Stacey; The Actress... errr... sort of.

This may be what I looked like when my bosses boss, Steve, asked to speak with me today. He told me that they had selected me to do some voice over work for the new hospital training video.  They had actors to do all the speaking parts, and we were told that the a couple of staff would be given non-verbal parts.  Steve explained that they needed an additional voice for voice over, and that they liked my expressive speech and tone variation. 

So off I went.  It was a bit odd. I watched a few others perform, and then received my script and the actor who would be playing opposite of me.  I was told that they were going to voice over an old movie and so I needed to be angry and erratic so it would be funny.  That is actually really hard to do, and I have never taken an acting class.  But the guy they hired as an actor, messed up a lot, and so even though I wasn't the greatest, I felt a bit reassured that at least I hadn't had to do any lines over.  I think it would have been helpful to actually see the video I was voicing over.  I have no clue what my body looks like.

The worst part was at the end when they told me they needed angry sounds of growling, screaming and muttering. 

Okay, right now give it a try. Seriously make angry growling noises.

Okay now imagine trying to do that in a microphone with a bunch of people staring at you.That I didn't do so well at.

Then they asked if I would read as another patient for a different scene.  I thought, why not?  They let you do what ever voices you want, so it is kind of fun.  In fact the weirder you are the more they seem to like you.  It pays to be weird I guess.

I went back to work and laughed about it with my co-workers.  Later, we had to evacuate our unit because they were going to use it for filming.  So I left with my patients.  While we were in the gym, one of our guys was struggling with a blood pressure issue, so I returned to the unit to get some juice for him.  They were filming, so I got what I needed and started to leave.  Then Steve saw me and stopped me. He explained that the girl that was suppose to be in one of the shots was missing and asked if I would step in.  He was with the superintendent of the hospital and bragging about my performance from earlier. I need good references so I said sure.  So I had an onstage performance as well. 

The guy who was playing opposite of me was suppose to put sun block in my hand, but improvised when he couldn't find it, and I received a hand  full of after shave instead.  I played along with it and no one else noticed.  But he messed up a bit on another part, and so we had to retake anyways.

I played three different parts, and was always a patient. I don't know what that says about me.  I always laugh really hard during training videos because they are so dumb.  I am sure when I see this one, I will laugh even harder. I will never be an actress but it sure was funny and it is a lot harder than it looks!