It’s Friday, and here are my three thoughts for the week…

GENDER NEUTRAL CASTINGS

This week I’ve received no less than three castings looking for, “gender neutral,” voices. I’ve heard some buzz about this for a few months, but hadn’t yet encountered it myself. It’s an interesting trend that may presage yet another avenue for talent to pursue if it sticks. I wonder if perhaps it is a corollary of the Xanax read I talked about a few weeks ago, which seems designed to be as anodyne and broadly inoffensive as possible. What are your thoughts on this emerging trend? Is it a fad, or here to stay?

WOVOCON

If you are looking for a great experience getting together with your fellow voice actors for knowledge-building and relationship-building, look no further than WoVO Con, the World Voices Organization’s annual conference. (https://www.world-voices.org/WoVOCon-IV) Coming up in just two weeks in Las Vegas, this fourth edition of the conference promises to be the best yet, with talent flying in from around the globe to attend. If you’re there, make sure to say hi!

VALUE ADD

This is a concept I frequently come back to with newer talent. While I’ll always defend the need for fair pay as a voice actor, in an expanding marketplace we often get bogged down by terminology that may be too broad to be of service when it comes to pricing. I’ve seen talent reject jobs that were described as regional or national broadcast for paying too little, when a cursory review of the product or service, (or a simple email exchange with the buyer,) would reveal that by, “national,” they mean three nights a week on a C-grade cable network at 2AM for three months. One reason I never post a rate card is because every job is unique. If Dominos wants a New York/New Jersey/Connecticut regional TV spot for 13 weeks, that’s one price and a re-bill thereafter. If it’s Joe’s pizza with one location in each state, it’s reasonable that the price won’t be quite the same. Think about what the client’s overall budget for production and airtime is. If you are getting 2-5% of that, you are getting a fair shake.

Until next week, this is JMC.