About Emma
Emma Clarke is a leading female voiceover and comedy/drama writer. She voices all kinds of things from advertisements to radio identity packages – but is best known as the ‘voice of the London Underground’.
Previous postings
- Cutting edge discussion: how to say road names in a commercial
- Facing the nation on the telly – the key issues
- Unaccustomed as I am...
- Mind the Gap: The inside story of a very British fiasco
- Awkward Advertising: BT’s Adam and Jane ads
- Translate these phrases into actual English and you’ll win a prize!*
- Excuse me, would you like to rent my mouth?
- Awkward Advertising: John Prescott the boxer
- Awkward Advertising: JLS Wii Party
- Awkward Advertising: Nice ‘n’ Easy’s Dance class ad
- Awkward Advertising: The Boots ‘Not giving gifts this year’ ad
- Awkward Advertising: Halifax’s “ISA ISA Baby” TV ad
- Awkward Advertising: that bloody Match Affinity commercial
Archives
Why I’ll never do porn
Monday
Oct 1 2007
I can talk like a red hot hottie. I can sound as though I’m wearing nothing but a layer of baby oil and a willing smile. Loads of commercials I get to voice have the direction ‘sexy’ at the top. And sometimes I do a voice that sounds too sexy – I mean, who wants to hear a sexy voice on an ad selling cut-price compost? – sometimes a sexy read is just gratuitous, and if I had a quid for every time I’ve been asked to recreate that scene from ‘When Harry Met Sally…‘
But I won’t do porn. Ever.
I get asked, often.You know, doing some dubbing, reading a saucy story and so on. A few months ago a bloke rang up to ask if I was interested in doing some work for a phone-line. “What kind of work?” I asked, suspiciously. “Oh, it’s nothing rude, like,“ he said, defensively. “It’s just a phone line that gives people medical information.”
I wasn’t convinced. The guy sounded like a cross between Bernard Manning and a sweaty thong. “What kind of medical information?” I asked.
There was a pause. “Anal sex,“ he replied.
I declined.
I’m not a prude – hell, far from it – but I don’t think I could do that kind of thing properly. For one, I couldn’t take it seriously. I’d burst out laughing on the build-up to the money shot… But also I don’t know how I’d be able to look my kids in the eye and know what I’d done to pay for their Play Dough. And to be honest, there’s something icky about knowing that on cold, lonely nights, somewhere, for someone, my voice is providing relief…
1 comment · add a comment · this blog is moderated
Emma Clarke takes no responsibility for any comments below, as these do not necessarily represent her views.
Allen
19 January 2011 at
12:58
One (hyphenated) word - Co-Pilot. "Turn left at the roundabout, you dirty little speeder!" Ok, maybe the second half of that sentence was implied, but it was implied heavily enough that I was band from using your voice on my Sat-Nav because my missus didn't like my Sat-Nav flirting with me! ha ha