“Great narration means getting out of the way,” says Liev Schreiber, who is the Voice of God on HBO’s documentary series Hard Knocks, which every season follows one NFL team through its training camp and preseason, and another through its regular season. “In my favorite documentaries, the narrator supplies the bare minimum of information you need so that you feel it’s happening in your own mind.”
Schreiber, an Emmy contender in the outstanding narrator category this year, has been the unseen storyteller of Hard Knocks since 2001 (the only exception being 2007, when Paul Rudd stepped in). For Schreiber, narrating a documentary for more than two decades means staying consistent “in terms of tone and read.” He credits 24/7‘s boxing episodes as a major inspiration for his own narration.
Liev Schreiber
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“Aaron Cohen’s writing style was very poetic, and the juxtaposition between the brutality of the sport and the poetry of the writing, for me, really determined the style,” says Schreiber. Plus, he’s always been heavily influenced by the late broadcaster and sports announcer John Facenda. “For me, it’s never really so much about the voice. It’s about suiting the language to the action and having it leave you in a satisfying place. Nobody was better at that than John Facenda,” he says.
Schreiber knows he shouldn’t pick favorites (“so many seasons have stood out to me”), but as it turns out, Offseason With the New York Giants, the season he was submitted for in the Emmys race, is one of his — because he’s a “New York guy.” A close second would be the 2023 New York Jets season, which for the first time saw Schreiber step in front of the camera as well — by dropping in on the Jets’ training camp by helicopter, no less. “It felt terrible,” he admits when asked about appearing onscreen in the season. “I had no business being there!”
Schreiber has received his fair share of Emmy nominations: for acting in Ray Donovan, and also for narrating other docs. “A nomination for acting is different than a nomination for reading somebody else’s words,” he says. “I do feel like the voice should disappear into your conscience, so the idea of being noticed is almost antithetical to the task. … It’s really sweet when that happens.”
This story first appeared in a June stand-alone issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. To receive the magazine, click here to subscribe.
