- Today, I'll be reacting to Ashton Kutcher's speech
that he gave at the Nickelodeon Teen Choice Award
several years back.
This speech is only three minutes
but it really went viral at the time
and has been since shared quite a bit.
In fact, it's so good that there's this politician
that basically plagiarized it
and gave this speech as if it was his
and got in some trouble for it.
So, you know you're good when you're getting plagiarized.
So I want to give you my reaction to Ashton Kutcher's speech
so that we can appreciate it,
but also learn a little bit
about how to come across ourselves.
So let's watch this now.
(upbeat music)
- What's up? What's up?
(audience screaming)
Oh, wow.
Okay, okay, let's be brutally honest.
This is the old guy award.
This is like the grandpa award.
After this, I get to go to like the geriatric home.
- [Fan] We love you!
- First of all, I don't have a career without you guys.
I don't get to do any of the things
that I get to do without you.
You know, I thought that...
(audience screaming)
I thought that it might be interesting,
you know, in Hollywood and in the industry
and the stuff we do, there's a lot of like insider secrets
to keeping your career going.
And a lot of insider secrets to making things tick.
And I feel like a fraud.
My name is actually not even Ashton.
Ashton is my middle name.
My first name's Chris.
(audience screaming)
And it always has been,
it got changed when I was like 19 and I became an actor.
But there were some really amazing things
that I learned when I was Chris.
And I wanted to share those things with you guys
because I think it's helped me be here today.
So it's really three things.
The first thing is about opportunity,
the second thing is about being sexy,
(audience screaming)
and the third thing is about living life.
So first, opportunity.
- Okay, so here we are,
and I can already see why this is going to be powerful.
So first of all, he starts with some light humor,
he thanks people,
helps them calm down and settle down a little bit.
They're going crazy for him, by the way,
not many of us get to such an enthusiastic crowd
when we speak,
but he gives them time to settle down.
He makes himself vulnerable and hooks them
by saying he feels like a fraud
and he tells them his real name.
But I'll tell you the moment that got me,
when he gave his main point,
he said, I'm gonna tell you three things
that I learned when I was Chris.
Boom, right?
That's a hook,
it tells you what he's gonna do,
and then he tells you what the three things are.
He says, opportunity, being sexy, and living life.
And by the way,
when I hear someone give a crisp preview like that,
I know they have a plan.
They know where they're going,
and he even pauses
in between those three points of his preview.
That's where you know, okay,
it sounds like this speaker has a plan.
Let's see where he goes with this.
I believe that opportunity looks a lot like hard work.
When I was 13, I had my first job with my dad
carrying shingles up to the roof.
And then I got a job washing dishes at a restaurant.
And then I got a job in a grocery store deli.
And then I got a job in a factory
sweeping Cheerio dust off the ground.
And I've never had a job in my life that I was better than.
I was always just lucky to have a job,
and every job I had was a stepping stone to my next job.
And I never quit my job until I had my next job.
And so, opportunities look a lot like work.
- Okay.
He knows where he's going, right?
He started off giving us a preview,
opportunity, being sexy, and living life,
and so he's making good on that promise so far.
He talked about opportunity and then he,
what I'm noticing though,
not only that he has a plan here,
is that he is tailoring everything he is saying
for this young audience.
Remember at the beginning,
he said, "Oh this is the old man award.
And I'm gonna talk about when I was Chris."
He's showing who he is, he's being vulnerable,
and then he's saying that these are the kinds of lessons
you can learn, these are the kinds of jobs you probably do,
sweeping floors, and maybe fixing roofs, and washing dishes.
Those kinds of jobs that young people do.
He's connecting this,
everything I've heard so far shows that he's connecting this
directly to this particular young audience.
He's not speaking to the industry,
he's not thanking his manager,
all those things are fine,
but he is talking to them and you can see it.
You can see it's taking shape now.
(audience cheering)
- Number two, being sexy.
(audience screaming)
The sexiest thing in the entire world
is being really smart.
(audience screaming)
And being thoughtful, and being generous.
- See, that's really smart.
- Everything else is crap, I promise you.
(audience screaming)
It's just crap that people try to sell to you
to make you feel like less.
So don't buy it.
Be smart, be thoughtful, and be generous.
- I mean, he's doing so many things great here.
So he's saying number two, being sexy,
because maybe that's what he thinks
his audience cares about, right?
He's trying to connect with his listeners here,
but he instantly pivots it to being smart,
being kind and generous.
So he takes what they might be interested in
and then he loads his real message into that conversation
so that they can learn from it through that hook.
He's also extremely emphatic.
He's got his non-verbals going,
he's using his voice in powerful ways.
He's really committed to this message.
And it is landing.
- The third thing is something that I just relearned
when I was making this movie about Steve Jobs.
(audience cheering)
And Steve jobs said, "When you grow up,
you tend to get told that the world is the way that it is,
and that your life is to live your life inside the world
and try not to get in too much trouble,
and maybe get an education, and get a job,
and make some money and have a family."
But life can be a lot broader than that
when you realize one simple thing,
and that is that everything around us that we call life
was made up by people that are no smarter than you.
(audience cheering)
And you can build your own things,
you can build your own life that other people can live in.
So build a life, don't live one, build one.
Find your opportunities, and always be sexy,
I love you guys.
(upbeat music)
- This is great,
this is one of those drop the microphone speeches.
So he really brings it home here.
And again, he's tailoring it to them,
he's talking about that their life is what they make of it.
They can create the kind of life they want,
they don't just have to live in someone else's world,
they can create the world they want to live in.
And that's a real powerful,
it shows that he wants his listeners to know
that they have agency.
They have something to offer.
That's powerful.
All three of these points,
really the whole speech was only a few minutes,
like three minutes speech of the total time he's talking.
That's powerful stuff
because it's tailored directly to them
and he's fully committed,
and he even recaps at the end.
You know, he has his three points at the beginning,
he shares his three points,
and then he recaps in one sentence
what his three points were at the end,
which is really, you know this guy's got a plan.
Now, big picture,
I'll bet you that he practiced this message 10 times,
I would not be surprised if he practiced this 20 times
in the privacy of his own home.
Probably sounded like a crazy person
pacing around his house
saying these over and over again
because he doesn't use any notes
and yet it doesn't sound memorized,
it sounds like he's internalized what he wants to say.
I mean, that is a really powerful way to do it,
so much better than a lot of the speeches you see
when people get awards
and they've got a little crinkled piece of paper
and they thank about 40 people that no one's ever heard of.
And I get why people do that,
but boy, this was a huge opportunity.
He was extremely prepared and he just crushed it.
Super impressed.
Wow, did he surprise me!
Ashton Kutcher had it in him!
That is really amazing.
Wonderful.
So I want to tell you a little bit about the channel,
if you're new to it,
well, I have something
called the Communication Coach Academy
and I offer public speaking
and other communication and leadership classes.
I'll put a link to that in the description below,
you can check that out.
Also, I would like to hear your comments
on what you thought of this speech, this message.
I thought it was incredible, but what do you think?
And also, what are your suggestions?
Write that down below.
Who else should I profile and react to next?
I would love to hear your comments and suggestions,
probably you're gonna have better ideas than I will.
So thanks for watching
and I will see you in the next video.