Marice Tobias, "Voice-over Coach of the Pros", Los Angeles, CA
by Jerry Vigil
She is indeed the voice-over coach of the pros. Her clients are some of the biggest voice-over talents in the country. They affectionately call her "The Voice Shrink." Her sensitivity to the human voice is almost magical. Her name is well known to those in the voice-over business, but her talents don't stop there. As a commercial director, she has numerous national campaigns behind her. She has directed films for Vestron and Disney. She became the first female director to win a Clio. The credits go on and on.
In the past few years, Marice Tobias has gained wide acceptance in the industry as one of the best voice-over coaches around. This month, we visit with Marice and get some insights into the art of delivering a piece of copy. We also get some tips on what is it that makes a great voice-over demo tape, and how to get the work. Make some room in the memory banks -- this one's long and loaded!
R.A.P.: Tell us about your background in the industry and how your voice coaching business started.
Marice: I started my career in New York, first as a script supervisor in commercial production, and then became a director. When I became a director, it was before the women's movement really had any effect on the industry, so it was very much a pioneering effort on my part. I was the first woman at a production company in New York.
I moved into agency work when I came to California. I had been brought out here to direct a spot for the agency that would become Wells, Rich, Greene/West. I was then offered a job and became Associate Creative Director at the agency and was Head of Copy. I continued to direct all the TV, radio, and multi-media productions while I was at the agency.
When I became an agency person, that's when I encountered the voice-over field. I would always do a director's cut (which was the first time the agency ever saw a director in the editing room), but I was never around long enough to do the post-production and work with the voice-over performer. So it was always a surprise to me to hear the voice when I saw the spot on the air.
Now I'm an agency person, and I'm working with voice-over performers. I'm noticing something very interesting. No matter what their background is, whether they're coming from broadcast, from acting, or from a music background -- which are the three areas that feed into voice-over - everyone forgot that this was acting. They would go in the booth, and my judgment was that they were imitating "the guy on the radio." A lot of these per-formers I had worked with, not only on the coast, but in New York as well. I knew their work on stage and in commercials, and some-thing happened. They changed, and they turned into what I felt was what they thought people were looking for. So, I realized there was a sameness to the work and a lack of identity. This is just an observation I made.
About the same time, I had directed a campaign, won a Clio, and got offers from production companies in Los Angeles. I accepted one at the Peterson Company and went back into production full time. It was at that time that I moved back from Irvine -- where our field office was for Century 21, which was my account -- to L.A. Bob Lloyd, the voice-caster here in Hollywood, called me. He said, "You should have your own workshop." I was astonished! That's one thing L.A. is famous for; there are a lot of opportunities for performers to get training. I said, "But there are at least ten workshops that I know of, because I've guest-directed at some of them." And he said, "There's nothing for the working pro. Some people are still doing the same read they did when they got into the business in 1971." I thought he was very, very astute because that was another observation I had made. There didn't seem to be any growth in the business -- it was the same old thing.
My theory about voice-over is that any of the performing arts are applied art. As such, they reflect societal changes and communications changes, and voice-over was kind of frozen in time.
So I began with a workshop. Bob had twenty people sign up immediately and had someone volunteer to be my assistant, and I was in business a week later.
I did that workshop for about six months. Then my father passed away, and I had to leave town for a while. I came back to town, but while I was away, I was formulating the thought that I really wanted to work with performers privately, as much as possible. I found that when I worked with them privately, I was picking up things -- picking up creative blocks, picking up stuff that was going on for them as a person -- that was showing up in their work. I really couldn't share that with them in front of a group of people. Combine that with the fact that a hot, new performer had come to town and talked to me about how he didn't really feel comfortable working in a group. He asked if I would consider working with him privately. I said yes. His name is Chuck Riley. He was my first private client, and I think that was a spectacular beginning to my coaching. Since then, I have worked with quite a few of the heavy hitters in the business, in promo as well as voice-over animation and narration.
That's how I started [the coaching]. It was essentially Bob Lloyd's idea, and for many, many years, coaching was an adjunct to my writing and directing. I've directed a feature film, and I've also done a film for Disney and numerous commercials. I'm still a writer/director, but in the last two and a half years, I've been traveling [with the coaching]. Once again, this was someone else's idea. I have a client in Washington, DC who voices most of the commercials for the Republican Party candidates. He had worked with me out here then moved back to Washington. He kept telling me there was a very respectable group of performers who had been going on their own steam all these years and really had no insight and no guidance in what they were doing. He felt I would be impressed with the caliber of performers, and he felt they would also benefit from what I did. Then, my dearest friend, who had moved to Washington from New York, was in a production at the Arena Stage and called and asked if I could come and see it. So I put the two things together, and that was my first trip travelling with coaching.
I realized that my client was right. The people were very talented, and it dawned on me there must be people all over. Wherever there's a microphone, wherever there is voice-over, there are people who could benefit from what I do. So, I came back to LA and I decided to experiment. My first official city, after Washington, was Chicago. I had been there years ago when I first became a director and found they were very receptive. The advertising business there is completely organized, so it was very easy to access people and information, and the agents, too. I started putting out the word and, through some clients, got referrals. I did my first trip to Chicago about a year and a half ago. Tomor-row, I leave for my fifth trip to Chicago.
Chicago has been real good to me. I've produced a lot of tapes there and basically helped shift the level of consciousness in terms of the "new read." That was something I started working with in the mid-eighties with some of the performers that were coming to me that didn't quite fit in to the "Harry Handsome Announcer" voice print. And yet, there was something very special about them. So, instead of guiding them into what was being done, I guided them into being absolutely excellent at what they were doing. Then, all that needed to happen for these people was the right campaign. The right combination of the campaign and the performer would launch them, and sure enough, with each one of them, that is what has happened.
So, a lot of the "new read" that you hear -- that more laid back, quiet, intimate kind of delivery -- started with my coaching some of these people in the mid-eighties.
R.A.P.: This "new read" sounds a lot like the "half voice" delivery Bob Magruder discussed in a recent interview.
Marice: Yes. Everybody has a way of describing it, but I work much more from the psychology of something rather than the actual technology of it. I don't work technically. When I coach people, I don't have them wear headphones; and privately, we don't work with a microphone. I work on their performance skills, and I work on them developing the same sensitivity to their work as a performer on stage. There's a tremendous difference. Even Bill Young mentioned in an interview once, after I had worked with him and his staff, that just not using the headphones makes such a difference in your delivery because you then have an intimacy and a directness with your audience. Here's the analogy that I use: did you ever have the opportunity to be sitting opposite someone in a restaurant with your back to a mirror, so that as the person is talking to you they can see themselves? You'll get the same effect in that they are so distracted and so enamored with their own reflection that they're really not communicating with you a hundred percent. They're just fascinated, like Narcissus, and it's the same thing with the headphones.
Now, if you have to work with timing, move with a jingle or something like that, obviously you have to wear them, but you wear them while you're doing the work. Also, some of the studios are set up where the only way you can hear the producer is through the headphones, but I encourage you to put them on and take them off so that when you're actually performing, if you don't have to hit cues, take the headphones off. I've gone to the mat with performers all over the country, particularly when we're about to do their [demo] tape, and at the last minute they get very nervous and say, "I really would feel much more secure [with the headphones]." With this one performer in Detroit, I said, "Alright, let's pick one piece of copy we're going to record today, and let's do it both ways, with and without the headphones. You pick which read you think is better, and that's the way we'll go." Invariably, they always pick the read without the headphones. It's always their choice, but I'm certainly not quiet about which way I prefer. It works... like gangbusters.
R.A.P.: In your workshops, do you not work with mikes either?
Marice: We do a little bit of recording in my workshops. I do two seminars right now. The first seminar is either an evening or a full day depending on the city and the size of the group. I do some recording at the beginning of the day or the evening and at the end. That is simply a reference to show these people how quickly they have shifted their read. But the workshop is not getting up, working at a microphone, and having someone say, "Oh, that was good. Very nice. Next." That's not how I run it at all.
R.A.P.: Do you think that, as with the headphones, some people, once they get behind the mike, become mike shy and lessen the effectiveness of their read?
Marice: Yes. They become mike shy, they shift into another voice, or they do something else.
R.A.P.: How do you overcome that?
Marice: I teach them to work with the technique that I show them for a while and not do playback, to just get in relationship to what it feels like. I work with feelings. I work with emotions. Those are our true barometers, our intuition. For a lot of people I work with, it's the first time anyone has demanded that of them, or introduced them to the idea of working any way other than technically and with what it sounds like. This is particularly true with the broadcast back-ground. The broadcast mentality is so different from voice-over. When I work with someone from broadcast they say, "You know, this is like me teaching you to write with the other hand." It's the same, only different; and there's a pull. There's almost a feeling of disloyalty that comes when you help someone make a shift like that. There's a transition period where the old ways are still pulling you, and the news ways are still not that familiar. During that period of time, I ask them not to record themselves because I really want them to have a different relationship with their work. Then, once you hear yourself played back, it's an objective view. It's not like you'll say, "Oh, is that how I did?" You'll know how you did because you'll feel it.
It's very exciting when I'm working with someone from broadcast and, in the middle of a read, they stop themselves and say, "That doesn't feel right." They know I've helped them make the transition.
R.A.P.: It seems that people from broadcast get stuck with that "radio" delivery.
Marice: Yes. We can go all the way back to public speaking which is the way that society informed the masses with information. That was a very oratorical style because it was in the Town Hall or a large auditorium, and masses of people came to hear one speaker. When the shift to broadcast came, the technology was there, but the style remained the same. That's why all those corny reads of the early broadcast days are so charming in their innocence, but they were talking to masses and masses of people. Then, for many years, the entire nation would listen to one voice the same way. There were two networks, the red and the blue. As the proliferation of networks and stations continued, you had much more narrowcasting than the business really acknowledged. It's only very recently that the business realizes that at any one time you're really only talking to one person. That's one of the reasons why I help shift the read. That announcer style, that generic read to everybody and nobody, doesn't connect. Part of that is because our communication style has changed. The human potential movement has put new ways of communicating into our daily life, and our applied art has to reflect that.
I felt that voice-over was sort of the last bastion of the oratorical read, and it wasn't syncing up with the rest of the applied arts. Of course, commercials and MTV are really breaking new ground every day, but I felt the companion there -- voice-over -- was lagging pretty far behind.
What we have now are people talking to people. More so than ever before, you're going to see on scripts, "No announcers please." "Not an announced read." "Guy next door" -- very conversational and very easy going because people don't want to be sold anymore. They want to be informed. They want to be enlightened. They want to feel there's some sort of caring behind the message.
R.A.P.: Do you think this same approach to delivering a message also applies to how a disk jockey says what he or she says on the air?
Marice: Oh yes. Several of my clients work for some of the networks, independents, and some of the cable companies. Even "coming up next" can either communicate or not communicate. I did a session for a client who works for The Family Channel, and his producer sat in while I directed him over phone patch. It was amazing. One of the producers said, "Gee, I now want to watch the movie." Anything you say delivered properly will communicate and communicate much more effectively if the intention is there, rather than it being what I call a mindless read. The mindless read has to do with time. It has to do with getting the information out, and there's no relationship between the performer and the material. A lot of broadcasters traditionally wanted that non-relationship. In the legal field, it's called a fiduciary relationship -- "We're not saying yes; we're not saying no." We're just telling you. It's like a newscaster's read. It's a very journalistic approach to the read.
The way I describe the difference between a broadcast read and a voice-over read is that in a broadcast read you say, "they're having a sale." In a voice-over read you say, "we're having a sale." I think that's the clearest distinction between the two arenas.
R.A.P.: It's interesting you use those lines because at most stations, copy written in-house is written in the third person.
Marice: Exactly. The DJ is the uninvolved observer. The voice-over performer is the voice of the company.
R.A.P.: Are you suggesting that writing copy that way, as we do in radio, is hurting the delivery?
Marice: I don't know. I mean, stylistically, you've got [spots] running right against those that are saying "we," and they're a little more invitational, a little more personal. And then you have these "sponsor ads." I don't know. I'd like to see a station be brave and try it.
R.A.P.: But stations intentionally write in the third person.
Marice: Yes they do, because the DJ is on every day, and they're reading spots for all the grocery stores in town, not just the one. So, I don't know what the solution is, but I do know what the result is. That individual ad does not have the same kind of connectiveness that the ad delivered by a voice-over performer has. There's just a distance there that's created.
R.A.P.: With your techniques, can a person do a great job on any kind of copy?
Marice: Anything. You can give anything a great read.
R.A.P.: It doesn't have to be some spectacular piece of copy to pull it off?
Marice: No. But it helps. Like anything else, the better it is, the better chance you'll have with it. But, if you know what you're doing, you can help the writing immeasurably. That's one of the reasons a lot of the performers that are working all the time in various cities keep working all the time. They have a knack for bringing something to life, for finding the writer's intent, even though it may have been obliterated by too many re-writes, and the client getting involved, and the legal department getting involved, and having too many copy points and too little time. But a good performer will be able to pick out what the intent is and ride with it.
R.A.P.: You made a reference to "creative blocks." What are those?
Marice: Well, you have to go back to my premise about this work, and that is that the voice is the mirror of the mind, and nowhere else in your personality are you more revealed than in your voice. So, a lot of stuff that's going on for you as a person -- value judgments, issues in your own life, even though you're supposed to be professional and leave all that at the door when you come to work or step into the booth -- so much of this is unconscious and shows up in the work in such subtle ways. It's what I call the most lethal and most subtle aspect of this work because it's going on at such a level that unless you're sensitized to it, you don't know it's showing up.
Performers will call me and say, "I'm doing great reads. My agent loves what I'm doing, but I'm not booking." I know exactly what's going on. They come in, and I have them read. I have an ability to listen to someone read and then tell them what's going on for them personally. It's a gift that I have. I was told by a psychic -- Since I'm from California, it's okay for me to talk about this -- I was told by a psychic a couple of years ago that I am what is called audio-voyant, so that I read off of voices in the same way a clairvoyant reads off of something they hold, and object. I can listen to someone, and I can pretty much tell what it is that's going on for them.
I hit on this years ago when I was listening to someone read a piece of copy. I always listen with my eyes closed, and the only thing that's going on is the delivery of the message. I said to this performer: "Are you vegetarian?" He was astonished, and he said, "How did you pick that up?" I said, "I think it was the way you said the word 'meat'."
R.A.P.: Wow! Hence the name "Voice Shrink."
Marice: Right. So it sometimes gets a little scary what I can pinpoint that's going on for someone, and I can do it very quickly. All I have to do is hear them read a piece of copy. I can also pick it up in conversation, but people tend to be guarded in conversation, especially when they first call me. They're in their very best voice. They're wearing their Sunday best. Yet, when they're reading, they're not really noticing. They're not covering up. They're not controlling it as much, and that's when it shows up.
Amazingly -- not that I'm looking to do this -- I've helped people make some pretty dramatic shifts in their personal lives by virtue of what it is I picked up in a read.
R.A.P.: Do you have any formal education in psychology?
Marice: I have a minor in psychology. It's the same information we all got, but it is an absolute love of mine. I do a lot of reading in that area, but no, I don't have a degree. Therefore, when I get to a point where I realize I'm in way above my head with someone, I will recommend that they go get the kind of counseling they need to get. A couple of times I've said to people, "I can't continue working with you because I can't really hear what's real for you until we get rid of this issue."
I'm very, very circumspect about that. I don't want to take the responsibility. I can't take the responsibility. It's just not what I do. But I can certainly surface something and then suggest what it is that could be productive for them as a person as well as a performer.
R.A.P.: What are some basic tips you have for producing a demo tape?
Marice: I produce tapes very, very differently than most people do. That's because I have a theory -- I seem to have a theory about everything (laughs) -- but my theory is that if you cut a demo tape simply from what you've done, then you're always working from your past. A lot of times, what you've done will keep getting you the same kind of work, but performers get frustrated. Everyone has more to offer than what they've been asked to deliver. For per-formers who want to expand their career, I believe in putting a tape together that reflects what you're capable of doing now, not just what you've done. Now that doesn't mean to put something on there that's a lie. When I go into the studio with someone, I go in because I believe they're now competitive on a national level because that's where the business is going. I also will put things on there they may not have even thought they were capable of doing, but in working with them we found out they were. The first audience for the tape is the performer himself because, a lot of times, what happens is somebody calls and says, "I can't believe it's me." And yet, they know it is them, and they know they can deliver that work consistently. If it's just something they came up with once or twice, it doesn't go on the tape. But if they are consistently capable of that style, that insight, then it goes on the tape because that's what they are capable of, and the community should know that.
The second audience for a tape, in most of the cities I go to, is the agent. Then of course it's the buyers, or as they say in Canada, the "engagers," which I think is a lovely term.
R.A.P.: When you say not to put something on a tape that's a lie, does that include spots you haven't actually done?
Marice: No. Not at all. What I'm talking about is a voice that you can sort of do, but you made up right then and there, or a read that was a fluke. That's why I work with someone prior to doing a tape, to make sure the work we're going to put on that tape is something they can deliver on a consistent basis and can deliver six months from now.
I produce my tapes in the studio. I have a lot of heavy hitters that I work with, and they'll send me the body of work they've done. We'll sit, and we'll listen; but I can tell you that the work they do in the recording session [with me] is where they are in their career at that point in time. They're at the top of their game. Therefore, when we compare the material we've generated with the stuff they've done, a lot of times, the stuff they've done just doesn't represent them anymore. They've moved on because, again, you're always working from your past. Now, if there's something that has been pulling for them, if there's a campaign that was very well known, absolutely it goes on. And if it's that well known, it leads the tape off so people will go, "Oh yea, that guy."
R.A.P.: What about putting something on the tape that is of a well-known, national nature?
Marice: Oh, I do that all the time. When I say my tapes are killer tapes, they're killer tapes. I mean, you sit and listen to my tapes, and my tapes will take your breath away. That's what a tape should do because there are a lot of tapes out there. In Los Angeles, the agents get between thirty and fifty submissions a week. Now, what is going to set that performer out of the pack? Number one, the tape itself has to be absolutely dynamic. Everything I produce is produced as if it were going on the air. We put a lot of production value into it. But the star of the show is the performance, so the production doesn't obliterate the performance.
I design a tape based on someone's voice print. I believe that when you get into putting a tape together, you're now into marketing, and the background I have in advertising and marketing comes into play there. In working with a performer, I identify their voice print. That's "the point of view," what they're bringing to the party. Then I design a tape to exhibit that by using it in predictable and unpredictable ways. But the scope is much narrower than many performers feel they need to put on a tape. That's because I believe you need to get known for one thing first. Get your foot in the door. Let everybody want to work with you. Then your career expands from that point on.
Then, that packaging has to be like an album cover. It has to be very tantalizing. But it also should carry some sort of feeling, the same way an album cover does, of what's inside. That album cover, that [cassette] J-card has to say, "Open me. Listen to me." So, a lot goes into the design of that as well. In working with someone on a tape, the concept is part of what I do. I don't do the actual artwork, but I can give feedback as the design progresses. I believe in that whole package being complete and sending a very specific message. The more specific you are, the more you're going to work.
R.A.P.: What should the length of the demo be?
Marice: Two to two and a half minutes. Of course, narration is a little longer.
R.A.P.: Has phone patch gotten to the point now where it is almost a necessity for voice-over studios?
Marice: I think so. I know that, of my heavy hitter clients, forty to fifty percent of their work is phone patch.
R.A.P.: Do you find phone patch to be as effective as being there in person?
Marice: Yes. I coach over the phone. I have a lot of clients I coach this way. I even have a client in Japan.
R.A.P.: What other ways has technology changed the voice-over business?
Marice: The technology is always changing. The quality of the reproduction of the sound is so accurate. Therefore, the performer's technique has to be really, really excellent. If there are any things that you have, like sibilance and mouth noise, you have to be much more hyper-vigilant about that because the technology really hears everything. It even hears what you're thinking now.
R.A.P.: This next question is based more on personal observation rather than on researched facts, but it seems that when a station is looking for a female air personality, it's easier to find a good female voice as opposed to a good male voice. Why does this seems so?
Marice: Well, this is now a very personal comment. This is not a professional comment, but, being a woman myself, I know this: we work harder. A woman, to make it in the business world or any profession, has to work twice as hard as a man. That's just a given. So when you're working with a female performer, you're working with someone who has really put a lot more into it. Now, I'm not saying that every man doesn't work, but I'm saying, by and large, my female clients are much harder working. They're more diligent in their training. They're more diligent in all the aspects of their career because, in voice-over, the amount of work for women is substantially less than for men. So the competition is that much more intense, and the excellence level is that much higher.
R.A.P.: A related observation is that if a guy has a real deep voice, then he has a good shot at getting a radio gig based on his voice alone. Female announcers, on the other hand, are not judged by their "ballsy" voices, so they need something else, something more.
Marice: Right. They have the relatability. They use wit, charm, whatever. Their work is much more dimensionalized than a lot of the males' work.
R.A.P.: And all this bleeds over into the voice-over business?
Marice: Yes it does, but still, there is a problem. When you get into the performing arts area like voice-over and television, this is an industry wide problem, the dearth of work for women. There is so much less. Now, there are some markets where there is more than others. Take Minneapolis, for example. In Minneapolis, the emphasis, in terms of voice-over, is for comedy and dialogue. And when you have more comedy and dialogue, you're going to have more women working. Minneapolis is a very distinct market.
R.A.P.: Something we often see in radio production is the use of female voices for the "sex sells" approach. Any thoughts on this?
Marice: Traditionally, there have been two kinds of female voices that work: the super-sexy voice and the bimbette. Those are just cliché stereotypes. As a result, a lot of the tapes I get from women will fall into either of those two categories. I train my women to be spokespeople.
R.A.P.: Have female voices made any inroads into the voice-over business outside of "super-sexy" and "bimbette?"
Marice: Yes. The inroads are quite dramatic. I think one of the biggest bonuses for women is Lindsay Wagner doing Ford, showing that a woman can not only do it, but can, year after year, maintain the identity of a professional car company. And some of the most magnificent voice-over work I've heard recently -- unfortunately, she passed away - was done by Coleen DuHurst for Amtrak. It's probably one of the best reads I've ever heard. And recently, out here particularly -- I don't know if it's national yet -- Linda Hunt is doing some exquisite work. She's an actress. She's the tiny person who was in "The Year of Living Dangerously." She's doing an absolutely magnificent job, and quite a few of my women clients are doing very well.
I have one client that's doing a lot of work for CBS' late night programming, and this is a first. She's very young. She has a very sultry voice, but it's still the first time that a woman has been used in that daypart.
R.A.P.: A lot of our female readers will be glad to hear that less emphasis is being put on "super-sexy" as the primary female delivery.
Marice: It's like anything else; it's breaking through the chauvinism and the judgments about what that represents. I've always been curious about the idea of the voice of authority being male, in terms of broadcast, TV commercials and radio spots, when in reality, the voice of authority that we grow up hearing most of our lives is a female voice.
R.A.P.: When someone from radio approaches a talent agent or client in the voice-over business, does their radio background have much of a negative effect?
Marice: Unfortunately, it does. Unless the performer has done some work before he puts that demo tape together, chances are he'll be dismissed the minute they hear the weight of the voice.
R.A.P.: Once this "radio" person had done the work on their voice and demo, should any reference to an association with radio be deleted from the conversation, résumé, etc.?
Marice: No. Hearing is believing. So many of my clients who are successful do have the broadcast background. There are pluses and minuses for everyone's background. The plus for the broadcast background is the comfort and ease in the studio, the modulation of the voice, and the ability to say vast amounts of words in minuscule amounts of time. These are all skills that are invaluable. They lack the acting skills. They lack the "relatedness" skills. They lack what the actor has.
The actor, on the other hand, has the relatedness, has the depth, but doesn't have the booth skill. The person who I think has moved the fastest is someone with a music background, someone coming from jingle singing or a related area. They have the ear. They deal with copy in terms of lyrics. They're not as inhibited as the broadcaster. They're not as overblown as the stage actor. They're a happy medium. The one thing with them is to make sure their reads aren't too slick.
So, with each area that I work with, I have particular attention that I give, given their background.
R.A.P.: Once the beginner voice-over talent finally gets an audition, what can they do at the audition to help their chances of getting the job?
Marice: Number one is not to deal with it as an audition. It's a performance. Take it seriously and prepare properly.
R.A.P.: Most Production Directors are directing talent every day. Can you give use any tips that will help make the talent sound better?
Marice: First of all, give the performer a chance to really, thoroughly read the material before they deliver it. You'd be surprised how many people don't do this because broadcast is a "rip and read" mentality. Everybody thinks that's the way it's supposed to be. You're "showing" something. But ultimately, when it's on the air, we don't know if you read it at all or you read it for ten minutes, but certainly the result will let us know.
R.A.P.: Before rolling tape, should the talent read the copy to themselves or out loud?
Marice: They should read it to themselves first. Then they should read it out loud, and they should feel comfortable with it.
Also, there is a tendency to over-direct, to tell a performer too much at any one point in time. This is especially true in recording sessions where there are too many people from the ad agency in the booth. You look over and see the performer's eyes are rotating in his head. After the five minutes of direction they just got, they have no idea which way to go.
R.A.P.: What should the director listen for when the talent is reading the copy?
Marice: First of all, they have to come in with an idea themselves, and that comes from the intention of the material. So they have to do some prep work also. Where are we going with this? What is it we want the audience to get? Prepare so that both of you are working for the same intention.
R.A.P.: You have a great deal of experience writing copy. How has commercial copy changed over the years?
Marice: We're becoming a much more visual society, and therefore, all our communication is infinitely more visual. You'll see [TV] spots on the air that have no voice-over at all, which I think in the long run is not a very smart thing because not everybody sits there glued to the TV while the commercial is on. If the person isn't watching the spot, you're losing your audience at that point.
But generally, in terms of copy and communication, everything is much more visual -- leaner, cleaner, more specific, not as much verbiage.
R.A.P.: More theatre of the mind?
Marice: Yes. And if radio copy could just keep that in mind, they would go a long way towards really delivering the message. But a lot of times the sponsor is involved in it, and the sponsor is coming from a point of view of "the more the merrier," in terms of words. They're also spending "X" amount of dollars, and they keep loading up the benefits in the spot. That obliterates the impact of the idea. There's a point of no return in copy where the person listening can absorb just so much material, and then you're just bludgeoning the audience with words.
R.A.P.: What determines whether a spot should be a thirty or a sixty?
Marice: It really depends on what you have to say of substance. If you're just going to be repeating and repeating and repeating, then what's going to happen is you're going to turn your audience off. Sometimes less is more, and the clients would do better with the shorter messages, more specific statements, and then, of course, the frequency has a lot to do with it. But you also have all those price/item spots. I think that retail is a breed in and of itself. Local advertising is a breed in and of itself. And you keep thinking that when Dad retires and Junior takes over the car dealership that things will change, and then they don't. I've just sort of thrown up my hands and said, that's a division of the work the same way promos are a division, or animation. It's a read in and of itself. For on camera performers, it's like the soap opera acting style is a breed in itself. You don't see soap opera acting elsewhere. You don't see it in episodic television. You don't see it on the big screen. It's indigenous to that arena, and I think it's the same thing with retail and local.
R.A.P.: What thoughts do you have on stations using the "big voice" to declare "More Music" and "Less Talk" with that "in your face" delivery?
Marice: I really think there needs to be much more thought in that voice choice and that stylistic choice. Radio is a very "me, too" arena. So what happens is, if you're the first guy on the block with the idea, great. But if you're the third guy on the block, you're just in the mix. I do consult in terms of the voice choice and the promo direction based on what someone wants the identity of the station to be. That is the vocal identity of the station. That's your signature. That's your logo, and I think that more thought has to go into that. I think the ID's should be more distinct than they are. You go anywhere in the country, and you hear the same jingle sold to a hundred different stations. They just do their own call letters to it. If you're a network, that's one thing. I just think that a little more work has to go into carving out independent and unique identities for your station.
R.A.P.: Would you suggest that a station use the "new read" technique in delivering a voice ID?
Marice: It depends on who they are. If they're an easy listening station, if they're a new age station, that's one thing. If they're rock and roll, no.
R.A.P.: Regarding promos, would you suggest that the voice that does the ID's also do the promos?
Marice: I think so. I believe in consistency of message and image. If you have too many voices, it's very confusing and you water down the impact of the identity of the station. Stations have to really see themselves as entities. They have to see themselves with the same identity-needs as a product or a service and really carve out a unique position for themselves because this really is "theatre of the mind."
R.A.P.: As far as marketing one's voice, talent agents will, of course, do some of that for you, and you mentioned how important the packaging of the demo is. What else can one do to further market themselves?
Marice: You have to find out who the buyers are. Some of my clients are pretty much in business for themselves in that if they are not in a studio, they are working on some kind of marketing. Much of that is just getting the lists of the people to send your tape to. Also, as you go along in your career, people do mailings to let people know what it is they're doing, and again, that's a very specific thing that I help the performer design. I don't recommend that you call people unless you've worked with them and have an ongoing relationship. If you call people, they don't know what to say to you as a performer. For some people, it works. In Chicago particularly, there has been a lot of client/talent contact over the years, but as the business gets bigger and there's more turnover, that contact is becoming less and less. The thing that works is communicating through the mail, mailing your tape and mailing, on a fairly regular basis, information about your work as a performer, because people like to work with winners.
R.A.P.: When you refer to "the buyers," who are you talking about?
Marice: The ad agencies, the production companies, and the recording studios.
R.A.P.: Do a lot of these companies find their talent without the use of a talent agent?
Marice: Oh, yes. They hire directly, particularly in narration, or in a market that doesn't necessarily have an active agent community, or just because they only have "X" amount of dollars and they're going to go to the talent directly.
R.A.P.: What determines whether you need a talent agent or not?
Marice: It really depends on where you are with your career and where you want to go. I have clients who are working in secondary markets [without an agent] but have representation in other markets. That, again, is a very individual thing. There is no rule of thumb. There's nothing wrong with going at it without an agent -- you will anyway.
R.A.P.: How many workshops are you doing now?
Marice: I go to at least one or two cities a month. [In October] I was in Toronto and New York. [In November] I go to Chicago. Then I'm going to Miami for Thanksgiving, and I'll be working with some clients there privately.
R.A.P.: What workshops do you have planned for the first of the year?
Marice: I'll be in Dallas and Houston at the end of January. Through the winter and into the spring, we'll hit the basic cities that I go to -- Chicago, Toronto, New York, Washington, and Dallas. I also want to open up the Seattle/Vancouver area, San Francisco, and Atlanta. St. Louis has also been suggested. I go to Minneapolis now, and I may go to Phoenix also. It's a matter of me making contacts with the agencies in the city and/or the performing community. When I have an indication that there is a group of people who would like to work with me, then I can schedule a trip.
R.A.P.: You are obviously extremely qualified to do what you do, but the $175 fee you charge for your workshops seems quite low.
Marice: The $175 is for the one day seminar. The evening seminar is less. Frankly, I agree with you because the actual time that I work with a performer is very brief compared to the amount of time they then apply what it is I've taught them. I've had people say, "Well, you should get ten percent of everything they do for the rest of their careers!" I just don't think ethically I could do that, and part of the reason I do what I do is because I love getting those phone calls and having someone say to me, "Marice, you won't believe what just happened!" Ultimately, that's my reward. It happened to me yesterday. I have a client that I worked with only once. He called and said, "I applied the technique for a film role, and I now have the lead in a feature film and will be away for a month!"