I’ve just started watching Game of Thrones (i’m on ep. 4), and American actor Peter Dinklage does a pretty good job of an English accent, playing Tyrion Lannister.
I know we’ve discussed this example in the past, but I respectfully disagree. It’s not awful, but it’s not good. I didn’t guess he was supposed to be English for quite some time. It’s more like a quite good American impression of an English accent than an actual English accent.
Also, what Candyman74 said.
I’d be harsher, it was awful. I initially assumed the character was an American with an affected accent because he liked the punk and/or Billy Idol scene. Then I found out he was supposed to be a Londoner …
Maybe it was lampshaded a bit when a flashback of Spike’s early days revealed that his working-class London accent was itself an affectation.
You mean “A dingow ite moi byebye!”
I thought Spike’s accent was pretty good, actually. But given that he was originally posh, from about a hundred years ago, and adopted this accent, and seems to have lived in the US since the seventies, his accent being a bit “wrong” is actually more accurate.
Yeah, I always thought it made sense for him to sound weird, considering he’d been living in California for lord knows how long.
You mean a good Westeros accent.
During a recent episode of Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me!, Gary Oldman revealed that he was assigned a dialect coach during the filming of Tinker, Taylor, Soldier, Spy to restore the purity of his British accent.
Hurrah! What did you get, a T-shirt? Can I see it? I helped you win!!
blushes I thought both of them blokes were English. I saw Davis in something where he had an American accent and I thought it sounded silly!
I remember when I thought Spinal Tap was an actual documentary about a band
Oh noes! 
Or Norn Iron even 
and you heard Tony’s real accent in the episode where all the adults turned into teenagers (sorry, I can’t remember the title) “I’m your Watcher, and I want you to kick his bleedin’ teeth in” or words to that effect
I thought Spike sounded reasonably Cockney-ish, but it was ‘obvious’ he’d spent time living in another country. It was hilarious when he tried to affect an American (Texan?) accent in one episode.
I just checked out that accent and it isn’t flawless, in fact in parts it’s awful. It’s very funny, but it’s not really that accurate, and has plenty of flaws.
No mention of Reese Witherspoon? She has pretty flawless accents in her films where she plays British roles (Importance of Being Earnest, Vanity Fair). Helps that they’re period pieces so the clear, enunciated upper crust English accent is completely in keeping.
I thought he was going for an extreme version of “(Northern) Irish Traveller”, the other Travellers in the film having a slightly less extreme version. I suspect that comedy was intended to trump authenticity at any rate.
You don’t need the (Northern) bit. Irish travellers live in both Britain and Ireland (north and south). He’s doing a traveller accent and in parts it’s very good but he lets slip a few times and it just sounds wrong. Some of the other actors are just using typical regional Irish accents, not actual Irish traveller ones. I agree his performance is funny and that’s all that matters.
I’ve heard a handful of British actors with really bad American accents - all the “Americans” in that Doctor Who episode about Daleks in Depression-era New York, for example. Apparently, we sound very flat and very nasal to you all. Or we sound like Jethro Clampett.
For what it’s worth, Kenneth Branagh’s American accent sounds decent to me. So does John Barrowman’s, but then, he isn’t faking it.
The one that impresses me is Michael Caine. Listening to him, you’d never know he was born and raised in Tennessee.
No, really. If you wait ten minutes you can look it up on Wikipedia.
It’s funny, until I saw this thread I was sure that Bamber’s accent in “Law and Order UK” was fake. Was he hamming it up a bit or was I just prejudiced by seeing BSG first, I wonder.
I’ve been watching The Wire, and Dominic West’s American accent is just…not good. I mean, it’s not comically bad. You can tell the guy is trying. He just sounds so incredibly British sometimes. Idris Elba, on the other hand (Stringer Bell on the show) has a flawless accent. I would never, ever, ever in a million years have guessed that guy is British.
Maybe something like this?
i thought brad pitt in snatch was pretty good…but i’m just an american who lived in britain for 4 years which is nowhere near enough time to understand you all