Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Rocket your D&D 5E and Level Up: Advanced 5E games into space! Alpha Star Magazine Is Launching... Right Now!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="DEFCON 1" data-source="post: 6249140" data-attributes="member: 7006">I find that doing your own impression of a celebrity produces some good voices to use for NPCs... but unfortunately, most times when I've heard it done, the DM wasn't actually doing his OWN impression.  He was recreating the voice of an impressionist doing that celebrity.As a result... any "famous" impression immediately ruins the situation.  Walken, Shatner, Bush, Nicholson.  No one really ever does their own impressions... they do their own take on someone else's impression of these people.  But when you do that... you end up focusing your voice on the "gimmick" of that comedian's impersonation, thereby making it blatantly obvious whose voice you are doing.  As a result... you no longer are inhabiting an NPC (as far as the players are concerned).  All they can do is say "Hey, your tavernkeeper is Bill Clinton!"This is why every single Shatner impression that ever gets done has the same exact halting cadence and emphasis that Kevin Pollak originated as the "Shatner gimmick" 20+ years ago... despite the fact that Shatner himself doesn't talk that way much at all.  But it's become so iconic that it's how we all now think a Shatner impersonation has to have.  And if you were to use that voice for an NPC... with your impression focusing on the halting cadence gimmick rather than actually recreating the sound of his voice... everyone knows you're doing Shatner as opposed to voicing an NPC.So my recommendation is that if you are going to do impressions of celebrities for some voices... don't use any celebrity for whom you are familiar with another more famous impression.  Do James McAvoy... don't do Sean Connery.  Cause once you try to... you're gonna end up with an entire table shouting "Shuck it, Trebek!" and thus ruining the entire point.</blockquote>

Verification