Kendall At the Billboard Music Awards
It is not the teleprompter’s fault! I can say this with some authority after all I am an operator of those wonderfully useful units. It is part of my job.
Apparently, Kendall Jenner screwed up at least one of her lines at the 2014 Billboard Music Awards. The 18 year-old younger sister of the infamous Kim Kardashian mistakenly introduced the band 5 Seconds of Summer as One Direction and giggled with embarrassment. Her confusing the two groups was due to her making a mistake in reading her lines on the teleprompter rather than due to genuine confusion.
Jimmy Kimmel later made fun of this faux pas on his show. He did a bit that introduced a phony new e-book device called “The Kendall.” Kimmel called this device a worse reader than her, claiming that it had “the illiteracy of a young child.”
Sources claim that Kendall skipped rehearsals for the show which is a quite an unprofessional thing to do. This might explain the reason for her being unfamiliar with the teleprompter and the reason for the error. By now, she should be aware of what being a professional means.
Kendall and Kylie Jenner will host the MuchMusic Video Awards Show together on June 15th. Hopefully this time Kendall will not skip her rehearsals.
Kendall is not the only TV/Film personality to make a mistake while reading a teleprompter. Other notable people have either misread or stumbled over words while reading a teleprompter.
To name some: actor Andrew Garfield, who starred in the “The Social Network,” civil rights and social justice advocate Al Sharpton, and even U.S. Presidents have all made blunders while reading from a teleprompter. Teleprompter blunders happen often and to many, but you can prepare before a teleprompter read so that it will happen less often.
President Obama Using the Presidential Model Teleprompter
I have learned from shoots that required teleprompter, of the importance of rehearsal before a shoot. Many people struggle with teleprompter readings if they have not prepared beforehand. While it is true that a teleprompter feeds a speaker their lines, rehearsal is still very important. One should try their best to memorize their lines, and to get a feel for the rhythm at which they will read their lines beforehand so that there is less of a chance of these factors impacting their performance. The teleprompter in this sense can be used as a safety net in case a line is forgotten. Also, do not worry about reading the lines at the speed the teleprompter is feeding them to you as the teleprompter operator should adjust the teleprompter speed to your reading speed, not the other way around. If the operator does not adjust the speed make sure you ask them to. In the end, a good natural performance is mostly decided by one’s preparedness and willingness to speak to the operator if he is operating the teleprompter too fast or too slow.
