VAM 156 | Interview with Julie Nathanson, Part 3
Welcome to episode 156 of the Voice Acting Mastery podcast with yours truly, Crispin Freeman!
As always, you can listen to the podcast using the player above, or download the mp3 using the link at the bottom of this blog post. The podcast is also available via the iTunes Store online. Just follow this link to view the podcast in iTunes:
http://www.voiceactingmastery.com/podcast
Welcome to the second part of my interview with the multi-faceted Julie Nathanson! Julie has worked on many high profile animated projects such as Suicide Squad: Hell to Pay, Elena of Avalor, and Avengers Assemble! She’s also worked on major games such as Call of Duty, Far Cry 5, and Lego DC Super-Villains. In addition to her voice acting work, Julie is also a professional screen writer for television and video games! And if that weren’t enough, Julie also has a Master’s degree in Clinical Psychology! Her broad range of interests and talents all inform and enrich each other and I’m so grateful she’s been willing to spend so much time talking with us.
In the previous episode, Julie explained how she made the transition from on-camera acting work to voice over and how she took an audience member’s criticism of her voice and transformed it into the inspiration to begin a whole new career as a voice actor. She also shared with us her 3 step process for understanding a character. If you haven’t listened to her outline her process in detail in the last episode, I strongly suggest you check it out before proceeding to the final part of our interview.
As we wrap up our discussion, Julie gives her advice to the aspiring voice actor. She explains how important it is to be friendly and pleasant while collaborating on a project so that people in the entertainment industry will look forward to working with you again. A positive attitude can help in other ways too! For example, Julie’s enthusiasm and genuine interest in her peers means that she feels happy for her fellow voice actors when they succeed, rather than feeling jealous of their accomplishments or self-critical for not booking a particular gig herself. By maintaining this spirit of positivity and support, Julie is not only able to feel inspired by the work of her colleagues, but she can learn from what they do as well.
Julie also discusses how her study of psychology has informed her approach to acting. While it’s clear that her insight into the human psyche helps her own artistry, she’s also been generous enough to share her knowledge with others. Recently, Julie gave a very important presentation at the Game Developer’s Conference in San Francisco on how game developers can use discoveries in psychology and brain wave synchronization to help improve collaboration between voice actors and the people who make video games! It’s a fascinating topic and I’m sure you’ll find it very enlightening!
Download Voice Acting Mastery Episode #156 Here (MP3)
I don’t see anywhere you have covered this, and maybe it’s a little outside your wheelhouse, but it would be great to have something on the specifics of recording audiobooks. That has it’s own set of challenges and seems pretty hard to do well, it might make for a good podcast episode or two.