Episode Notes
This week, I had the pleasure of sitting down with the remarkable Tina Morasco, an award-winning casting director and coach. Tina is not only a powerhouse in casting, but she also brings a wealth of experience from her on camera work and as a voice artist. Her unique perspective makes her coaching sessions incredibly sought after, so much so that she’s created an extensive video library to share her knowledge. Recently, she even added a Spanish subtitled version for broader accessibility.
Episode Highlights:
– Tina’s Journey: Tina shares her fascinating story of how she accidentally found her way into the world of voiceover. From starting as an agent trainee at William Morris to building a voiceover department at ICM, her path has been anything but conventional.
– Creating Talent: Tina’s philosophy of not poaching talent but rather creating a unique department of fresh voices is inspiring. She shares about scouting talent from the most unexpected places, including bartenders and stand-up comedians, many of whom are still thriving in the industry today.
– The Essence of Casting: Tina dives deep into her casting process, explaining how she uses her extensive background to help actors connect with the story they’re telling. Her ability to merge her experiences as an agent, actor, and casting director makes her approach both unique and incredibly effective.
– Coaching Insights: Tina opens up about why she loves coaching even more than performing. The joy she finds in collaborating with actors and helping them discover their potential is truly inspiring. She also shares her strategies for staying grounded and balanced amidst her busy schedule, from spiritual practices to simply taking a moment to play with her dogs.
This episode is packed with valuable insights for anyone in the entertainment industry, especially those navigating the world of auditions and casting. Tina’s stories are not only informative but also deeply motivating.
Log into www.tinamorascocoaching.com where you can also sign up for her personal video library. Use code NICKY for 20% off.
Transcript
Nicky: Hello everyone, and welcome to the last episode of season 9 of La Pizarra, my name is Nicky Mondellini. If you’ve been listening to our previous seasons, I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for helping us grow. If this is your first time tuning in to La Pizarra, welcome! La Pizarra means The Slate.This is a space where you’ll find many interesting conversations about the entertainment business, and not just from a performer’s perspective, but I also love to ask many questions to the people who make things work on the other side of the camera. If you enjoy this podcast, the best way you can support us is by liking, downloading and sharing this, and other episodes on social media and leaving a review on Apple Podcasts.
And speaking of the other side of the camera, my guest today is the amazing Tina Morasco, she’s an award-winning casting director and coach. She also has plenty of experience in front of the camera, and as a voice artist, which is one of the reasons she’s a phenomenal coach.
Before heading the casting department at Sound and Fury Media, Tina was an agent at the William Morris Agency, and later she was recruited at ICM (International Creative Management) to help create and build their voice over department. But after a while she decided to go back to Rutgers University where she previously earned her BA in Communications, this time to pursue her Master’s Degree in Acting.
Later Tina moved to LA to begin her acting career, and since then she has worked steadily in Film and Television. Her credits include Jane the Virgin, Castle, Parks and Recreation, Two and a Half Men, Numbers, Boston Legal, CSI, Cold Case and many more. She’s also the voice of the HGTV series Love it or List it, as well as countless TV and radio commercials and promos.
In 2018 she joined Sound and Fury Media, where, as I mentioned before, she is currently head of casting.
Tina’s coaching sessions are in high-demand. So much so that she decided to create a library of videos where she teaches all the elements needed in commercial auditions. And recently she added a Spanish
subtitled version of the library.So, if you’re bilingual but you prefer to have Spanish subtitles just in case you miss something, this is your chance to have access to a great resource that will help you book the job. But I will let the creator of this special library explain things in detail.
Join me in exploring the creative mind of Tina Morasco.
Nicky:Tina, thank you so much for joining me today! It’s such a special treat to be able to talk to you.
Tina Morasco: Oh, my gosh, thank you for the invitation, and you know I would do anything for you, so I am thrilled to be here.
Nicky: Well, I have lots of questions for you, because obviously, as Talent we always want to know what a casting director is thinking. And also, I wanna know several things, besides talking about your beautiful library, about the ways we can help each other, like the way we can make your job easier. But before we get into all of that, I would actually like to start at the beginning. What is it that got you interested in the entertainment business in the first place?
Tina: Oh gosh, I had been dancing around, I like to say, in every seat in the musical chairs game of this business.
Nicky:Yes, you have, yes!
Tina: And, like so many people, I sort of landed in Voice Over accidentally. I graduated from college, and then I started as an agent trainee at William Morris in New York, and I was all over the place, you know? Working in all different departments, and eventually landed in the commercial department which at that time was On Camera commercials, Voice Over, and soap operas were all lumped together. And the woman who became my boss was like, the voice over maven in New York City at the time. She was such an amazing mentor, and I truly did not know at all what voice over was. So, I would listen to her on the phone pitching clients, describing voices as “velvety”, or, you know “it’s like putting on a warm sweater listening to this person”, or whatever, I would be like “gosh, I never thought that voices had, like a feeling to them, a description to them. And it fascinated me and I got really, really,really interested and into it, and there the assistants had a lot of responsibility, so I was going out every night and going to Broadway, and Off-Broadway, and Stand-up comedy and they gave the assistants license like “hey, if you see somebody who’s interesting, you know, give them your card and bring them in and we’ll all do a meeting and stuff. And, I mean, what a joy as a 22 year old, you get carte-blanche to New York City and just like scout and that, and so I quickly came to find that I really, really enjoyed it, and I, you know, started to get good at it. And I left there and I went to ICM and I started their Voice Over department. So prior to me coming, they only had a department that represented celebrity Talent. In the LA office, I was in New York, and in the LA office they had a Voice Over department like you know today, like you and me, and everybody at our level competed for voice overs. But New York didn’t, and they wanted one, and the person who hired me only went to do celebrity deals. He didn’t really go back into the day-to-day voiceover world. He hired me to build that department. When I got there, we had literally one client. I had to go out and scout talent all over the land. It was probably one of the fondest time periods of my life, because I was really out there changing people’s lives, not even on purpose. My bartender at the Raccoon Lodge became like one of the biggest bookers of the ’90s. People that I would go and see doing standup in little tiny shows, or I would go see my friend do a play. Then there would be somebody with a cool voice there and I would bring them in and they’re still doing voice over today.
Nicky: You were recruiting people who had never done voiceover before?
Tina: None of my clients had ever done voiceover before, which is how I learned to coach. Our philosophy was we didn’t want to steal clients from other agencies. We really wanted to create our own unique department.
Nicky: Yes, your own talent pool.
Tina: Because it was ICM, we had access to some really significant talent. We had people like Liev Schreiber, Patrick Stewart and Sigourney Weaver and all of these huge talents. I would go out and scout brand new talent and I would be like, “Hey, you want to learn how to do voiceover?” Then I would bring them into our fancy pants studio and really teach them how to do it.
It exploded because New York was so saturated with the same old tried and true. At that time, voice over was much smaller, like just a nucleus of people who were really active and involved. It was like the same people over and over and over going to all the same auditions, the same people were booking everything. All of a sudden, this new department came on with like these eclectic talents from all different walks of performance life. They were just bringing something so unique and fresh to the–
Nicky: I can only imagine, definitely.
Tina: Yes, so casting directors loved us and the department took off. The cool thing and how I really learned to coach and to produce demos too, is because none of our clients had any voiceover experience, right? I’m teaching them as we’re doing the auditions. Then I had to produce demos for every single solitary one of them because none of them have any previous work to share. For us to make an agency demo to send out to our buyers, we had to produce fake demos for all of these clients. I probably did 60 all in one fell swoop.
Yes, it was talking about, like education by fire. Much like now, I worked probably 14, 15, 16-hour days every day for several years. One night I was sitting in a Broadway theater. I’m trying to remember what show I was seeing, but I was seeing one of my clients in a show. I literally got struck by lightning. I was just like, I was watching the show and I was so overwhelmed with emotion, but it wasn’t just the emotion that the show was eliciting in me. It was like this longing of like, I need to do that. I was like, no, you can’t do that. I just couldn’t shake it.
I really in complete secrecy started taking acting classes at night, after I would work all day. I started really training to audition for a grad program. I thought, you know what? I’m going to leave this up to the universe. If I’m meant to do this, I will apply to one program. If I get in, I’ll go. If not, I’ll just continue my journey as an agent. Sure enough, I got in, which is still mind boggling because I really had no business getting in at that point. Then I spent three years getting my master’s in acting.
Then going out to LA as an actress. Then for the last six years going into casting. When you see what I write in casting specs and everything, you’re seeing the compilation of all those different parts. It’s a little bit of my agent brain, a lot of my actor brain, and then a lot of my casting brain all woven together to be able to lure you into the read that the clients are hoping to hear.
Nicky: That’s amazing because not every casting director does that. At most, we get like five words of what they’re looking for and that’s it. You have to make up the rest, like gritty, grounded, natural, not announcery. That’s it, right? A lot of the time it’s like, okay, what else would they be looking for? You really have to direct yourself, but you actually help talent a lot because in those specs and people have to read the specs, definitely, because they do inform you and they do help you a lot as to how you can do your read in a different way. Then of course, just give it your all, but that’s it.
Tina: The thing about the specs is like, whenever anybody says like, don’t read the specs. I’m like, that would be the equivalent of you coming in for an audition live. I say like, “Oh, Nicky, I’m so glad you’re here. I just hung up with the creative team. This is what they said they wanted.” You go, “Shh, no, I’m going to do me.” It’s like, you would never cut the casting director off when they’re about to give you the answers. The specs are basically like, hey, this is everything that I would say to you if we were live and in person, like we used to be in the good old days. I’m trying to literally give you every breadcrumb to lead you to the delivery that we’re hoping to hear.
Nicky: Of course. You also translate whatever the creative director wants. Sometimes they probably don’t even know what to ask for or how to ask for things. How much coaching do you also do to the casting director in order to get whatever they want? I’ve been in sessions where they really don’t know how to ask for things.
Tina: Yes. I find that they often have a very specific idea, but sometimes they don’t know how to express it in actor terms. That’s probably what you’ve experienced a lot in sessions, and I have dear friends who are creative directors or copywriters. This is an important thing to share with actors too, is that my friend will call me the night before a session and he’ll be like, “Hey, would you just look at the script and give me a couple of direction notes so I don’t look like an idiot in front of my client?” They are just as nervous a lot of times to direct the talent as the talent are to be directed.
It’s really important as Talent to not feel like it’s just you in the hot seat. Everybody is sweating because everybody’s under the microscope. It is symbiotic, we’re all working together, we’re all in this together. What I find is that they know what they want, but they don’t really necessarily know how to express it. We’ll just do a Zoom with the creatives and we’ll let them tell us the genesis of the project, how it evolved, who they’re hearing in their head. We really know how to ask leading questions that will clarify.
If they say like, “Oh, it’s a comedic spot. Tina Fey or Amy Poehler.” We’re like, “Okay, great.” They work together very well all the time, but they’re very different brands of comedy. Tina Fey is much more close to the vest and wry and sarcastic. Amy Poehler is much more zippy with a little zing at the end where she gets you. We’ll make those distinctions and see if we can get one. They might say like, “Listen, we’re open to any form of comedy that really tells this story and moves it along.” Then it’s up to us to decide like, oh, I really think this read serves the story and I think this read serves the story even though they’re vastly different.
Nicky: Yes, for sure. I think it’s really important for them to know that even though they have a reference and they will send you a reference, they also need to explain what is it that they want because you definitely don’t want to do an imitation of the reference that they send you. It’s like, okay, what are you trying to tell me with this reference?
Tina: With the reference, we’re usually saying, especially if there are several references, what we’re looking for is like, okay, what is the essence of these four different references? What do they all have in common? Because they’ll probably have very different vocal sounds. Usually if you’ll see like Viola Davis and Sigourney Weaver and Scarlett Johansson, and let me say like Emma Stone. They’re different ages and very different actors, but I would say what they all have in common is they’re incredibly confident. They’re incredibly self-possessed.
They’re comfortable in their own skin. They’re not people-pleasing. They’re very settled into themselves. Then I would read the rest of the specs and see if they match that, which they probably would. Then I’d go, okay, well then I’m going to bring that version of me to this story. That is very wise, no need to prove or to push my point of view on anyone. I’m just going to sit back in my expertise and just share what I know from a very calm, relaxed, pulled back energy. It’s about the essence.
Nicky: The essence, of course. That’s what we have to glean from the references all the time, okay. Before we get into a little bit more about the library, I want to touch a little bit more on your acting career. Are you still performing by the way because you love it so much?
Tina: It’s funny that you say that because I didn’t tell anybody and all of a sudden, I’m getting all these emails. I never thought anybody would see it. I just did a teeny tiny little role on a show called Clipped that is starring Ed O’Neill and Laurence Fishburne. It’s on Hulu right now. It just dropped maybe two or three weeks ago. Tiny little role, tiny little role but I was like, with that cast, I’m not saying no. Every now and then. I really don’t have time. As you know, I’m casting pretty much all day and coaching the rest of the day.
I don’t really have time to do that many auditions, but when one lands in my lap and I think like, oh, this feels like it’s in my wheelhouse, I do it. It’s just enough to keep me creatively fulfilled.
Nicky: Yes, for sure because I was going to ask you how you do it all. You’re casting so many projects and then you’re top, you win the awards at SOVAS every year because of casting all sorts of projects, especially Commercial.
Tina: That’s all we do, yes.
Nicky: Of course, all your coaching and you’re a mom and everything. You wear so many hats, so I want the name of your vitamin supplement.
Tina: You know what? There’s a lot of ginkgo biloba that goes into all of it.
Nicky: Ah, Ginkgo.
Tina: Ginkgo biloba, yes, exactly. If I go like that, you’ll see all the rest, probably that way, all the rest of the bottles back there. No, it’s good organization, some time management skills, and then prioritizing what fills your cup. I start every day by coaching now that I’m on the East Coast, because the time is on my side. I still work West Coast hours for Sound and Fury, but coach twice a day before I start casting. Coaching really fills my cup because I miss and I love human interaction and that connection. I love the creative process, working with actors.
Honestly, I think I love coaching even more than I loved performing because I love the collaboration. I love sharing what I know and then letting you all take how you understand what I’m sharing and then let that blossom in your own unique way, and then turning it into something that would be way greater than I could have come up with on my own, or that maybe you could have come up with on your own, but the synergy of working together just explodes it into something even greater than us.
Starting my day off like that is really energizing. Then I get to go right into casting and that just exercises a different part of my brain. It’s all good. My little one is not so little anymore. She’s in college. She’s off starting her own life. The dogs and I sit here and we listen to auditions all day.
Nicky: How do you find a balance because you’re obviously super healthy? Do you dedicate some time to exercising, to just disconnecting and going off the grid for a little bit, or how do you find that balance?
Tina: I have a pretty good spiritual practice. I work with, I would call her a spiritual therapist that I work with once a week. I meditate, I go to the gym. Not as much as I should. I mostly will do my 12, 3.30, my walk and a little bit of weights. I think it’s the spiritual part of it. It’s just taking time to disconnect from the go, go, go and really connecting inward and just seeing what’s present inside of me. I’ve been doing a lot of– this might be a little too out there for voiceover conversation, doing a lot of inner child work.
I find for anybody who knows what I’m talking about, I find that bringing my inner child to work with me or to whatever, just incorporating that little girl inside of me that may have been bypassed in years past or ignored. I don’t know, it just invigorates and creates a little bit of spark and joy. Sometimes I’ll bring a picture of her with me to casting one day and I’ll look at her and I’ll imagine she’s either going like, or she’ll be like, yes, I like that one.
Nicky: Wow, I like that.
Tina: Then sometimes I’ll just take a little break and go play with the dogs for five minutes and come back. Just trying to stay present. Casting really requires tremendous focus and being in the moment because if you start to daydream or you start to multitask, you start to think about a million other things, you might miss the subtlety and the nuance of what you’re listening for. Constantly, casting is sort of a meditative process for me.
It’s very Zen. I really have to get very focused and deep into it. The more present I am, the faster it goes and the more accurate it is. When I finished the first pass and I go through, I’m like, oh, this is really good. I find if my mind is busy or I’m multitasking or I’m prepping jobs at the same time I’m casting or whatever, it often takes me much longer because I have to go back and reshape and reform what I’ve currently done.
Nicky: When you are in that area, in that focus zone, how long does it take you or how much of an audition will you listen to before you know this is going to go in the preferred batch or just scrap that one?
Tina: Yes, it’s a really good question.
Nicky: Five seconds.
Tina: Not even. It’s usually whatever the opening moment is. If that opening moment is a full beat, like a full couple of seconds, I’ll listen that far. The ones that are going to get scrapped, get scrapped almost instantly for any number of reasons. It could be just terrible sound quality, totally wrong demographic, for like a lot of those obvious technical reasons. What I’m really zoning in on and listening for is the establishment of your connection to the story. I always want to hear that you understand the story that’s being told and you’re responding to it in that first moment.
We talk about this all the time when I work with you. You never want that opening moment to just feel like it’s just getting shot out of a cannon. It’s just like at JPMorgan. It’s like, no, no. It’s got to feel like we’re settled in, we’re having a conversation. You just said something to me that forces me to respond with the opening moment of whatever that copy is. I’m really listening for the establishment of the connection. You can hear that pretty much instantly. I could do it for you. You could close your eyes and you would know immediately which one sounded really good because it sounded conversational, but didn’t really have a connection and which one was totally organic and connected.
If you sat with me in cast, you would realize you only need– nobody starts out great and then tanks and nobody starts out terrible and then gets great. Whatever is established in that opening beat really continues on. Now, that’s just the first pass through. Then, I quickly make my yes and no decisions based on that. Then I’m going to always have way, way too many yeses that I can’t send all of those to the client. That’s when I get that folder that has all the yeses in it. Then I listen all the way through.
The first listen-through is just really weeding out those ones that there’s clucking chickens in the background or cars screeching and honking. Then once I have the folder of the preferred ones, then I listen all the way through and I’m listening, did you hold that connection? If it’s comedic, did you add just a little point of view that made it really unique to you? Was there just something so powerful and potent in your understanding of this story that is just undeniable and has to continue on? Then I have to start making the really difficult decisions of which are the best of, and that’s what takes a long time because then you’re competing against the best of the best of the best of the best.
Then it’s like, oh gosh, this is Sophie’s choice here. I go through and I pull out my absolute favorites until I get to about 60 per gender, if we’re casting all genders, I try to send no more than that to the client because I feel like that’s when their ears start to burn out but about 60 is a good cross-section because you can get lots, you can get the full spectrum of age range. You can get lots of different vocal qualities and types and then you get a lot of different perspectives but the common thread will be the specs and the common thread will be everybody will be connected to that story in a truthful, authentic way.
Nicky: Everybody will be telling it from their own point of view and so that’s what’s good. It just goes from something that somebody is reading to something somebody is living in that way.
Tina: Yes, and living truthfully, absolutely, just nailed it.
Nicky: Who is the one that makes those decisions once you send it to the client? Is it mostly the creative director, the creative producer? The end client, I don’t suppose would be the one to weigh in, would they?
Tina: I think it’s the team. Oftentimes once we send it off, the process then is elusive to us. We communicate with the producer, the producer is the liaison but it’s usually the creatives that make the decision and it’s usually a team of them. There’s usually multiple people. As you know when you go into the sessions, there are several people there. Sometimes we’ll get their spreadsheets back and it’ll have all the creatives names. Then if we have a short list, checks next to who they each picked and then some notes why, but we don’t often see that. Usually, the producer just reports back.
I think it’s the creative team. I think ultimately the creative team is the one that then advocates on their own behalf of who they really want to hire. I do think the client has to approve before booking because we hear that all the time. They’re like, “Okay, here’s our short list.” Then they’ll come back to us and they’ll be like, “Okay, Nikki was client approved.” I think ultimately the client is the final say, but they’re usually probably only presented with two options or maybe three options. The creative team has called it down to that.
Nicky: Talking about improvisation, for example, I know because you’ve said this before in other sessions or webinars that if it’s a comedic copy, then it’s okay to improv a little bit. You don’t want to change too many words. How much of it is it? Do you like to listen to that?
Tina: It’s a spectrum and here’s the spectrum. What I always say is treat the copy like a “Read the room” situation. When we used to go in rooms. You wouldn’t go into a funeral and be like, “The funniest thing happened on the way over here.”‘ You wouldn’t go to a raucous party and stand in the corner and whisper. You want to match the energy and tone of whatever the copy, whatever the story is sharing. If the copy is very loose, very off the cuff and it’s got words in there like doozy and bonkers and whatever, and you can tell that it’s very playful, then you can absolutely bring your playfulness and your playful ideas and energy to it.
You can probably add a little bit more if it’s obviously a very serious spot about healthcare or some important topic, you don’t want to touch it. You don’t want to change anything. How much? This is where the spectrum comes in. This is where you have to be incredibly self-aware. Everybody does. There are people who are so gifted at improv that when I’m casting a comedic spot, I cannot wait to get to their auditions because they go absolutely off the rails and take it really, really crazy far. Sometimes I have to even edit that down because they’ll end up being like a three-minute spot.
I’ll just take the best of their crazy improv and cut it down a little bit. It makes me laugh all day. It works because they’re masters at improv. They know how to take it far out and then bring us right back to the story. That’s the key, is that if you’re going to take those liberties and go really far, then you have to effortlessly toggle us right back to the story. That’s what’s so good about it but most of the time, those people are not the ones that, sometimes they book, but most of the time, those people are not the ones that book the job.
The ones that book the job when we’re asking for improv are the ones that just took what the writer gave them and then added like plus one. Just give it a little something that is very specific to the story that just tickled you a little bit and then just bring us right back to the story. If you know that you’re a very funny person and you have really great ideas, then go for it but if you’re not a funny person, like we’re all funny, we all have a good sense of humor, but if you’re not gifted as a comedian or improv artist, which most of us aren’t, then just a little thing.
We were just casting for something where one of the lines was, “Yes, and you’ve read enough true crime to realize that vacation planning isn’t a justifiable excuse for murder.” That was the end of the line. I thought, oh, it’d be really funny if somebody added like we checked or we Googled it and then you keep going. Just something that small that you’re totally in the flow of the story and you’re like, “Yes, it’s not a justifiable excuse for murder. We Googled it. Anyway, back to the story, da, da, da.” A little tiny thing like that is just really cute and funny.
If you can tell the way the script is set up on the page, if it’s like line and then drop down line and then drop down line, and even if the lines aren’t full sentences and they’re dropping down, that’s indicating that these exact words are going to match up to one picture. Then these words are going to match up to another picture. There’s not going to really be room for you to play in something like that. Usually when things are open to ad lib and improv, it’s usually like a run-on paragraph where it’s like a rant about something. Again, it’s being discerning, using your better judgment and going like, “Yes, this one feels like it can hold a little bit of playfulness and this one feels like it can’t”.
Don’t worry about it if you’re not an improv master, because I’m telling you, rarely are those people the ones that book the job. Every now and then they do, and it makes me happy. A lot of the times when we do see the client feedback, they’ll be like, “Oh, this person was hilarious, but let’s see if the comedy holds when they stick to the script.” Take the pressure off of that, but also don’t feel like you’re confined by only saying these exact words. I want you to only say these exact words on things that you can tell are going to be cinematic and they’re really subtle and the picture is really driving the spot. You don’t want to mess with those.
Nicky: One of the things that has always bugged me a little bit, and this is told by a lot of actors and then voice actors as well, it’s that commercial copy is not written as a conversation. That is like the first block that we encounter. I’m guessing that’s what prompted you, and now we’ll talk a little bit more about the library, to create these videos where you’re walking us through how to convert that commercial copy into something that actually feels like a conversation.
Tina: Yes. I think it piggybacks exactly on what we were just talking about. Because commercials these days are so much more like short films, there are going to be lines that match up with certain visual images. That’s why it’s not set up like a conversation because they’re saying like, hey, these words line up to this picture, then there’s a new picture. The mistake that actors make is they think like, oh, I got to sound conversational and in real conversation, I would run all those together. It’s not going to match the film.
There is a way to say those lines conversationally and honor the structure of the story the way it is laid out for you. It’s really by immersing yourself very deeply in what the story is and figuring out what is probably going on in those line breaks. What do I imagine the visuals are? Or in our case, we try to leave them as often as we can. Let me read what the visuals are and let me imagine that visual image is filling the gap between those lines.
The gap between the lines are what I like to call the thought bridges. It’s the silence that allows me to hear how your synapses are connecting thought A to thought B. Oftentimes, the way those lines are being connected and what you’re thinking about in between those lines is what we’re visually seeing on screen. I talk a lot about whether it’s given to you on the page or whether you have to imagine it, it is crucial to understand visually what is probably playing out in that film and using those visuals as part of your response to the person you’re talking to.
If you’re saying like, show me your prodigies. Your Wunderkinds. I would imagine that we’re seeing a very young Simone Biles at two years old walking on a balance beam. When I say show me your prodigies and then I picture Simone Biles, wunderkind. Then maybe it’s like young Tiger Woods, your overnight successes. It’s like Michael Jordan shooting hoops till 5:00 AM in the morning. You have to get very vivid in your mind’s eye and your imagination.
Then I could take these big beats between those and it’s still going to sound totally conversational because I’m so invested in what I’m responding to, the visuals, that just looking at that and then just responding to you with that evidence of– and what I would set up prior to that is in that particular script, basically the essence of the story was there is no such thing as an overnight success. For every prodigy you want to show me, I will show you the thousands of hours and the blood, sweat and tears that they put in to become that overnight success. If you just keep moving forward, you’ll get where you want to go. That was the whole point of that script.
I would imagine that I was talking to somebody like maybe my daughter who was a competitive figure skater her whole life, who’s like training for the Olympics and then suddenly one day comes to me and says like, “You know what, I don’t want to do it anymore. There are people that are just unfairly gifted.” I’m like, “Oh yes, show me, show me your prodigies. Show me the unfairly gifted and I’ll show you the sleepless nights.” Now, it all lines up to the picture because I’m picturing the picture in my head, but it’s not like, show me your prodigies, your wunderkinds, your overnight successes. That conversational pace isn’t what’s going to serve the film. Does that all make sense?
Nicky: No, it totally makes sense, definitely. Yes, because our voice is just a compliment to everything that people are seeing. Even if it’s a big commercial, you still have to leave time for people to imagine what you’re talking about.
Tina: Yes, and the other thing that I’ve been really on in my coaching lately that I’ve been clocking people on and I do it too. When we get paid to read, our brains get really good at reading. What happens is your eyes will be going way faster than your mouth can keep up. What’s happening is if your eyes are already here, but your mouth is still here, there’s going to be a disconnect. As a listener, I don’t get to land fully in this moment if you’re already here.
It’s like, you’re always playing chase of the words. It’s really important that you are literally just landing on each word as you’re seeing it visually. That will allow the listener to have that moment and be settled in to show me your prodigies. If I’m already on wunderkinds when you’re still seeing prodigies, I’m like, wait, I’m not in it with you. Something is like pulling me out. We’re going to be really sunken in and present in every single moment and not worry about rushing. It’s not a speed reading contest. It’s a film and it has to evolve.
Nicky: How have the styles changed for commercials, for TV and film commercials, that now everything has to be in that style, that it’s required for people to be grounded and not to be too exaggerated or anything. The first word everyone says in casting is not announcer-y at all.
Tina: I think the style, what we were talking about is that commercials have gotten much more sophisticated, much more elevated, and they’re truly, when we get the decks from the creative team, they don’t even refer to them as commercials. They don’t think of them as ads. They’re not selling us anything. They’re making short films. For the longest time, I just didn’t get it. It was like, “Oh, in this film campaign, in this 60-second film, in this 30-second film.” I was like, okay. Then all of a sudden, again, got struck by lightning one day. I was like, oh, they really mean it. These are short films.
How that changes our approach as voiceover artists is you are now an actor inside the short film, but you’re playing a co-starring role. You’re not the star. The film is the star. They’ve spent a bazillion dollars shooting this thing. They’ve spent a bazillion dollars licensing the music. You are a co-star. I like to say that the voiceover now should think of themselves as like the first chair violinist in a gorgeous symphony orchestra. You need to play with precision. You need to have an emotional connection to the music. You really need to execute perfectly.
As an audience member, I shouldn’t be able to pick out the violinist. It should synthesize and integrate perfectly and seamlessly with the orchestra as a whole. That’s what voiceover is meant to be now. It is just there to get in there and figure out how it can blend in and serve that story and not be noticed. All these actors are out there going like, “Yes, I’ve been coached.” They’re like, “You got to get noticed in the first two seconds.” I was like, here, at least, when we’re casting, how you get noticed is you understand the story that you’re telling and that you’re telling that story with no ego, no need for yourself to stand out, but you’re there to serve. You’re there to serve that story as best you can.
The other way that I think commercials have changed, and this has been going on for a while, but I think that advertisers are obviously very savvy and have done a ton of research. They know that all of us trust our peers before we make a purchasing decision. Every time we go to buy something, if you’re going to go on Amazon, you go to the customer reviews and you look at the photos, like if it’s a piece of furniture or whatever. You’re like, okay, I believe if this is what it’s going to look like in Billy Bob’s backyard in Pacoima, that’s what I’m going to get, not these beautiful stock images that all the companies are using the same ones.
We trust our peers before we decide if we’re going to make a purchase or not. If you’re going to invest in a new technology, you might go watch a YouTube review and see if you feel like it’s worth it or not, or if I’m going to wait for the next generation. A lot of us aren’t really influenced solely by commercials. When I was a kid, there was no internet. We weren’t talking to our friends about like, “Hey, what do you think of the new Barbie?” It was like, we saw the new Barbie and we’re like, “must have new Barbie”. It was the commercials that were selling us everything.
“Your life is going to be so much better if you have this thing.” Now, advertisers know that we’re all going to each other. That’s why so much advertising is done through influencers. They’re real people wearing clothes and showing you what it looks like on them. Real people of all different shapes and sizes. That’s why TikTok is such a phenomenon because it’s just real users making content about what works for them, what they like. Advertisers have obviously caught wind of this. They want the voiceover to sound just like it is just peer to peer content.
It’s just me sharing something with you about something that I have had an experience with or something that I know like the back of my hand and not I’m speaking on behalf of the institution. Therefore, there’s an inherent mistrust but we trust our friends. Instead of it being like, “Oh, so you got the new blah phone. Let me show you how to use the camera timer,” which is what commercials used to be. Now it’s like, “Oh my gosh, let me save you two weeks and let me show you where they hid the frigging camera timer.” Which one of those are you going to trust? You’re going to trust your friend who’s telling it like it is to save you time.
Nicky: Exactly, because people definitely don’t like to be sold to. Whenever you hear something that is too insisting, you just tune out. Don’t you?
Tina: Yes, or if it’s too spoon fed on a silver platter or too saccharine or too whatever, you’re sort of like, oh, I don’t trust that.
Nicky: Yes, exactly. I hope you’ve enjoyed listening to part one of this interview with the amazing Tina Marasco. Join us next week for part two. I assure you will not want to miss it.
