Baby, I'm A Star
Dear Readers,
In case you haven't noticed, Moscow is a very, very strange city. Well, the strangeness continues. Last week, my friend "B" and an acquaintance from Ghana were just hanging out on Old Arbat Street. A woman approached them and asked if they were American. When B said that he was in fact, an American, the woman asked if they would agree to test for a voice dubbing part in a film.
B exchanges numbers with the woman and gets the directors name. He looks the name up on the internet and finds that the guy died a few years ago. At this point, B is suspicious enough to say forget and not go. I convince B that it would be, at worst, hilarious and, at best, a foray into a new career :-)
B had mentioned that they may need some other American sounding voices and had a part for a woman, so I and another colleague "A" accompany B to the screen test. Besides, in Moscow, when travelling to new places, it is always good to go with a friend (or several).
We get down to Mosfilm -- which is Russia's version of Hollywood, where we meet Ella the producers assistant, I guess, we never got a business card or anything.
So Ella takes us to the producer who "had lived in the US for a long time, is fluent in English and can recognize an American accent". The guy is a pleasant enough fellow, but his English is at least 4 metro stops from fluent. He gives us the 30-second down and dirty about the film: A light-weight Russian boxer falls in love with a heavy-weight American boxer's girlfriend. He writes her a letter confessing his love. The American boxer, of course, finds out and wants to fight the Russian boxer. The two boxers meet in a climatic match at the end of the movie. The title of the film is roughly translated "Weeble-Wobble".
After this synopsis, I am thinking this film has Oscar buzz all over it.
Then, the director gives B the line that he needs to read:
"I am going to kick your ass, bitch."
Now, I am thinking Cannes Film Festival, here we come. Plus, I can hardly breath from laughing so hard.
B, a professional through and through, goes into the sound booth and nails it on like the third or fourth take.
Then they ask me to read for the part of the girlfriend.
The first line of the clip is "Vanya, Vanya, Vanya".
The second line is "You won me fair and square, I will marry you".
Third line " We can have sex anyway you want". FULL STOP.
I am not going to say that line. I can't say that line. I am a feminist, a married woman of a certain age with kids (girls, no less). So, no way. I think my exact quote was "hell to the no." The director was very understanding. He said that if I didn't want to do it, I wouldn't do a good job so don't push me. The session ended and we left. As we were walking out, I called my husband to get confirmation of my original decision not to do it. To my complete shock, my husband chastised me for not doing it. He actually said "don't be such a punk." Who knew after 10 years of marriage, he could still surprise me?
So on Friday, back to the studio I go. This time the Russian boxer's coach (the "Mickey" role in Rocky) is overdubbing his lines. I watch for 2 hours as this guy walks through the process of re-recording his own lines. The work is obviously difficult. So difficult that I am really doubting my ability to do this. I am not a professional and now, I am not laughing.
I run out of time and cannot stay to record my lines because I am hosting a birthday part a colleague at my apartment. I am told to return on Monday and do both the screen test, and if the producer likes me, the recording as well. We set the time for 6 pm.
In the interim, I am scheduled for a business meeting at 5 pm across town. Ella calls me at 2 pm on Monday and I tell her that I have a business meeting at 5pm and will not be able to make the meeting at 6. Maybe 6:30 pm.
This leads to a series of funny and very Russian conversations. Ella "forgets" that I told her I had a business meeting. I was meeting with the folks who pay my rent and salary while I am here, so they get priority on my time.
She starts calling me at 6:05 asking me to hurry. Since I am taking public transportation, I find that request completely asinine. What does she want me to do, tell the metro driver to go faster, the bus driver to ignore the traffic and traffic laws? But as I am acculturating, I tell her " I will try to hurry". In the process of hurrying (e.g. waiting for the bus to arrive after my 5 stop metro ride), she calls me back again and asks for a status on the hurrying. I tell her I am still in the process of trying. She asks me to take a car. I remind the native Moskvichka that it is rush hour and if I take a car, I will never, ever get there. Plus, who exactly is going to pay for the car? So I continue my telepathic conversation with the bus driver, urging her to hurry through the traffic. I guess I should have used my telepathy to move the other drivers out of the bus' way, but I am not powerful enough to do that yet.
I actually don't get to Mosfilm until close to 7pm -- my telepathy still needs a lot of work.
So I get there and everyone, the director, producer, sound guys are all waiting for me. I go right into the sound booth. They have, quite nicely, provided me with a translator. He also overdubbed some lines for another American character in the film. During his wait for me, he wrote out my lines. Boy was I surprised when I saw that the third line had even more dialogue. It now read:
"We can have sex anywhere you want, but I am on top".
Okey-dokey and here we go.
At this point I am committed, so I start the process. It takes me several takes to get the first line. Dubbing is like yoga, there is a lot to think about -- starting the line in sync with the time stamp, matching up the tempo and volume of my speech with the actor's lips and finally emoting, stressing certain words etc. As I said before, I am not a professional actor, so it was a little tough, but after about 10 minutes, I got the hang of it. I progressed through the 2nd line with very little problem.
The third line, yeah, that one, was problematic. The actress starts talking off screen, so I didn't have a visual cue as backup if I miss the time stamp. She also didn't deliver the line with the right inflection, so the line syncs up badly. My translator and I are discussing the problem during playback and I say to him, in a whisper, "Its not my fault, she didn't deliver the line correctly. I cannot make chicken salad out of chicken sh*t." At this point, my inner diva is in full bloom.
My translator, and new friend Michael, is a professional actor. He gives me some guidance on delivering the line and we nail it. The director, after playing back the entire session, tells me that I need to re-record the first lines "Vanya, Vanya, Vanya" in a louder voice.
I start recording again. In the first playback, the director tells me that I am saying Tanya instead of Vanya. As a long-term English speaker I am well versed in the difference between T and V. So I record again. This time he says I got 1 Vanya and 2 Tanya's. Record again. No improvement. Now the director is a little annoyed and says he is coming into the sound booth to help me. OK, he is the experienced director, I am an amateur, I appreciate his wisdom and assistance. He comes in with a pen and a piece of paper. At the top the paper he writes in big letters V A N Y A. He jabs the word with the pen and says, "Say this". He then writes in big letters T A N Y A, crosses it out and says "Don't say this".
This is the actual copy of the "note" the director gave me.
My translator and I just look at each other, then burst out laughing. I am laughing so hard that I have trouble composing myself to finish the session. But I finally manage to pull it together. We try again, still no improvement. Then the director tells me to say "Wanya" with a "W". Two takes and 6 Wanyas later, I am finished. My 30 minute, soft-core, verbal film career is over.
I am fond of saying that life in Russia is not fun, but it is funny. This fun, funny experience is the exception that proves the rule.
In case you haven't noticed, Moscow is a very, very strange city. Well, the strangeness continues. Last week, my friend "B" and an acquaintance from Ghana were just hanging out on Old Arbat Street. A woman approached them and asked if they were American. When B said that he was in fact, an American, the woman asked if they would agree to test for a voice dubbing part in a film.
B exchanges numbers with the woman and gets the directors name. He looks the name up on the internet and finds that the guy died a few years ago. At this point, B is suspicious enough to say forget and not go. I convince B that it would be, at worst, hilarious and, at best, a foray into a new career :-)
B had mentioned that they may need some other American sounding voices and had a part for a woman, so I and another colleague "A" accompany B to the screen test. Besides, in Moscow, when travelling to new places, it is always good to go with a friend (or several).
We get down to Mosfilm -- which is Russia's version of Hollywood, where we meet Ella the producers assistant, I guess, we never got a business card or anything.
So Ella takes us to the producer who "had lived in the US for a long time, is fluent in English and can recognize an American accent". The guy is a pleasant enough fellow, but his English is at least 4 metro stops from fluent. He gives us the 30-second down and dirty about the film: A light-weight Russian boxer falls in love with a heavy-weight American boxer's girlfriend. He writes her a letter confessing his love. The American boxer, of course, finds out and wants to fight the Russian boxer. The two boxers meet in a climatic match at the end of the movie. The title of the film is roughly translated "Weeble-Wobble".
After this synopsis, I am thinking this film has Oscar buzz all over it.
Then, the director gives B the line that he needs to read:
"I am going to kick your ass, bitch."
Now, I am thinking Cannes Film Festival, here we come. Plus, I can hardly breath from laughing so hard.
B, a professional through and through, goes into the sound booth and nails it on like the third or fourth take.
Then they ask me to read for the part of the girlfriend.
The first line of the clip is "Vanya, Vanya, Vanya".
The second line is "You won me fair and square, I will marry you".
Third line " We can have sex anyway you want". FULL STOP.
I am not going to say that line. I can't say that line. I am a feminist, a married woman of a certain age with kids (girls, no less). So, no way. I think my exact quote was "hell to the no." The director was very understanding. He said that if I didn't want to do it, I wouldn't do a good job so don't push me. The session ended and we left. As we were walking out, I called my husband to get confirmation of my original decision not to do it. To my complete shock, my husband chastised me for not doing it. He actually said "don't be such a punk." Who knew after 10 years of marriage, he could still surprise me?
So on Friday, back to the studio I go. This time the Russian boxer's coach (the "Mickey" role in Rocky) is overdubbing his lines. I watch for 2 hours as this guy walks through the process of re-recording his own lines. The work is obviously difficult. So difficult that I am really doubting my ability to do this. I am not a professional and now, I am not laughing.
I run out of time and cannot stay to record my lines because I am hosting a birthday part a colleague at my apartment. I am told to return on Monday and do both the screen test, and if the producer likes me, the recording as well. We set the time for 6 pm.
In the interim, I am scheduled for a business meeting at 5 pm across town. Ella calls me at 2 pm on Monday and I tell her that I have a business meeting at 5pm and will not be able to make the meeting at 6. Maybe 6:30 pm.
This leads to a series of funny and very Russian conversations. Ella "forgets" that I told her I had a business meeting. I was meeting with the folks who pay my rent and salary while I am here, so they get priority on my time.
She starts calling me at 6:05 asking me to hurry. Since I am taking public transportation, I find that request completely asinine. What does she want me to do, tell the metro driver to go faster, the bus driver to ignore the traffic and traffic laws? But as I am acculturating, I tell her " I will try to hurry". In the process of hurrying (e.g. waiting for the bus to arrive after my 5 stop metro ride), she calls me back again and asks for a status on the hurrying. I tell her I am still in the process of trying. She asks me to take a car. I remind the native Moskvichka that it is rush hour and if I take a car, I will never, ever get there. Plus, who exactly is going to pay for the car? So I continue my telepathic conversation with the bus driver, urging her to hurry through the traffic. I guess I should have used my telepathy to move the other drivers out of the bus' way, but I am not powerful enough to do that yet.
I actually don't get to Mosfilm until close to 7pm -- my telepathy still needs a lot of work.
So I get there and everyone, the director, producer, sound guys are all waiting for me. I go right into the sound booth. They have, quite nicely, provided me with a translator. He also overdubbed some lines for another American character in the film. During his wait for me, he wrote out my lines. Boy was I surprised when I saw that the third line had even more dialogue. It now read:
"We can have sex anywhere you want, but I am on top".
Okey-dokey and here we go.
At this point I am committed, so I start the process. It takes me several takes to get the first line. Dubbing is like yoga, there is a lot to think about -- starting the line in sync with the time stamp, matching up the tempo and volume of my speech with the actor's lips and finally emoting, stressing certain words etc. As I said before, I am not a professional actor, so it was a little tough, but after about 10 minutes, I got the hang of it. I progressed through the 2nd line with very little problem.
The third line, yeah, that one, was problematic. The actress starts talking off screen, so I didn't have a visual cue as backup if I miss the time stamp. She also didn't deliver the line with the right inflection, so the line syncs up badly. My translator and I are discussing the problem during playback and I say to him, in a whisper, "Its not my fault, she didn't deliver the line correctly. I cannot make chicken salad out of chicken sh*t." At this point, my inner diva is in full bloom.
My translator, and new friend Michael, is a professional actor. He gives me some guidance on delivering the line and we nail it. The director, after playing back the entire session, tells me that I need to re-record the first lines "Vanya, Vanya, Vanya" in a louder voice.
I start recording again. In the first playback, the director tells me that I am saying Tanya instead of Vanya. As a long-term English speaker I am well versed in the difference between T and V. So I record again. This time he says I got 1 Vanya and 2 Tanya's. Record again. No improvement. Now the director is a little annoyed and says he is coming into the sound booth to help me. OK, he is the experienced director, I am an amateur, I appreciate his wisdom and assistance. He comes in with a pen and a piece of paper. At the top the paper he writes in big letters V A N Y A. He jabs the word with the pen and says, "Say this". He then writes in big letters T A N Y A, crosses it out and says "Don't say this".
This is the actual copy of the "note" the director gave me.
My translator and I just look at each other, then burst out laughing. I am laughing so hard that I have trouble composing myself to finish the session. But I finally manage to pull it together. We try again, still no improvement. Then the director tells me to say "Wanya" with a "W". Two takes and 6 Wanyas later, I am finished. My 30 minute, soft-core, verbal film career is over.
I am fond of saying that life in Russia is not fun, but it is funny. This fun, funny experience is the exception that proves the rule.
posted by S | 5:58 AM
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