What little girl doesn’t want to grow up and be a Disney princess? Well, maybe that is the wrong question to ask in 2018. Maybe some little girls want to grow up and be the handyman or the shopkeeper or the grumpy old lady next door. Well as a character voiceover actress I get to be all of them! From mermaid to candy princess to British little boys to kitty cats, I have voiced them all. So what does it take to get to do this kind of work and how does a voiceover gal like me prepare?
When I first started out, I was blessed to find amazing coaches! I took classes with the incomparable Cristina Milizia. I am actually almost a voice match for her so studying with her was extremely helpful. I also had more months than I can count of private lessons with the legend Fred Frees, who grew up in our industry. Fred insisted that I not make my demo until I had a roster of characters that I could hold 8 hours a day 5 days a week like you have to do when you book a job. I also learned that you aren’t doing voices, but are building complex characters and that made all the difference. Before I knew it I had a lot of people floating around in my head!
Fred also insisted that I take improv classes. This was way out of my comfort zone which is exactly why he said I needed it. He said I needed the improv to really be able to do the scripts justice. At the same time he really upped the ante with the copy that we worked with and every session was a real workout. I learned to go from character to character and I practiced for hours every day, building the roster of make-believe and building my skill set too.
By the time I did my demos, I was ready. I have been blessed to book a good amount of character work- from games to toy prototypes to E-learning, I LOVE it all! I can also switch from character to character with ease in one job and that is all because of my training. Is there any other field where you can say you have a lot of different voices floating around in your head?? I really don’t think so!
For a link to a character demo – click here!
