Thursday
11th September 2003
A tale
of two voices - Donald Sinden |
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| Donald
Sinden |
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Hear
an interview with Donald Sinden, who's in the Royal Shakespeare Company
Production of The Hollow Crown with Susannah York. |
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Donald
Sinden, who appearing in The Hollow Crown in Malvern, has one of the
most distinctive voices in showbusiness.
He says he owes those deep mellow fruity tones to two separate voice
coaches.
Early in his career he went for help to a voice coach with the wonderful
name of Leslie Chartris Coffin - who convinced him he needed to make
his voice deeper.
Unfortunately when he moved into films - he's appeared in the Cruel
Sea and Doctor in the House amongst many others - his voice was too
deep for the young parts he was playing.
This meant a trip to another voice coach, who raised his voice a whole
octave.
Now he's learned to speak somewhere between these too extremes, but
he maintains people still can't believe he really speaks like that.
"When I meet people they say 'I thought you put that voice on
for TV! But you can't put on a voice like this - you're just lumbered
with it."
In his 62 years in showbusiness he does everything from Music Hall
to Opera - with a good deal of TV work thrown in along the way.
The Hollow Crown
He's appearing in Malvern in The Hollow Crown, described by the publicists
as 'a unique and celebratory piece of entertainment about the Kings
and Queens of England.'
It was first devised in 1961 by John Barton and this production will
be under his direction.
The Hollow Crown attempts to give a human face to the changing role
of the monarchy through the ages.
From Richard II’s soliloquy at Pomfret Castle through to Malory’s
Morte d’Arthur, by way of Victoria’s naively moving description of
her own coronation and a fifteen year old Jane Austen’s partial, prejudiced
and ignorant historian’s entertaining account of the monarchy from
Henry IV to Charles I.
The Hollow Crown is composed of letters, speeches, poems, songs and
music written by the heads of our country which sparkles with the
wit of several centuries.
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