Chapter 22

My coach was a twenty-some-year-old named Vince Jacobs. Vince told me he had studied at the University of California for dramatic acting. Apparently, he was considered to have a wonderful voice but the camera didn’t like him. I didn’t know cameras had emotions so I questioned this statement. He explained that some of the best-looking people in the world didn’t look right on camera.

For example Richard Nixon our Vice President was very presentable in person, but on camera looked like a thief. He could have played villains, but never a good guy. I thought that a pity since if he was Vice President he must be a man of honor.

Vince explained that he would work with me on presenting my lines in a natural fashion. The background of the story had my family bringing me with them from Ohio, so I had no accent to worry about. All I had to do was say the lines like a real person.

I had no more than two consecutive sentences in the entire script, so I had figured it would be easy.

He had a Grundig tape recorder which he started. He then read out a line from the script to which I had to respond. I had the script open and read the sentence. He then played it back. From its stilted sound, it was obvious that I was reading the line. He had me repeat the line five times Then try it without the script. It took me several more tries and I was finally able to say the line naturally.

He played my line back and it sounded very natural. Then he played his and my lines back. It sounded like there were two different conversations going on. While the lines were both clear they didn’t come across as though we were communicating with each other.

Vince pointed out that the line presented to me came across as a challenge and while the words I used were the right ones, they came across as accepting an invitation to a tea party.

Mr. Andersen played by John Wayne says, “Are you up to this boy, it is long and hard, there will be no running home to mama.”

My reply is, “Yes Sir, I am up to this.”

Not a whole lot to say. On the recording even when I said the sentence in a natural manner it was still flat as if I was disinterested. Vince said the same line but had a rising inflection at the end. The neutral sentence now came off as returning the challenge with a little resentment thrown in.

I tried it that way several times. The last time on the recording it sounded like it was supposed to, Vince came out in a very high tone British accent.

“By Jove, I think he’s got it”

In the exact same accent, I returned.

“Thank you me Lord, it is appreciated.”

This stopped him dead in his tracks.

“Where did you learn to do that accent?”

“Me mum, she is British.”

“Can you do any others?”

“Not really unless you count my Spanish accent.”

“You speak Spanish?”

I thought about telling him who my godmother is, but decided that it wouldn’t make a difference and would come off as bragging. Vince dropped the Spanish and told me that I had a pretty good command of the language. He also said that I should somehow let the writers know of my other accents as they might need them someday. Actors always had to be planting seeds for the next job.

We continued on with my lines, now I would memorize them so I could speak naturally, and then worked on the inflection. After a while, it began to flow. I would read and understand the intent of a scene, then structure the strength and tone of my reply based on the scene.

We did this till lunchtime then adjourned to the cafeteria for lunch. I tried a burrito for lunch. It was pretty spicy, but I thought I could learn to like them. My first bite was funny though. I thought my mouth was on fire. Vince had been waiting for it. He laughed as I gulped a Coke.

“You easterners aren’t used to this. It won’t take long and you will be putting Tabasco sauce on everything.”

He then had to show me what Tabasco sauce was. He poured a drop on my burrito and I was gulping Coke again.

After lunch, I went over to the schoolhouse where Miss Sperry was waiting for me. She immediately started me in on the tests. The first one was math. Towards the end of the test, I was running into problems that I hadn’t seen before. Since they were solving formulas I used the knowledge I had and the solutions crossed checked so I think I did okay. It also told me what I had to do tonight.

I asked her what days each subject’s exams would be given. This did not breach any exam protocol so she told me, Latin tomorrow, English on Thursday, Biology on Friday then World History on the following Monday. Fortunately in my suitcase were my textbooks from school. Since the tests were based on the whole year, I would have to at least look at the entire book. I had no illusions that I would learn everything, but anything was better than nothing.