Falsetto in dialogue

kneedeepinthedoomed

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Is it seriously uncommon in plays etc. to require an actor or actress to speak (not sing!) a few lines in falsetto? I can't really find any examples on the internet.

Anybody know an example where this is the case?
 

Maryn

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That seems like one of the few times a wryly might be apt, but damned if I can think of a play that's got a line or two that has to be delivered in falsetto. Let me think a bit and I'll edit if I come up with any.

Maryn, who sees a fair number of plays
 

VeryBigBeard

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Yeah, I'm having a similar brain-freeze on thinking of an example. Something tells me Wicked, the musical, has a couple, but I can't say which lines off the top of my head. I know I've been in a local production that had an actor use it for a bit, but I can't remember which one and I'd have been in the band so not always paying that much attention to what the actors are doing. It can be done, though. Not even that hard to sing in it.

It's sometimes used as an effect by a specific actor or production to put a unique spin on things or communicate an idea/emotion in a particular way. It's the sort of thing that might get introduced at the directorial level rather than by a playwright.

Python use falsetto all the time. But that's largely improvisatory, rather than being "required" by some higher authority.

ETA: So yeah, I wouldn't say it's uncommon, exactly. It's a known thing. As a detail, depends on the context you'd want to use it in. I'd believe that it would be required, though, if it made sense for that particular situation.
 

Maryn

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Because I still haven't remembered a falsetto, I've been trying to come up with other examples of lines from plays that are to be delivered in a vocal style unlike the character's normal way of speaking. Surely there are times when a brief Southern accent, a childlike voice, robot speech, or a speech impediment the character doesn't really have, something along those lines, is in the script rather than the director's option.

But my brain, she is empty.
 

mrsmig

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It's not as uncommon as you might think.

The character of Mary Sunshine in the musical Chicago is usually played by a man in drag. This not only entails singing countertenor, but speaking in falsetto.

I can think of any number of men-disguised-as-women plays which usually involves said actor speaking in falsetto; e.g. Ken Ludwig's Leading Ladies, Brandon Thomas' Charley's Aunt (or the musical version, Where's Charley?). A tired old casting choice for Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest is to have it played by a man in drag. I did a production of The Threepenny Opera with a man in drag playing Lucy Brown, speaking the lines in a light falsetto.

As far as a woman speaking in falsetto, the title character in the musical Little Mary Sunshine*not only sings soprano, she usually speaks in the same pitch. The show is a spoof of the old Jeanette MacDonald/Nelson Eddy films.

ETA: And of course, there's the old Instant Soprano trope. It happens rather famously toward the end of A Christmas Story when the dad gets a bowling ball dropped in his lap on Christmas Day.

*a different Mary Sunshine than the one above, naturally.
 
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Doug B

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Years ago, I directed the farce "Love, Sex and the IRS" by Michael Parker. A young man dresses as a woman to fool an IRS Agent. I can't remember for sure but the script must have called for falsetto because there was a running gag when the young man 'accidentally' drops out of falsetto to the consternation of the IRS Agent.

Doug B
 

kneedeepinthedoomed

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Hmm, okay. So it's commonly used for drag roles or comic effect.

Here's my use:

A crazy smile spreads on her face.


CATHERINE
This shall redeem me in His eyes.


She crouches and scoops up some of the ichor. Smears it over her face. Rolls her eyes up as far as they will go.


CATHERINE
(in a creepy little-girl voice)
O wanderer beyond the void.


She gets up and raises her arms.


CATHERINE
(falsetto voice)
Thou art chaos and slaughter.
Ruin and savage ruthlessness!
All shall quake and stumble in your footsteps,
all shall fall!
All shall be consumed!

She pauses, exasperated.


CATHERINE
(child voice)
I must prove myself worthy.


The red-and-black soldiers watch her in silence.
 
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VeryBigBeard

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I think it works in your use well enough. I understand what you're trying to communicate there.

Just because I've read parts of this and we've chatted about dev before, my only crit here would be that you might be over-directing in the script. That can really depend, though, and I know you're largely a solo dev so it may not matter. Did you plan to work with a separate voice director or actors later on?

With a good actor... it's incredible what levels of nuance he or she can add a line. So much of that is shades of grey, though, and a big part of voice directing is guiding/iterating the actor through the exact tones. It's the kind of thing that's very hard to say from the writer's side, sometimes. So I could write (falsetto) or any other stage direction in the script. In some cases, that might tell me a lot, in other cases it tells me next to nothing. That's why actors and directors do read-throughs early in the process. They're looking to see how a scene sounds.

So in this case, putting on my (limited) voice directing hat: it's obvious from the context Catherine is prostrating herself before some kind of god or lord, worshipping. That context probably informs the voice more than (creepy, little-girl voice) does because all you're really doing is calling a trope, here, and little girls can sound creepy in a lot of different ways, some of which my given actor may or may not be better/worse at pulling off than others.

That line's actually short on info, really. The kind of info that only the writer can provide, like why is Catherine so taken with this god? Is this worship sincere or a front? Is she in mortal danger one way or the other? That then starts to give me context so that, instead of trying to tell my actor to do X voice, I can give my actor the right context and then know when I hear the right voice. There may be any number of variable deliveries that will sound right, some might be completely different than you expect. As a writer, you make the director's and actor's jobs easier when you give them room to find the tone themselves rather than trying to dictate a specific, often vaguer-than-you-think tone.
 

Lady Ice

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I agree with the above. One of the most exciting things about writing a play is that actors can interpret it in different ways, which means that it will continually feel fresh.
 

frimble3

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And what if the actress-playing-Catherine's 'creepy little girl' voice is her falsetto, or at least very similar? Perhaps more general instructions would be better?
 

kneedeepinthedoomed

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Yes, I'm probably over-directing, but then again, I am the director as well as the writer here, and those directions mark my thought process more than anything else. I'm not gonna put a gun to the voice actress' head.

The context is independently produced videogame rather than stage play or movie, so there isn't gonna be a whole lot of production machine running in the background, and there aren't gonna be a whole lot of takes for voice actors, thus... there needs to be a minimum amount of direction. Same reason there are (some) camera directions in the script - there isn't gonna be a director, animators need instructions, and I may even be one of them.

The voice actress isn't gonna read the entire script, even, because it's likely going to be freelancers working over the Internet. They are going to get the scenes with their dialogue highlighted, some directions, perhaps a 3D stage mockup, and that's it. Hence, the directions are a must. There are just major, major constraints involved.

Why these characters behave that way will be clear from their previous appearances in the script. With any scene taken from a later part of any script, you could ask the same question. Why does Brutus see Caesar's ghost? It's obviously explained earlier. Seeing the earlier scenes with Catherine involved is going to provide a basis to the voice actress.

I should edit out tropes like the little girl stuff, thanks for pointing that out. That slips in sometimes.

I think I really need to mark my threads [videogame] or something like that. If this was a play, then yes, less direction would be a good thing. Letting the actors shine and interpret it a hundred different ways. Videogame cutscenes are a different ballgame, and unfortunately one with a lot of practical weirdness and limitations involved.
 

JJKHawaiian

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I think in Mrs. Doubtfire where she (he) screams, "Hello!" to the lady (assigned by the courts) checking up on the place of residence. She has her face full of whipped cream (cake icing). I've been trying find the screenplay pdf, but not able to.
Robin Williams, Daniel Hillard, uses a falsetto voice for that brief moment. I'm sure there are other parts where a falsetto voice is used ("drive-by fruiting").
I'd be interested in finding out what technique they used. Especially, if it was used a good portion in the script. It would be tiiring to use parentheticals ALL the time.