While attending voiceover workshops last summer, one of the things I learned is that the voiceover industry tends to be male-dominated. Despite the fact I noticed both workshops had more women attending, I really didn’t think much about it until I was watching TV last night. I had just finished watching one of the America’s Next Top Model cycles, had just finished watching a young woman win a Cover Girl contract (based in part on a commercial she shot during the competition)…and listened to a man announce a Cover Girl commercial.
Somehow, that just seems wrong to me. It’s a product for women. Women are featured in the ads. Why isn’t a woman narrating those commercials?
I started digging around, and while I didn’t find much I did find that studies have discovered that we tend to find women believable and men authoritative when we listen to voiceovers. I also discovered how much I don’t pay attention to movie trailers. I think in the back of my mind I’ve always recognized that movie trailers are narrated by men, but with Don LaFontaine’s passing last year there has been a slow, subtle movement to hire women to do these trailers. It hasn’t always been successful because of the movies involved, but there has still at last been an effort.
It’s something I want to start paying more attention to. Does it matter whether the material needs to be believable or come from an authority figure? Is the right gender advertising the product? Are women really not well-represented in the voiceover industry?
