They sometimes switch nationalities for Arnold, as well. In “Predator”, his nickname was “Dutch”.
“OverSoutherning” would always get a comment ln MST3K. There is an abundance of actors who were born and raised in the south, but somehow Minnesotan Jessica Lange got cast as Blanche in “Streetcar”. Southern accents in American films are always laughably terrible.
I don’t even think southern-born actors can pull it off anymore, it probably got beaten out of them by voice coaches early in their career. I’ve never heard an actor who can do a natural southern accent like Lindsay Graham or Pat Summerall, whose natural southern accents were things of beauty.
The best Arnold line ever was at the start of Commando, when they had to explain how he came to be in an elite US Army unit. They just made him an anti-Communist refugee: “Venn I vas a little boy in East Cher-ma-nee…”
To be fair, that’s true of any of his movies besides Bill and Ted.
And that’s why it’s not “All I want to do when I wake in the morning is hear your voice”.
John Travolta in Killing Season does a horrendously painful Serbian accent, and i don’t even know what a good Serbian accent sounds like. What? You’ve never seen or heard of Killing Season? Be glad.
From RogertEbert.com (though sadly not written by ebert, RIP):
Larry Fine, of The Three Stooges. Whenever Moe and Curly, or Moe and Shemp, or Moe and Curly Joe, would affect an accent, Larry would just speak in his same American accent. He never attempted an accent, even when, as he sometimes did, he used Yiddish phrases (all the Stooges, except for “Curly Joe” DeRita, were Jewish).
“Movie Accent Expert Breaks Down 32 Actors’ Accents | WIRED”
Don Cheadle in Ocean’s 11. Ugh.
I just started watching an Irish show starring Scottish actor Iain Glen—Ser Jorah Mormont. I’m no expert on Irish accents but it sounded pretty terrible to me.
Ah … It’s called Jack Taylor — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ID0QoJRBS2o
This is exactly the reason I can’t stand to listen to Hugh Laurie’s American accent.
She has said in interviews that she can no longer do her original Australian accent. It’s gone, like John Mahoney’s original English accent.
[quote=“ralfy, post:87, topic:768166”]
“Movie Accent Expert Breaks Down 32 Actors’ Accents | WIRED”
[/QUOTE]Thanks. I was expecting an awful watchmojo type thing but this was actually fascinating:)
Zellweger doing a British accent was pretty good. First of all because she’s an American actress playing a Sloaney pretentious gall in a pretentious industry, secondly because British accents are far more varied than are portrayed in movies, so it’s easy to suspend any disbelief. Even Hugh Grant put on a fake accent in that film, as he was playing a caricature of a type you imagine works in the media in central London.
I thought the same about Don Cheadle’s accent, and not knowing of him thought he was a Londoner givin’ it the all that an’ then some in a Hollywood massive film. I’m a Londoner and have heard that type of speech many times, when someone’s trying to make an impression.
Jane Leeves’s accent as Daphne Moon really grated on me, her brother who appeared for an episode or two was almost Dick Van Dyke-ish in how bad his accent sounded, but she was in every episode and her faux Mancunian accent was a real bugbear. She’s from Essex, as is David Beckham, and so her natural accent is more Home Counties with a bit of Eastender - far removed from Mancunian.
As for Christopher Lambert; he couldn’t act his way out of a paper bag, let alone do that whilst changing his accent. He’s also a complete twat, but at least he’s self-aware enough to know he can’t act and so doesn’t try to anymore.
[Shrug] Beats me. As a dyed-in-the-wool American, I wouldn’t know a Londoner from a Mancunian. Simon Moon just sounded like an English tough guy.
The recent Harry Potter-adjacent film *Fantastic Beasts *had some truly awful Noo Yawk accents, mostly delivered by British actors. And I mean, some of them were “Daleks in Manhattan”-level bad.
I believe the same is true for their mother, played by Millicent Martin. Having lived in England myself, I know something about its regional accents; ones from the north are very different from those in the south.
Wasn’t the guy who played Simon Moon actually from Australia? And the rest of Daphne’s brothers from everywhere but Manchester?
Yep, an Australian putting on a dodgy London accent. Beats me how he could be her brother seeing as they were born in different parts of the country. Maybe that was some kind of in-joke, as Aussies’ and Brits’ accents are often mistaken for each other. It’s hard to think the producers of Frasier actually made the mistake themselves.
In The Marx Brothers movie Go West the three women in the saloon join in Groucho’s toast and give their places of birth as Mississippi, South Carolina, and Louisiana.
Chico says, “Hey, I thought-a these-a girls were sisters.”
Groucho answers, “They are, but their mother lived in a trailer.”
Who knows where Harold and Gertrude Moon lived all those years they were bringing kids into the world. All over England, perhaps! 
Millicent Martin in Stop the World, I Want to Get Off!:
Millicent Martin as Gertrude Moon on ***Frasier***:
Which actually made it funnier. 