How do actors (or anyone else for that matter) go about learning to speak in a believable foreign accent, (i.e. while speaking in their own native language, they can sound like they’re from another country?)
I remember Peter Sellers spoke in an excellent American accent (as the president of the USA) in the movie Dr. Strangelove. And Gwyneth Paltrow in Emma spoke in a very good English accent.
Did they have to learn to mispronounce words in order to pronounce them correctly? Did they have to stay in character all the time in order to maintain their accents?
David Alan Stern and Gillian Lane-Plescia are the foremost instructors in accents. You can order a CD or tape of just about every accent under the sun here.
Excellent? I have loved Sellers all my life, but I’ve always thought that President Merkin Muffley was one of his least convincing accents. Oh, well, de gustibus and all that.
BTW, Sellers built all his characters by starting the voice. He was set to play the part of Major Kong (the B-52 pilot) as well as the other three, but couldn’t get the Southern accent down. So the part went to Slim Pickens.
BTW, Sellers built all his characters by starting with the voice.
:smack:
Nitpick: It’s true that Sellers had difficulty learning the Texas accent; however, the real reason he quit the part was because he broke his leg. (Which is also why the character of Dr. Strangelove is confined to a wheelchair.)
Nick Nolte in Lorenzo’s Oil had a TERRIBLE accent, although I did read somewhere that that’s how Augusto Odone actually talks! (But I doubt he drops the accent and launches into Nolte-speak whenever he gets angry…)
I studied acting at college in the UK, and we actually had accent classes. We were given a rudimentary grounding in phonetics, and then given various words written down phonetically in a variety of accents.
We were also given more esoteric (mumb-jumbo) techniques, such as “New Yorkers live in a crowded, frantic world, so their words are short and clipped, whereas Texans live in the big sky and have a slower, more laid back and open way of speaking”. This sort of thing helps some people.
Of course, it’s to do with one’s talent for mimicry too. Some people just ‘get it’ without tuition, some get it with hard work, and some people never get it at all no matter how hard they try.
For me, there’s a “key” word or phrase that I have to say to get a handle on any given accent. I’d put my general ability around 80%, which still wouldn’t be good enough to convince native speakers. I’ve been living in Ireland for 9 years and have only just started to be able to do a vaguely reasonable Irish accent. Gwyneth Paltrow’s ability is pretty stunning, as is Meryl Streep’s, and all the Aussies and Brits in Hollywood seem to be pretty good at being American.
Most of them are, but I’ve heard that it’s easier for Brits to sound American- you just flatten your vowels.
Er, further nitpick: in Roger Lewis’s biography of Sellers, it is said that Sellers faked a broken ankle in order to evade having to play the part of Major Kong…
It has always struck me that Americans have great difficulty with French accents. Maybe it’s because Mel Blanc’s awful accent as Pepe Le Pew. But they also say “mass-oose” (to rhyme with “moose”) for masseuse, so it might not be all be his fault.
I think that’s an arbitrary statement with little basis in reality. For example, English people trying to do a (non Mass or NJ) American accent have to reinsert the trailing letter Rs that our accent negates. That takes a lot of concentration. I’d say that was said by someone who didn’t really know.
I’d agree with jjimm. I’m in a position to hear a lot of different British accents, and a lot of people trying to imitate an American accent 'cause they think its funny. They get the vowels OK, but the ‘r’ is verrrrrrrry difficult. Especially at the end of a short vowel, like in ‘car’.
Incidentally, I accidentally started speaking in a really posh accent when I was imitating one of my friends, because the really posh accent is quite nasal, which is actually easier for a (Chicagoan) American.
I always find the BBC productions very amusing, where they have some British actor pretending to be an American, and the accent always sounds sorta like Maryland (half way between Virginia and New England).
An old girlfriend of mine in Denver, who was a professional voice coach, taught actors and actresses how to speak in foreign accents as part of her work. She specialized in accents most commonly used in the theater; Brooklyn, Boston, a few Southern US accents (New Orleans, urban South, rural deep South), Irish, a few UK accents (Recieved Pronunciation, Cockney, Liverpool), and Australian. She’d have to do some research if she got a rare request for a regional dialect not often used in live theater, like Canadian Prairies, Pittsburghese or South African.
Of course we won’t mention Dick Van Dyke’s wonderful Cockney accent !
I speak Syrian Arabic (though I’m a little rusty but not too bad), and even though its not my native language, I found it easy to do an Arab accent when speaking English to someone, especially telemarketers. (Body language is important too!)
It seems to be a matter of mastering the sounds of a language and then transferring those sounds to your own language.
For example, would a non-native speaker of French do a more convincing French accent than say someone who is just trying to do a French accent in their own language?
Most Americans have little formal familiarity with French. Plus, it has vowels that we don’t have at all. If you are not familiar with the way someone speaks your language, you’ll more likely than not fail to reproduce their accent of your language. The “eu” in masseuse is the open mid front rounded vowel, which is simply the rounded form of the e in “met” (in American English).
You also need to hear an accent frequently to get it right, which is why all of those American kids whose parents are foreign born can imitate their parents really well. I can do a somewhat decent imitation of my grandmother, but my parents are both native English speakers, so I don’t always get it right (although a Filipino accent is easier than say, a French or German one).
It is funny to hear many British actors who haven’t had a lot of training in American accents trying to reproduce them. There’s always a very British edge to the accent even if they get 99% of it right.
Speaking of Filipino accents, i remember in the movie “The Adventures of Priscilla: Queen of the Desert” that the “Filipina” wife of the mechanic they meet has an incredibly horrible Filipino English accent. It doesn’t sound anything at all like a Filipino accent, and sounds like poor imitations of Thai or Vietnamese English accents. And yes, I know she’s supposed to be Filipino because she says a very distinct vulgar phrase that any Filipino will instantly recognize. I think the only thing the actress got correct was substituting P for F.
I agree. Having spent several years at school in Texas, I thought I could do a great American accent - until I did a voiceover in it a couple of years ago, and was shocked to find that my vowels were hopelessly clipped, and I just sounded like another crappy jobbing British actor faking it, as found in much BBC radio drama.
I always find it funny when Americans decry “Horrible British accents” but just as easily the British can do horrible American Accents (even when trying a Brooklyn or NY accent)
Maryland isn’t halfway between Virginia and New England; it’s right alongside Virginia. Most of Maryland (outside Baltimore) uses a Tidewater accent, which is basically Southern. Certain islands in the Chesapeake, however, have their own accent. The uplands of western Maryland begin to merge into the Appalachian dialect.
What’s really midway between New England and the South is Philadelphia. Sounds to me like most British actors who do bad American accents try for the Philly accent. At its worst it can be pinched, harsh, nasal, and very flat. Patrick Stewart is one actor who should stay away from American accents.
Gary Oldman is the Accent King of the world. Nobody else can do such a wide variety of American and other non-British accents and get them all right.
I dunno, but good actors can do it. When Peter Ustinov was interviewed on US TV he sounded like he was from the midwest. But he naturally spoke with a British accent and many people in this country thought he was putting that on.
And it isn’t only foreign accents. The British actress who played the physical therapist on Frasier (I can’t come up with the name, dammit!) said she learned the Manchester manner of speech after several month of practice with a coach. And most US listeners wouldn’t have known the difference.
You do know that the character of Daphne is a complete joke in the UK, due to the accent not remotely resembling anything real? Whether it was originally a knowing nod to an anticipated British audience familiar with bad accents coming from American mouths, or just ineptness, I don’t know. But Jane Leeves certainly knows and accepts how silly it is.