Improve Your Voice-Overs.... Don't Let The Script Get in The Way

There's an old saying in acting, and that is you have to learn your lines and then forget them. But what does that mean? And how does it apply to us as voice over people?

It's a puzzle isn't it, what does it mean? You're learning your lines and then you're forgetting them. Well it doesn't mean you don't remember them. 

What they're referring to in the acting community is that the words on the page are not really important once you are delivering your lines because it's the meaning and the tone and the emotion that is far more important. 

Okay you've got to try and get the words in the right order and remember what they say. But that's part and pass of being an actor I guess. Now for us as voice over artists, we can't forget our lines, can't possibly do it, there they are, written on the script in front of us. 

But I think it has some relevance, that old saying has some relevance to us as well, in terms of our performance. 

And that is because really the words on the page are just that, that's all they are. They have no meaning, no life until we bring our voices to them. And it is the way we do that, that is important.

So the words on the text, on the page are of course, they're important. 

Clients have probably spent a lot of money on copywriters or whatever trying to get the best words they can in some cases. But they don't really as words that just lie there, they don't really live, they don't breath and it's our job to do that. 

It's our job to infuse them with emotion and to convey that message. Whatever it is, whether you're selling second hand cars or you're informing people doing a corporate or you're narrating an audio book. It really doesn't matter. The principle remains exactly the same. You're owning those words. 

We talk about ownership of words in voiceovers. 

So they're somebody else's words but they become yours and that's the important thing to remember. So although you can't forget your lines, you can't forget your words, you can at least forget that they are just words, and start to bring your personality, your individuality and your tone of voice to the message that is being written or has been written on the page. 

So I think that old actor saying has quite a lot of relevance to what we do. As long as you own your words, you should be fine. Alright, thanks very much for watching today. Look after your voice and see you next time.

Gary Terzza is a British voice-over coach.