Michigan Three - Text
This forty four year old actor speaks with a very mild Michigan dialect. His 'r' is unusually light suggesting an influence other than the midwest but he is a child of Michigan. There is a characteristic change on the back 'honest' vowel which becomes a front vowel in Michigan, as demonstrated in "beyond, pot, not, Oliver, Molly, college, and job." The 'a' in cat is somewhat flat and is exhibited in the words, "Ann Arbor" and "passage." This sample was recorded in the Spring of 2000 by Cynthia Blaise. Running time: 00:03:14
TRANSCRIPTION
[Uh] I first started acting in high school, and what happened was, it was a-- the musical Mame, and I’m not a musical person. And I-- that was the first time that I ever auditioned in my life, so they asked me to read for-- I think Beauregard was the character’s name, the southern gentleman. And I was so nervous I went and read with my regular voice. And so, it was the first time… ever did anything like that, and meantime you learn from it. But I got in the chorus, and that was the first time.
And then (uh) I had some fun with that, and people liked it, so I got a-- kinda got hooked on it. And then from there I did a few more shows with (um) the high school I was at, which is Belleville, Michigan, which is outside of Detroit. It’s (um)-- it’s about seven miles from the main airport, Metropolitan Airport, and it’s before you get to Ann Arbor. So, kinda stuck in the middle there.
And then (uh), let’s see, what else did I do? From there was, let’s see (uh)… Plays were: Diary of Anne Frank, (uh) Oliver! the musical-- Oh, I forget which one that was, one that was on the Titanic, but (laughs)-- Unsinkable Molly Brown, that’s it. (Uh)
And from there on I went to college, which is St. Mary’s College, which is in Orchard Lake, Michigan, which is (uh) by the West Bloomfield area. And the reason why I went there was --not for theater because they don’t have a theater program-- it was decided whether I wanted to be a priest or not. So-- I was raised a Catholic, and so… In my b--upbringing, one of us in the family-- out of the five children, one was supposed to be a priest, and one was supposed to be a nun. So, (um) it was-- came down to me (laughs) to be the priest. (Uh) My older sister, she backed out of being a nun, so that wasn’t for her. And then, when I was going to college, I kinda realized that the priesthood wasn’t for me either, so I made some decisions that way. (Uh) Finished with a Bachelor of Arts in Communications, and then I just thought I’d try to go on to whatever kind of theater I could, which was community theater, but also work a full-time job at the same time, which was banking, or hotel work, or-- haven’t waited yet, so, hopefully, that’ll never happen.
(Um) And otherwise, I’ve been acting now for about-- It’s a little over 25 years now, yeah.
UNSCRIPTED SPEECH TRANSCRIBED BY JACQUELINE BAKER, ASSOCIATE EDITOR FOR TRANSCRIPTIONS, February 20, 2008