---
title: "Trying to Find a Theater Stage/Voice for an Impossible Situation"
date: 2010-01-14
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canonical_url: https://idratherbewriting.com/2010/01/14/trying-to-find-a-theater-stagevoice-for-an-impossible-situation/
---
# Trying to Find a Theater Stage/Voice for an Impossible Situation
My teammates recommended that I read a little faster, that I add more inflection and maybe even switch to an outline rather than read a script.

I agree, but it's hard to do that. It's hard to develop that personal voice. It's not a technical problem to simply figure out. It's a theater art, and I have no background in theater. (Okay, in 8th grade I had a one-line role in *Oliver Twist*.) 

As I've been reading voiceover books on Google, clearly the consensus is that you need to implement some acting. You have to imagine a situation, what character you are, who the audience is, and the situation you're in. This theatrical situation is exactly what a local voiceover coach said the very first day of a workshop I attended.

Voiceover pro James R. Alburger also emphasizes the role of acting in voiceovers:

> Remember, voice acting is theater of the mind, and you are the actor. When you become the character in the copy, you will be believable to the audience, and a suspension of disbelief will be created. When the audience suspends their disbelief in what they hear, they become more open to the message. This all starts when you discover the character in the copy. ([The art of voice acting: the craft and business of performing for voice-over](https://www.google.com/books?id=N33mm0KwD10C&printsec=frontcover&dq=the+art+of+voice+acting&ei=m75OS5u8D53-lASX7dGCDQ&cd=1#v=onepage&q=&f=false))

Voiceover professional Bob Bergen gives similar advice:

> "Acting, acting, acting!!! No matter what kind of VO [voiceover] work you are trying to break into, it's all about the acting. . . . The obvious trait that animation voice actors have is the ability to change their voice to match characters . . . you have to be believable. There is no such thing as a good voice! Everyone has a good voice! If you listen to radio and TV you hear very real, non-announcer-y, guy/gal next door reads. It's oh so much harder to be real than it is to be announcer-y!" (quoted in [Voiceovers: Techniques and Tactics for Success](https://www.google.com/books?id=Bp0sp0c0c-UC&dq=Voiceovers:+Techniques+and+Tactics+for+Success+By+Janet+Wilcox&source=gbs_navlinks_s), by Janet Wilcox)

In other words, good voiceover involves acting. The problem is that in commercial voiceovers, the situations are more story-driven. Sure, they could take place on a stage in a situation with characters. But in instructional writing, you're saying mundane sentences like* click this, select that. Do this to create a new widget, and then save it, etc. *I'm practically falling asleep writing this sentence.

Inflect your instructional script with some interesting pitch and emotion, add some drama and soul to it, twist a word here and there, and you end up converting the instructional script into a ridiculous soap opera. *Click *this. Now SELECT this button .... and when you're ALL finished, go ahead and *save the information. *

On what kind of stage could an instructional script like that take place? I've said [in past posts](https://idratherbewriting.com/2008/11/14/finding-a-conversational-voice-in-video-tutorials/) that you can imagine yourself sitting in a cafe explaining to a friend how to use a software application. But somehow that isn't enough. You're still yourself, the user is too ordinary, and the setting is mundane.