well spoken girl since in the story she is generally quite patient and well mannered despite everything that's happening around her so making her sound innocent and likeable. She will have a higher pitched voice since she is a young girl. The cat will have a much deeper voice and one that suggests he is very relaxed and laid back, almost like he's saying she shouldn't care where she is, she should just enjoy it. Because of this, his words will be spoken a lot slower where as Alice's will be generally fast paced to show the desperation and eagerness to get out of wherever she is. The narration should evoke the atmosphere so when I say something such as "But he only grinned wider", I feel it has to be said so it seems perplexing, and it's from Alice's emotional point of view. I feel if I can get that right then the surreal nature of this story will come across, if the delivery is fairly bland then the story as a whole will just be a bit more mundane so I really need to get that right. The key here is to create the full picture through variation.
14/1/17:
Today I gave all of my ideas a go, recording it into my phone and listening to it back and in terms of my goal of varying them, I think I did a decent job. I feel that if I took out the "Said Alice" etc then it would still be easy to tell who is talking and I even noticed I was putting in the emotional tones for the characters even though they were not listed in the text. For example when Alice says "But I don't want to be among mad people" I made it sound as though she got frustrated by the fact she was getting nowhere, not rude, just frustrated. So today I showed a good deal of variation, whether or not it would be good in terms of volume and clarity, I'm not overly sure since I wasn't testing that out.
28/1/17:
As I mentioned before I didn't try and test the volume levels of the performance so I performed it and instead of listening to it on my phone, I imported it to my computer and listened to it through my speakers. The notes I made for myself were that I need to project a little more, although I put that down to being in my home while recording and don't like others hearing me rehearse. My clarity was fine and I could understand the recording very well. I think with this I'll probably stand fairly close to the microphone since nothing requires me to be loud, In fact, it more demands that I be quieter, more subtle and possibly mysterious so this will require some close delivery, not too close like I'm whispering but about 7 or 8 inches from the microphone to really get full clarity.
Contemporary Monologue:
I had a few options to choose from but wanted something I'd never done before. Also a goal for me with this entire assignment was to try and show range/versatility in my voice. So something I wanted to experiment with was the use of accents and I had two monologues that I thought would be suitable. My initial choice was Mickey's speech from "Blood Brothers" since the play takes place in Liverpool and I wanted to try that accent as well as the challenge of seeing if I could portray a child's playfulness, innocence and mischief purely through the voice. This was my speech for a while and it was even used for our microphone technique session. However I changed it because it was a comedic piece and all my pieces are fairly light-hearted or comedic at this point and it lacked some variation in that department. So I wanted to go with something else that had a focus on accent and was a bit more dramatic.
The one I changed it to was the Atticus Finch courtroom monologue from "To Kill a Mockingbird", I had already done this and when I thought about it, it seemed incredibly fitting for a radio piece. It's main focus is emotion and vocal tones, even in the film version there is very little movement besides pacing and the occasional hand gesture so those things can be easily removed and it would still have the same effect.
The main feature about this one I must take note of is pace. This is meant to be a very tense, suspenseful scene. The character is a lawyer sticking up for a black man during a time of prejudice and he feels this speech in the courtroom is his best chance to get his point across so he uses it to his fullest. When he makes a point, he let's a pause happen to potentially give the people he's talking to time to think, even if it's only 2 or 3 seconds. I feel I have to use this at points in the speech such as after he says "She tempted a negro" or "The only good hand he possesses, his right". This will bring that aspect of him across, like he's trying to persuade them, where as if I cut the dramatic pauses out then it would go by much faster and nothing would sink in.
I said it's run on emotion and that emotion is restrained anger, since he's in a courtroom he can't show full on anger otherwise his reputation and authority could be jeopardised. He believes the man he's defending is actually innocent and the fact that the towns racial hatred is clouding their judgement is getting to him. I'm going to have to try and bring this across with specific moments in my voice. A line that comes to mid is "Rigid and time honoured code of our society", that line means he thinks there's no reason for this law to be around other than for the sake of traditionalism. At that point I could make that moment a bit angrier or have a slightly more aggressive tone. This will add variation but also having fluctuating moments in anger and moments of restraint so it will be engaging and keep the listeners attention by changing things up during the 2 and a half minute speech.
22/1/17:
I gave it a run through on my phone today and I have confidence in this as a radio piece. The way I think I should perform it is to stand about a meter or so away from the microphone and then project my lines as if I were in a courtroom, this means the microphone would pick me up very clearly but would have no distortion or popping sounds what so ever. This also makes it easy to edit since the only thing that may be required in post production is the slightest of echos to suggest the size of the room which of course cannot be replicated in a studio. The volume in my piece fluctuates slightly so during those moments where I have to speak a little quieter I will simply take a small step forward to accommodate the volume change.
Advert:
I was initially going to go with the Tesco's one but decided I couldn't when the list of item I'd have to say fast is obscured in the latter half by another person so this meant I couldn't get a proper script for it. So the advert I have decided to go with is a Thorpe Park advert. This one starts with a man at the park telling the listener how good it is and where to book tickets. The main chunk of the advert however is a humorously presented list of reasons as to why you should not attend the park. Even though most of them are conditions and health states, it finishes it off with a comment about everyone else just being scaredy cats. It uses a sort of reverse psychology/taunt to tempt people into coming along. It is as I said though in a fairly humorous manner and not overly serious.
The reason I've chosen it is because the ad's focus is on fast, clear delivery which is something I have never done in this kind of context before. I have proven that outside of acting I can manage fast, articulate delivery although that's more to do with singing or rapping and that's with things that never had a comedic edge to them or any lighthearted mannerisms. I've proven in the past that I can pull of some good comedic timing and with this piece I see the potential to show it in a different light.
I feel for the sake of comparison it would be best to find an advert that delivers the offer or message in a way that's either significantly slower or significantly faster. After looking at a few, I realised one that has a focus on normal or slower pacing would give a better contrast. I mentioned the advert for "AA fuel assist" and the people in the ad talk normally although still with clarity but the last person (The narrator) has more time to get all his sounds out clearly where as I have to rush mine. The other people in the ad talk in a persuasive manner and I feel that would also be good for my guy in the first part of the ad. I listened to quite a few but they all had similar good points, the main one I noticed (And one of the most important) was clarity.
11/1/17:
Today We had to perform our pieces into a microphone for the first time as a rehearsal in order to practice our microphone technique. I performed my advert since it's the one I feel is up to a decent standard at the moment. When doing it I made sure to stand a good distance away from the microphone when delivering my loud, enthusiastic part but then step further forward and tilt my head to the side a bit when saying the bulk of my advert since it's much quieter. I decided to step forward quickly since the two voices in the advert have to contrast in tone and volume so the faster I can make that happen, the more intentionally jarring it should be and therefore a little funnier. With all these projects I do want to try and make it so there's less work for the editor and less time can be wasted to fully utilising these abilities and correct timing that can be done.
My feedback for performing was pretty positive. The thing I was very happy to hear was that I did have a great degree of clarity although I personally thought that I could have gone a little further, there were a couple words that sort of blended together even though the overall performance was pretty good. I wasn't properly warmed up at the time although when I had to perform it again, later that day it did have full clarity.
Most people found it to actually be very funny as well which means I'm achieving the contrast I wanted for it. There was one person who thought my voice in the first part of the advert didn't work although they never gave a reason and everyone thought it was pretty good. I like it mainly because of the aforementioned contrast that it provides, one moment the voice is happy inviting and very enthusiastic where as the other is very serious, yet humorous and is drastically faster.
Some constructive feedback I got was that I need to place a breath in there so I don't sound out of breathy by the end of it. I had already considered the idea of putting a comical, over the top, deep breath in there since it does get used in other ads such as the Tesco's one I mentioned before, however I really feel it would be funnier and more impressive and effective if I did it in one breath. I know I can do it, I just need to find the right warm, ups to get me to do it.
One thing I need to mention is the need o stay hydrated. I often forget to do this for rehearsals and it's a huge flaw of mine and it did happen today. For the first read again that's where my flaws came through and this was a major factor. You don't want the voice to sound warn out or tired which it can do if not hydrated and it can be distracting when heard.
17/2/17:
Today we had to demonstrate one of our pieces to the class using a microphone plugged into speakers but this time we actually got to show Sally. This time however we were all behind a screen so we could not see each other and only had the actors voices to go off of. I again demonstrated my advert since I feel it's still the one I feel was the most prepared.
The feedback for it was overall very positive. I was told I have some great clarity especially considering it's all very fast and has to be done in one breath. My volume was also very good and my clarity was spot on this time although I still had that annoying issue where half way through, I need to take a breath. I again got the note that I should add a breath in but to be honest I really don't like that idea because it does takes away from the impressive nature and it's just not very representative of that advert trope. Terms and conditions readers never take a breath so to do it would not be accurate and would it would just seem lazy. People say it's OK to add it in for comedy but it's really not that funny, someone who is being very serious saying these reasons as to why you shouldn't come is much funnier than referencing it and being overly self aware. I have practiced it and done it in one breath so I'm going to try my best to do it again in the recording
The feedback I got today suggested that my voice for the beginning part fits very well since it's meant to be very enthusiastic and it seemed a bit infectious, some people did genuinely enjoy it. This was good to hear since it got criticism last time although people have either warmed to it or always liked it. Some people were even quoting it afterwards so I must've done something well.
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