Matilda Resource Page
Notes about accent:
I have been asked a number of times about whether or not the lines should have a British accent (Roald Dahl is British, and the novel is set in England) and I have been coyly answering this because I wanted to hear the characters all perform together (as opposed to in bits and pieces that I have pictured based on auditions). Some of you have begun building a character voice. and that is a decent start. But those accents…
Yes, I would like you to use a British accent, HOWEVER, the warning I am issuing is that, with MOST HS students, it is WAY over the top. One of my top priority is to allow the story to be the feature, and sometimes an overdone accent/character voice can pull attention away from that.
Step one--If we all use the same procedures, we should get similar results, here is a pretty clear article.
https://www.wikihow.com/Speak-in-a-British-Accent
Note: this will take some work to apply if you have a lot of lines, you’ll have to put some time in. As you can imagine, the more time you put in, the better you will be at something.
Step two (and I am excited)—Lipari: Mrs. Lipari is going to come to rehearsal on February 6th for our next read through. Mrs. Lipari is a fantastic Lipari, and you can all be extremely excited about meeting/seeing her. (She is also British and has done work on stage). Please have your accent as well prepared for that date as you possibly can.
Step three: character voicing: I am referring to trying to create a requisite voice based on who you are, for example, Jaxon has to be a middle aged athletic woman or Matilda is five. The main course for this will be the little kids. From the number of different versions I have watched, I have drawn the conclusion that this is pretty tough because the kids either come off looking like aloof teens or overly whiny.
Here’s my guidance/expectations:
* use primarily your voice, but slower
* big words are hard to pronounce, so they have a little pause in front
* your face will sell your sound
* don’t overdo the singsong element, use it sparingly (Alaina does this once in a while—she’s my template)
I have been asked a number of times about whether or not the lines should have a British accent (Roald Dahl is British, and the novel is set in England) and I have been coyly answering this because I wanted to hear the characters all perform together (as opposed to in bits and pieces that I have pictured based on auditions). Some of you have begun building a character voice. and that is a decent start. But those accents…
Yes, I would like you to use a British accent, HOWEVER, the warning I am issuing is that, with MOST HS students, it is WAY over the top. One of my top priority is to allow the story to be the feature, and sometimes an overdone accent/character voice can pull attention away from that.
Step one--If we all use the same procedures, we should get similar results, here is a pretty clear article.
https://www.wikihow.com/Speak-in-a-British-Accent
Note: this will take some work to apply if you have a lot of lines, you’ll have to put some time in. As you can imagine, the more time you put in, the better you will be at something.
Step two (and I am excited)—Lipari: Mrs. Lipari is going to come to rehearsal on February 6th for our next read through. Mrs. Lipari is a fantastic Lipari, and you can all be extremely excited about meeting/seeing her. (She is also British and has done work on stage). Please have your accent as well prepared for that date as you possibly can.
Step three: character voicing: I am referring to trying to create a requisite voice based on who you are, for example, Jaxon has to be a middle aged athletic woman or Matilda is five. The main course for this will be the little kids. From the number of different versions I have watched, I have drawn the conclusion that this is pretty tough because the kids either come off looking like aloof teens or overly whiny.
Here’s my guidance/expectations:
* use primarily your voice, but slower
* big words are hard to pronounce, so they have a little pause in front
* your face will sell your sound
* don’t overdo the singsong element, use it sparingly (Alaina does this once in a while—she’s my template)
Practice Tracks
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Smell of Rebellion can be found here: http://year6show.weebly.com/smell-of-rebellion.html