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Toddlers & Tiaras....does anyone understand?
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<blockquote data-quote="Marguerite" data-source="post: 351921" data-attributes="member: 1991"><p>Susie, I think you're right about the 'bad habits' a kid can get into, when it comes to the fake smiles and other mannerisms that they're taught to put on. I remember seeing a documentary about Shirley Temple in her role as an ambassador for the UN. She was talking to an old man from Ghana, I think it was, and I saw the character she used to portray as a little girl, coming out in her voice and other facial mannerisms. It was so ingrained in her form so young, that she had never lost the habit.</p><p></p><p>Similarly, Jerry Mathers, who played "Leave it to Beaver", was back on TV as an adult in a sort of "Return to the Beaver" storyline. The trouble was, his acting was still the same, so there he was, a grown man, "acting" like the child he used to be on TV. Perhaps in his mind he was acting and that is what he remembered the craft of acting to be, that exaggerated turn of the head, the "aw, gee," regret in his voice as he looks at his feet... the poor bloke had been totally ruined as an actor.</p><p></p><p>This doesn't always happen to child actors - only those ones who are trained to be cutesy and who never learn anything more than this. But in pageants (from what I've seen on TV when it occasionally impinges on the Aussie consciousness) these pageant kids never learn anything BUT cutesy.</p><p></p><p>We have child actors here. We don't have much in the way of pageants, I don't think. I'm sure there are some, but I think a country has to have a "critical mass" of pageants in order to make it worth people's while to get involved. You seem to do best when you go form one pageant to another, otherwise the expense and the hassle just isn't worth it. Plus we're a big country here with a smaller population, you have to travel further to get to the next pageant and there aren't the same numbers of people involved to justify it all.</p><p></p><p>What seems to be the big thing here, is dance lessons, acting classes, especially those agencies which sign kids up technically as agents for them to get paying jobs on TV, but in reality the kids have to attend classes in order to remain on the books - only they have so many kids registered, that the chances of getting a break in paid work is miniscule.</p><p></p><p>The fashion when I was a kid, was elocution lessons. "Speech and drama", mostly because back then Australia had a collective inferiority complex about our own national identity. It was embarrassing to seem to be Australian, it was seen as lower class, somehow. The British class system seemed to prevail and the announcers on the radio as well as our political leaders, all sounded British. In my parents' day, an English accent got you places. By the time I came along it had been modified somewhat, a very English accent was not so desirable. So of course we were all trained to speak what was called "educated Australian" which I guess is similar to the way Cate Blanchett sounds. It's the accent you need on an Aussie stage if you're doing Shakespeare. It was only a few years later that a broader Aussie accent became publicly acceptable - that is, acceptable in public life (radio/TV presenters and in parliament). That's how we get the broader accents in people like Russell Crowe and Paul HOgan, although Paul Hogan especially talks the way he does because he was always, proudly, "working class".</p><p></p><p>These days we don't really have a class system in Australia, but increasingly parents want the fast buck for their kids and try to get them into some form of paid performance. I admit I'm no exception - we succeeded to a certain extent with easy child 2/difficult child 2. However, she's not as driven to it as she used to be. Ironic really, considering we've just been told that she now has a second entry in IMDB, for her role in "The Black Balloon". She's also in there for a short film called "Eve". In that short film, she doesn't even appear until after the final credits. </p><p></p><p>There is danger in any kind of training for kids, that teaches them that you have to be false to succeed. To a certain extent my childhood elocution lessons did this, but it was still happening on a very broad scale. Maybe it was easier on me because I was so darn good at it - so good, that although I've trained myself to speak with a much broader accent than when I was a kid, I still sound "posh" when tired. I actually have to bung on an Aussie accent!</p><p></p><p>The dance classes the kids did, taught them to smile while performing even if their feet hurt or they've just missed a step. Almost the same as a false pageant smile, but not quite. easy child 2/difficult child 2 is darn good at the performing smile, I've seen her really tired at the end of a long stiltwalking gig, feet hurting and shins blistered, ready to get down off her stilts - then along comes a kid wanting a balloon, and easy child 2/difficult child 2 just dazzles with that smile. She's marvellous with kids. We used to think ti was because she was a kid herself, or looked so much like a kid the same age that other kids warmed to her. But now she's older, little kids still love her and want to sit on her when she's running a party. I think she's going to make a very popular teacher when she's finished her training. </p><p></p><p>It's funny where you can end up when you do this sort of thing - I did speech and drama, and I also did a lot of acting up until I had kids. Then I worked in science, finally left when I became disabled and only recently have I begun getting back into acting work, especially anything using my voice. Back to my training.</p><p></p><p>easy child 2/difficult child 2 did a lot of dance training, then learned her circus skills when she was 8. She's worked professionally in various ways since she was about 11 years old, took a break for a few years and now is getting back into it (with me at the moment, it seems) but is adapting all this to take her into teaching and working with kids. The play we're both involved in is to be presented as a teaching aid for schools. So we meet in the middle...</p><p></p><p>What life skills or future employment prospects can come out of the training for pageants?</p><p></p><p>Marg</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Marguerite, post: 351921, member: 1991"] Susie, I think you're right about the 'bad habits' a kid can get into, when it comes to the fake smiles and other mannerisms that they're taught to put on. I remember seeing a documentary about Shirley Temple in her role as an ambassador for the UN. She was talking to an old man from Ghana, I think it was, and I saw the character she used to portray as a little girl, coming out in her voice and other facial mannerisms. It was so ingrained in her form so young, that she had never lost the habit. Similarly, Jerry Mathers, who played "Leave it to Beaver", was back on TV as an adult in a sort of "Return to the Beaver" storyline. The trouble was, his acting was still the same, so there he was, a grown man, "acting" like the child he used to be on TV. Perhaps in his mind he was acting and that is what he remembered the craft of acting to be, that exaggerated turn of the head, the "aw, gee," regret in his voice as he looks at his feet... the poor bloke had been totally ruined as an actor. This doesn't always happen to child actors - only those ones who are trained to be cutesy and who never learn anything more than this. But in pageants (from what I've seen on TV when it occasionally impinges on the Aussie consciousness) these pageant kids never learn anything BUT cutesy. We have child actors here. We don't have much in the way of pageants, I don't think. I'm sure there are some, but I think a country has to have a "critical mass" of pageants in order to make it worth people's while to get involved. You seem to do best when you go form one pageant to another, otherwise the expense and the hassle just isn't worth it. Plus we're a big country here with a smaller population, you have to travel further to get to the next pageant and there aren't the same numbers of people involved to justify it all. What seems to be the big thing here, is dance lessons, acting classes, especially those agencies which sign kids up technically as agents for them to get paying jobs on TV, but in reality the kids have to attend classes in order to remain on the books - only they have so many kids registered, that the chances of getting a break in paid work is miniscule. The fashion when I was a kid, was elocution lessons. "Speech and drama", mostly because back then Australia had a collective inferiority complex about our own national identity. It was embarrassing to seem to be Australian, it was seen as lower class, somehow. The British class system seemed to prevail and the announcers on the radio as well as our political leaders, all sounded British. In my parents' day, an English accent got you places. By the time I came along it had been modified somewhat, a very English accent was not so desirable. So of course we were all trained to speak what was called "educated Australian" which I guess is similar to the way Cate Blanchett sounds. It's the accent you need on an Aussie stage if you're doing Shakespeare. It was only a few years later that a broader Aussie accent became publicly acceptable - that is, acceptable in public life (radio/TV presenters and in parliament). That's how we get the broader accents in people like Russell Crowe and Paul HOgan, although Paul Hogan especially talks the way he does because he was always, proudly, "working class". These days we don't really have a class system in Australia, but increasingly parents want the fast buck for their kids and try to get them into some form of paid performance. I admit I'm no exception - we succeeded to a certain extent with easy child 2/difficult child 2. However, she's not as driven to it as she used to be. Ironic really, considering we've just been told that she now has a second entry in IMDB, for her role in "The Black Balloon". She's also in there for a short film called "Eve". In that short film, she doesn't even appear until after the final credits. There is danger in any kind of training for kids, that teaches them that you have to be false to succeed. To a certain extent my childhood elocution lessons did this, but it was still happening on a very broad scale. Maybe it was easier on me because I was so darn good at it - so good, that although I've trained myself to speak with a much broader accent than when I was a kid, I still sound "posh" when tired. I actually have to bung on an Aussie accent! The dance classes the kids did, taught them to smile while performing even if their feet hurt or they've just missed a step. Almost the same as a false pageant smile, but not quite. easy child 2/difficult child 2 is darn good at the performing smile, I've seen her really tired at the end of a long stiltwalking gig, feet hurting and shins blistered, ready to get down off her stilts - then along comes a kid wanting a balloon, and easy child 2/difficult child 2 just dazzles with that smile. She's marvellous with kids. We used to think ti was because she was a kid herself, or looked so much like a kid the same age that other kids warmed to her. But now she's older, little kids still love her and want to sit on her when she's running a party. I think she's going to make a very popular teacher when she's finished her training. It's funny where you can end up when you do this sort of thing - I did speech and drama, and I also did a lot of acting up until I had kids. Then I worked in science, finally left when I became disabled and only recently have I begun getting back into acting work, especially anything using my voice. Back to my training. easy child 2/difficult child 2 did a lot of dance training, then learned her circus skills when she was 8. She's worked professionally in various ways since she was about 11 years old, took a break for a few years and now is getting back into it (with me at the moment, it seems) but is adapting all this to take her into teaching and working with kids. The play we're both involved in is to be presented as a teaching aid for schools. So we meet in the middle... What life skills or future employment prospects can come out of the training for pageants? Marg [/QUOTE]
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