Lights, Camera, Hablá!

There is a big film industry in Buenos Aires. You may have seen some of the films made here . . . you can even see actors out and about in the streets. In fact, today on my way through the building to meet with our Academic Director, I crossed paths with a famous 60-something gentleman-actor of soap and film star fame. I have yet to find out his name, but I was told that he is a well-known personality in Argentina. That being said, I'm not going to talk about film acting . . . but voice acting.

Joe, Jen, and Claudio

Every year the Ministry of Education develops language tests for the entire city of Buenos Aires. Over the last 3 months, I have worked with a team to review, revise, and edit listening and reading passages and test items to be used to assess the English language levels of elementary and high school kids. Well, Saturday was the big day of recording the listening segments. We arrived at Julian's sound studio early enough to catch my co-workers buying some "facturas" (Argentine pastries) to give us energy for the recording session. The Ministry had recruited Susan from New Zealand, Emily from Tennessee, Jacqui from Indiana, Jen from Texas, Joe from Oklahoma, and Claudio from Argentina (who can affect a perfectly British accent).

Susan, Claudio, Jacqui, Emily, and Carla

We all took our turns in the sound-proof room reading our scripts . . . scripts that included fairy tales, interviews, news broadcasts, conversations, teachers conducting class, phone messages, and commercials. I got to do a commercial, be a teacher, and read an NPR-type news story. Joe was a hen-pecked husband, a newscaster, and a teenaged boy (one of those three was type-casting . . . ). It was really a fun experience! I had marked the scripts for stress as part of the tedious editing process, and I was pleasantly surprised at how authentic everything sounded. Julian will later insert the clapping, ding dongs, beeps, doors opening and closing, and background music. How cool will that be? I can't wait to hear the final product.

I hope the kids of Buenos Aires enjoy taking their next standardized English language test. Having played many-a-language-tape and CD in class, I have to say that our new-found enthusiasm for acting certainly came through in our voices.