I watched The King’s Speech again a couple of nights ago. Such a lovely film. When it first came out and I told people what about my work here at London Speech Workshop they would ask - “Like in the King’s Speech?”
And I would say—well not exactly.
And superficially that is true—what we do here at London Speech Workshop is very different from Lionel Logue’s strategies. He gets his clients to swear, sing, roll around on the floor…
We get our clients to do exercises for different aspects of communication—we use a Churchill speech to teach how to do eye contact, and an exercise called ‘Tube story’ to teach the value of gesture.
We have all sorts of exercises that make complex, subtle things like sharing ideas with impact, connecting with people and vocal expression, accessible and easy.
Some of these exercises can seem a little silly, and yes, there may even be an imaginary ball that makes an appearance, but every single exercise has a clear point and a visible outcome.
But beneath the differences in detail, there are similarities. Logue’s techniques are not so much about removing the king’s speech impediment, but instead, about giving him his voice.
And that is at the heart of we do.
Clients often come to us wanting to get rid of something, it may be an accent, a bad habit or a deeper fear around public speaking and our approach is constructive rather than reductive. Rather than view our client as someone who needs something removed, we provide a set of powerful tools that replaces bad habits with good ones, and clients get to see the changes for themselves. We believe everyone has everything they need to be their own best communicator. We provide the framework and the simple tools to achieve this.
There is one fantastic scene early on in the film where Logue bets the King he can get him to say a Hamlet speech without his stutter. The king thinks the whole notion is ridiculous and says as much, but agrees to the bet. Logue puts headphones on the king, which play very loud classical music, wiping out his own voice. This ‘trick’ achieves the desired effect, and Logue records the king to prove it. When the king listens to it days later (after having stormed out the room declaring the whole exercise was a failure) he hears himself in wonderment. It’s a little bit of magic.
That’s a little how we work too, we use our tools, filming our clients before and after they learn a tool and then when they watch back, it’s a magical experience. Transformation occurs.
So there are more similarities between Logue and the Serlin Method™, than meets the eye!
Do you struggle with confidence and clarity when it comes to public speaking, or do you want to get rid of an elocution habit that lowers your confidence? Want to get a taste of what communication success could feel like with the Serlin Method™? Then book a Taster Session with us today and start your journey towards communication transformation.