Steven Soderbergh’s new movie Haywire opens this weekend. It stars MMA star Gina Carano. I’m not an MMA fan nor had I ever heard of Gina Carano until Haywire came about, so I didn’t notice anything wrong with the trailer until I saw on TMZ that Carano’s part—her ENTIRE part—was dubbed over in the final cut of the movie. Additional dialogue recording is part of every film, but it’s mainly for cleaning up bits of audio here and there, in scenes where the sound is garbage. Dubbing someone’s entire part, line by line, is not your typical ADR session. That’s some serious work.
Carano herself doesn’t deny that this happened, admitting she went into the recording studio and redid her part so that Soderbergh could remix her vocals and create a voice less identifiable with her own because she sounded too feminine…? Her explanation didn’t make a lot of sense. Here’s Carano’s real voice:
Here’s the Haywire trailer:
Different, right? Like, really different. So different that it doesn’t even sound like the same person, even accounting for some studio wizardry. In fact, it kind of sounds like actress Laura San Giacomo. (Lainey: Kit De Luca, baby!) Which is the rumor going around, that San Giacomo, in fact, recorded the part and Carano’s voice wasn’t altered but replaced. Here’s a sample of San Giacomo speaking:
Now go listen to the trailer again. You hear it, right? There are a few lines that do sound like Carano. But others, like “You can tell me right now why you sold me out”, sound like someone else altogether. And yes, there’s an uncanny resemblance to San Giacomo’s deeper, huskier voice.
So here are your buffet selections:
1) Carano re-recorded her part and Soderbergh remixed her vocals to create a less feminine voice.
2) Someone else, possibly Laura San Giacomo, recorded the part and was dubbed over Carano to create a less feminine voice.
3) Same as two, except it was done because Carano is not a good actress and dubbing her part was cheaper than reshooting the movie to compensate for her shortcomings.
Despite getting shuffled around last year and ultimately landing a January release date, Haywire is expected to perform well at the box office, and critics are responding positively to it. Yet I suspect the reasoning behind the vocal fake-out has more to do with #3 than anything else. Because why else, if we're supposed to be so into this ass-kicking female action hero, would you change such a big part of her performance? To sound less girly? Really? SHE'S A GIRL. If that's the logic, then what's really being said is, "We don't want a female action star, we want a male action star with breasts." And Soderbergh is not that kind of filmmaker. He's not Michael Bay. Which leaves the possibility that Carano's performance was weak and they had to do something to punch it up.
Welcome to the buffet. What would you like to have today?
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