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'My advice: make the joke earlier.' The speech doctor reviews 3 speech actors

(In Harry Potter, True Detective and Juno, they were better)

Actors are like people when they go on stage as themselves. And just like ordinary people, I occasionally think 'that could really be better'. Soon we can check it out with the Dutch actors at the Gala of the Dutch Film Festival. With those calves. But first the great examples.

Take Oscar winner and veteran Hollywood actor Matthew McConaughey:

He does do it with jokes and such and a real structure but the way he thanks God and his Family remains, frankly, downright boring. In any case, I expected more from it. Oh and panic and or drugs radiates from his eyes. That too.

That Ellen Page being terribly nervous when she comes out at the LBT congress is understandable.

Being honest about your non-hetero orientation, so early in your career, in Hollywood, is incredibly brave.

My advice? Tell a little earlier.

Now the viewer listens to five minutes of platitudes about equality and being nice to each other before we know why she is shaking like a reed. This seriously distracts from the content. Name the (pink) elephant in the corner of the room!

And then to top it off, Emma Watson (yes Hermione) gets to address the UN as a special ambassador of the -he for she- project.

She has not won an Oscar, she is not coming out of the closet, so hyper personal is not her story. But she is a potty serious and nervous that I seriously wonder if feminism benefits from this amendment to it (message: feminism is not man-hating).

Finally, after more than 10 minutes, she creates air.

" You might be thinking ' who is this Harry Potter girl and what is she doing speaking at the UN?'

My advice? Make the joke earlier.

Otherwise, Harry will remain the big elephant in the corner of the room.

"I've been asking myself the same thing. All I know is that I care about this problem and I want to make it better." Reply: "If not me, who? If Not now, when?"

Only now is there relaxation, both in the room and in the speaker. The saintly tone has tempered slightly. A person is standing, and that person has a good question:

"I invite you to step forward and to ask yourself ' If not me, who? If not now, when?"

Hannah Roelofs

Dramaturg, speech coach and student English teacher.View Author posts

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