Voice Coaches Blog

This installment of Voice Overs of the World focuses on a few advertisements with great voice overs featuring accents.

Old Navy has always had a unique sensibility to its ads. Their latest campaign, the SuperModelquins, has been running for over a year now, so it must be doing well for them. And while I’ve seen a bunch of them over the past several months, it wasn’t until this most recent batch that I really paid attention to just how much voice over work there is going on in each commercial. Here I’ve spotlighted three of their most recent (and most voice-over-intensive) commercials in the campaign.

I found some great examples of what I like to call “Matter of Fact” Humor. What that means is that each of the commercials below are funny, clever, well-written ads that require a certain style of delivery. Although these are funny ads, none of the voice overs go for over-the-top humor. Instead, they take a subtle, more stoic approach. The reads aren’t flat or emotionless, but the voice talents involve add just little touches of humor here and there to really sell a dry sense of comedy.

In addition to a film and television career that encompassed over 50 years of acting, Mr. Graves was also a noted voice over talent. He’s most famously known for hosting A&E’s Biography series since 1987, a job that involved narrating the lives of numerous actors, sports figures, scientific pioneers, and notoriously famous personalities.

These two ads featuring deep, male voice overs are about as far away from an announcer-style delivery as you can get.