So two jobs in the last few weeks have come down to me and another “Woman”.

Which, in my opinion, is fantastic.  If they go guy, it’s me. If they go girl, they go her, and there just isn’t that much I can do about being a woman, except for years of hormone replacement and very costly surgery.

So on one job, they went with the girl, the other me.  50/50?  I can live with that.

What’s more on one of the jobs they told me one of the big reasons I got the job was I was the only one able to say, “Ahhhhhhh” and make it sound believable.

Who knew that skill set would one day pay off?

Agents love this!  They love to call you at those times where you think they’re calling about a job.

They don’t want you to get to excited, but they just got a call from the producer and they said they’ve narrowed the massive nationwide search down to you and 5 other guys.  So stay by your phone, cause the call could come at any moment and when they make up their mind they’ll want to record right away!

My advice…Do not stay by your phone!  Do not call your family to tell them “the good news!”!  Do not start thinking about how much money is coming your way!  And do not start spending any of that money!

Do whatever you can to put it in perspective.  Yes, it is an accomplishment.  Yes, you have a much better chance then you did when it was down to you and 1252 auditions via VoiceBank. Yes, you need to be able to record if they do go with you.  And, Yes it could change your life.

Just remember, chances are what they are and the “House always wins in the long run”, and it’s not down between you and another guy, cause they just went with Matt Damon, who’s schedule just cleared up, and who they wanted all along.

One more thing, try to stay positive.

]]> http://www.daleinghram.com/blog/2010/04/its-down-to-you-and-another-guy/feed/ 0 http://www.daleinghram.com/blog/2010/03/sometimes-they-come-back/ http://www.daleinghram.com/blog/2010/03/sometimes-they-come-back/#comments Wed, 24 Mar 2010 22:05:35 +0000 Dale http://www.daleinghram.com/blog/?p=183 It’s been my experience that when a big account goes, it goes.  You’re the voice, then you’re not, and that’s that.

After all why would they bring back someone they got rid of.  That would be like bringing  back the first Darren Stevens from Bewitched.

The other part of winning a big account is losing a big account.  It is inevitable, at some point, the ride will end, the bars will lift off and some kid with bad acne and no motivation will ask you to exit while someone else takes your seat.

“Easy Come, Easy Go.”

is easy to say when it’s coming.  Try it when it’s going.  That’s the hard part.

I was talking with another Voice Over talent today about “the going” part.  He said that he wished every voice over could get a big account and then lose it.  It provides a perspective that you just don’t get when it’s coming.

The tendency of big accounts is lazy and entitlement.

The hard work somehow doesn’t seem as important and you begin to feel like you deserve the checks.

When that goes, if you’re not in the right place mentally, it can lead into a major downward spiral.  Then you get desperate, and that’s the kiss of death for a read and a career.

I personally have had the big accounts and lost them, and have wrestled with every emotion that comes with that.

Luckily, I’ve now had the experience of having one of those big accounts come back, and having lost with the ability to say “Easy Come Easy Go”, while it was going, I can now fully enjoy the coming (back), with an appreciation and understanding that only comes from losing.

Mall Cops On TLC

“Mall Cops” has had 12 episodes ordered by TLC and should start airing sometime in Spring of 2010.

“Conveyor Belt of Love” will air on Jan 4th on ABC.  If things go well it has a chance of getting picked up for more episodes.

“Conveyor” marks my second foray into the world of Dating Shows, having voiced  750 episodes of “Elimidate”

Conveyor Belt Of Love on ABC Jan 4th. Click Here for Trailer.

Between now and those pay checks anything can happen.  As it did when I was the original voice on “The Simple Life” with Paris Hilton and Nichol Richie.  The producers loved me, but somewhere along the way Fox decided they didn’t.  As my saying de jour goes. “It Is What It Is.”

So really excited about the possibility of these two shows, but reserved as well.

As always never sure that  my voice will end up on the show or that the shows will actually air, and definitely not counting the money until the check has cleared.

And yes… The check hasn’t cleared before!

Normally a mess up doing Voice Over, is just that, but on occasion it becomes a monster threatening to send you to the Looney Bin.

Your Brain starts to sweat about not getting it right and you cascade into a down word spiral of self doubt and loathing.  You start to think about how dumb you are for not being able to say a stupid word or phrase that a 3 year old could.  in my cause “Toyota”

You start to wonder how stupid everyone listening  thinks you are.  About how stupid you’ll look when your ineptitude makes it onto some famous reel of stupid people.  If fact somehow you’re entire life becomes stupid in the wake of your complete failure to say one stupid, dumb, stupid word.

The question is not so much how you got here, but how you get out.

My advice: Do whatever you can!

Namely remember the song from Sesame Street.  “Oops I made a mistake that’s all.”

It’s life, it happens, and the only real way you’ll leave a lasting “BAD” impression is to panic and start acting like a weirdo.  Make fun of it.  Get goofy.  Breathe.  Think of playing baseball with Kangaroos.  Anything to take your mind off of your Brain Sweats.

Oh, and you probably will find that you actually will begin to sweat for real!

I finally did say Toyota right.  My secret?  I took my  Left Shoe off and waved it in the air while I read the copy.

Seriously !

Whatever it takes.

I love working in Voice Over and that is why I do it.

Unfortunately  why most people get into it is for the lifestyle and/or the money.

Silly, Silly, People.

"I'm just in it for the Money!"

Though they both may be great products of a successful VO career, they don’t provide the drive for attaining a successful career.

The Hope must be fueled by the right desire.  In my opinion, that desire is the WORK itself.

Money and Lifestyle make for false hope’s that are much easier to disappoint.

Never get cast as the Dead Man in a movie.

Things are slow, real slow.  The office was scary quite, just as work for most is scary quite. The only thing you can do when it gets slow, is to get busy!

The more you think about the slow, the slower it’s gonna get.  So get out there and do what you always wished you had the time to do.  Do what you’re good at and get better.

Take a class, work on your craft.

One guy I know has dropped his golf handicap by 2 points.

I’m hitting the “To Do” list around the house, and our garden has never looked better.  Might even make it to the Ukulele jam session I’ve been meaning to go to.

Never let slow draw attention to itself.  It makes you do things like think about getting another job, and that’s almost as bad as thinking about teaching.

For the most part what I learned became part of my collective unconscious, however one piece of advise from some “How to Act” book from some unremembered partially famous actor, has continued to periodically surface in a check reminder.

No matter how good of friends you become with your agent, there will probably be a time when, for business reasons, you’ll have to leave for another agent.

It is a harsh reality that I never thought would apply to me, as my agent at the time was 150 years old, smelled of cigarettes smoked during prohibition, and could never remember who I was.  

Only you will know when it’s time to leave and hopefully after much thought and sought advice.  As a cartoon on the wall of a casting director reads:

Changing Agents is like changing chairs on the Titanic.

Rash and quick changing of agents in an effort to find the always elusive “Greener Grass.“, will more often then not make you wish you could Wonder Twins Power into the shape of a boomerang and find your way back to your old agent.  You can imagine that Humble Pie is a big ole’ slice of bitter.

When it’s the right time and the right reasons, changing agents, no matter how good of friends you’ve become, can be one of the most useful tools you have to further your career.  

Just remember

Be Good

Don’t burn a bridge if you don’t have to.  Your Old Agent may be your next best New Agent!

The Good

You show up to work in your T-shirt, shorts, and flip-flops.  You read a few words that you don’t have to memorize, drink coffee, eat free food, and then about an hour later go home to your fantastic VO pad, pour the Margarita’s and wait for the fat checks to come raining down like candy at a 4th of July Parade.

The Bad

You send out your demo, that cost you 1500 dollars, to potential agents for the 3rd time and for the 3rd time they tell you they have too many people with your voice on the roster.  You take class after class, go to audition after audition, and then finally you get a booking… and it’s to be voice #2 for Sun Drop Soda.  

It’s your big break!  Your part consists of saying “Awesome!” and the commercial is going to run in the SouthEast and Wisconsin.  You go home to your one room garden apartment, fire up the hot plate for afternoon Ramen and Beans and wait for your $250 check to arrive 2 months late.

The Ugly

Your Agent calls you in the morning (all good agent calls come in the morning), to tell you , that you just booked “The Voice Of…”  You have multiple recording sessions from your new home studio, and you know spend more time on the phone with your agent then your girlfriend/boyfriend.

You buy the car/shoes/house/boat/ski condo on the beach (just cause you can).  You pay for dinner… for the table next to you. The sessions just keep coming and the fat checks arrive in your mailbox like pre approved credit cards.

Then one day while watching your 70 inch Waterproof Hovercraft LCD that’s floating above the pool, you see your commercial… except the voice at the end isn’t you… somebody else is “The Voice of…”.

You call your agent, he says they went a different direction/lost the account/is as shocked as you.  

It was your only account, the fat checks go anorexic.  Your monthly bills rivals the  GDP of Guam, but you’re so used to spending like Bradgelina and investing like Madoff that you find yourself sleeping in your friends garage next to his Ferret Farm wishing you could  go home to your one room garden apartment, fire up the hot plate for afternoon Ramen and Beans and wait for your $250 check to arrive 2 months late.

There comes a time in every VO’s life where the only person you can talk about VO is with another VO. And believe me, you will need to talk VO.  But, no matter how long you’ve been married, together, around someone, if they don’t VO, then they don’t really know VO.

It’s like being home schooled.  You just sit there learning from Mom, and if there’s no outlet with fellow students you become…well…home schooled.

A friend of mine once told me:

“The mind is like a dark alley way. A bad place to be alone.”

So too is the mind of VO actor.  You have to make time to sit down over coffee, wine, pudding, whatever, to talk shop.
There’s enough examples of VO actors who don’t find the time to socialize and self therapize. They sit at home and stew over every moment of every read.  They think of nothing but VO and tend to spiral down into actor self pity and/or self superiority.

These people tend to  part conversations like Moses parting the Red Sea.  We all know them and we all avoid them.

Telling your worries, problems, successes to a friend who is, say a Pharmacist, will get you pills not sympathy. (Most likely for treating neurosis.)

The need to vent about lack of auditions, bad agents, bad jobs, no work, is an important part of staying sane, with the most sympathetic ear always being someone who needs to do the same.

Open up conversation with a trusted VO friend and save yourself the therapist fee.