September 4, 1998
Not much to a phone audition really. There's no dressing for the part. (There wasn't even any showering for the part.) There's no drive across town fighting the traffic. There's no sterile waiting room chock full of desperate actors. There's just me and my phone, and a few voices on the other end.
I read with Linda as I had done for the first audition. This time, two of the producers were also listening in on speaker phone. I did my little "voice that wasn't what they were looking for" and kept in mind the notes Linda had given me and then just sat quietly and waited. Finally a response from one of the producers, "Cool." This was not the "cool" of awe as he tried to process how perfect my voice was for this job. Nor was this the "cool" of intrigue as he listened to this whole new angle for the first time and wanted to brainstorm the best way to make it work. This was what all had feared. It was the "cool" of wrongness as it hit this vociferous producer that no, I was not, in fact, what they had in mind and they did not decide that they liked the fresh idea.
And with today's adventure, my voice-over career had both begun and
come to a close. Valiant fight, ABC boy.