The Voice Over Practice Script Library

A boy comes running up, and he asks, “What exactly is the ocean? What is the sea?”
You could hit him with a lot of statistics and Latin names, but the answer isn’t something you’ll find in a book. To really know what the ocean is, you have to see it for yourself. And hear it. And taste it. You have to feel its power.

Do not go gentle into that good night,Old age should burn and rage at close of day;Rage, rage against the dying of the light. Though wise men at their end know dark is right,Because their words had forked no lightning theyDo not go gentle into that good night.  Good men, the last wave by, crying how brightTheir frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,Rage, rage against the dying of the light. Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,Do not go gentle into that good night. Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sightBlind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,Rage, rage against the dying of the light. And you, my father, there on the sad height,Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray.Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Bee 1: Hi we're bees.

Bee 2: And we're mad!

Bee 1: Have you ever gone up to a bee and said, "Hey, you bee, thanks for inspiring the great taste of Honey Baked Ham."

Bee 2: No, you haven't!

Bee 1: Whatever!!! You love it. You enjoy it. But you never thank us.

Bee 2: And YOU wonder why... we STING!

Lucky Man – A memoir by Michael J. Fox
Chapter One - A Wake-up Call
Gainseville, Florida – November 1990

I woke to find the message in my left hand. It had me trembling. It wasn’t a fax, telegram, memo, or the usual sort of missive bringing disturbing news. In fact, my hand held nothing at all. The trembling was the message.
I was feeling a little disoriented. I’d only been shooting the movie in Florida for a week or so, and the massive, pink-laquered, four-poster bed surrounded by the pastel hues of the University Center Hotel’s Presidential Suite still came as a bit of a shock each morning.
It was Tuesday morning, so while I couldn’t recall the exact details of the previous night’s debauchery, it was a pretty safe bet that it had something to do with Monday Night Football. In those first few seconds of consciousness, I didn’t know what time it was, but I could be fairly certain that I hadn’t overslept. If I was needed on set, there would have been a phone call from my assistant, Brigette. If I had to leave the hotel at 10:00 A.M., let’s say, she would have called at 9:30, again at 9:40, then finally at 9:50 she would have taken the elevator from her floor up to mine, let herself into my room, propelled me to the shower, and slipped into the kitchen to brew a pot of coffee. None of this having transpired, I knew I had at least a few minutes.

Even with the lights off, blinds down, and drapes pulled, an offensive amount of light still filtered into the room. Eyes clenched shut, I placed the palm of my left hand across the bridge of my nose in a weak attempt to block the glare. A moth’s wing—or so I though—fluttered against my right cheek. I opened my eyes, keeping my hand suspended an inch or two in front of my face so I could finger-flick the little beastie across the room. That’s when I noticed my pinkie. It was trembling, twitching, auto-animated. How long this had been going on I wasn’t exactly sure. But now that I noticed it, I was surprised to discover that I couldn’t stop it.

Weird—maybe I slept on it funny. Five or six times in rapid succession I pumped my left hand into a fist, followed by a vigorous shaking out. Interlocking the fingers of each hand steeple-style with their opposite number, I lifted them up and over behind my head and pinned them to the pillow.
Tap. Tap. Tap. Like a moisture-free Chinese water torture, I could feel a gentle drumming at the back of my skull. If it was trying to get my attention, it had succeeded. I withdrew my left hand from behind my head and held it in front of my face, steadily, with fingers splayed—like the bespectacled X-ray glasses geek in the old comic book ad. I didn’t have to see the underlying skeletal structure; the information I was looking for was right there in the flesh; a thumb, three stock-still fingers, and out there on the lunatic fringe, a spastic pinkie.

Script:

Lucky Man – A memoir by Michael J. Fox
Chapter One - A Wake-up Call
Gainseville, Florida – November 1990

I woke to find the message in my left hand. It had me trembling. It wasn’t a fax, telegram, memo, or the usual sort of missive bringing disturbing news. In fact, my hand held nothing at all. The trembling was the message.
I was feeling a little disoriented. I’d only been shooting the movie in Florida for a week or so, and the massive, pink-laquered, four-poster bed surrounded by the pastel hues of the University Center Hotel’s Presidential Suite still came as a bit of a shock each morning.
It was Tuesday morning, so while I couldn’t recall the exact details of the previous night’s debauchery, it was a pretty safe bet that it had something to do with Monday Night Football. In those first few seconds of consciousness, I didn’t know what time it was, but I could be fairly certain that I hadn’t overslept. If I was needed on set, there would have been a phone call from my assistant, Brigette. If I had to leave the hotel at 10:00 A.M., let’s say, she would have called at 9:30, again at 9:40, then finally at 9:50 she would have taken the elevator from her floor up to mine, let herself into my room, propelled me to the shower, and slipped into the kitchen to brew a pot of coffee. None of this having transpired, I knew I had at least a few minutes.

Even with the lights off, blinds down, and drapes pulled, an offensive amount of light still filtered into the room. Eyes clenched shut, I placed the palm of my left hand across the bridge of my nose in a weak attempt to block the glare. A moth’s wing—or so I though—fluttered against my right cheek. I opened my eyes, keeping my hand suspended an inch or two in front of my face so I could finger-flick the little beastie across the room. That’s when I noticed my pinkie. It was trembling, twitching, auto-animated. How long this had been going on I wasn’t exactly sure. But now that I noticed it, I was surprised to discover that I couldn’t stop it.

Weird—maybe I slept on it funny. Five or six times in rapid succession I pumped my left hand into a fist, followed by a vigorous shaking out. Interlocking the fingers of each hand steeple-style with their opposite number, I lifted them up and over behind my head and pinned them to the pillow.
Tap. Tap. Tap. Like a moisture-free Chinese water torture, I could feel a gentle drumming at the back of my skull. If it was trying to get my attention, it had succeeded. I withdrew my left hand from behind my head and held it in front of my face, steadily, with fingers splayed—like the bespectacled X-ray glasses geek in the old comic book ad. I didn’t have to see the underlying skeletal structure; the information I was looking for was right there in the flesh; a thumb, three stock-still fingers, and out there on the lunatic fringe, a spastic pinkie.

You have meddled with the primal forces of nature Mr. Biel
And I won’t have it.
Is that clear?
You think you merely stopped a business deal.
That is not the case
The Arabs have taken billions of dollars out of this country
And now they must put it back.
It is ebb and flow.
Tidal gravity.
It is ecological balance.
You are an old man who thinks in terms of nations,
And peoples.
There are no nations.
There are no peoples.
There are no Russians.
There are no Arabs.
There are no third worlds.
There is no west.
There is only one holistic system of systems.
One vast and immane,
Interwoven,
Interacting,
Multi-varied,
Multinational dominion
of dollars.
Petro dollars.
Electro dollars.
Muti-dollars.
Riechmarks.
Rens.
Rubles, Pounds and Shekles.

It is the international system of currency,
Which determine the totality of life on this planet.
That is the natural order of things today.
That is the atomic and subatomic,
And galactic structure of things today.
And YOU have meddled with the primal forces of nature.
And you will atone.
Am I getting through to you Mr. Biel?

You get up on your little 21” screen,
And howl about America and democracy.
There is no America.
There is no Democracy.
There is only IBM, and ITT, and AT&T,
And Dupont, Dow, Union Carbide and Exxon.
Those are the nations of the world today.

What do you think the Russians talk about in their Councils of State?
Carl Marx?
They get out their linear programming charts,
Statistical decision theories, Minimax Solutions
And compute the price cost probabilities of their transactions,
And investments.
Just like we do.

We no longer live in a world of nations and ideologies Mr. Biel.
The world is a college of corporations.
Inexorably determined by the
Imutable bylaws of business.
The World is a business Mr. Biel.
It has been since man crawled out of the slime.
And our children will live Mr. Biel
To see that
Perfect world
In which there’s no war,
Or famine,
Oppression,
Or brutality.
One vast ecumenical holding company.
For who all men will work to serve a common profit,
And which all men will hold a share of stock.
All necessities provided.
All anxieties tranquilized.
All boredom amused.