Shift in Rec'd Pronunciation /o/ phoneme?

Factual Questions
#1

For as long as I’ve been aware of pronunciation issues, I’ve understood that the /o/ phoneme in Received Pronunciation manifests as [əʊ] (in General American it’s [oʊ]). You can hear it in English media all the way up to the present day.

Here’s Hugh Laurie and Stephen Fry. (at 0:15 SF: “no mention”; at 0:20 HL: “Beau Brummel”)

Here’s Hugh Grant (at 2:15, “No, no, no, of course not”)

But lately, I’ve been hearing English actors using what sounds much more forward and rounded, perhaps like [əœ]. I associate this kind of sound with Southern Hemisphere English (Australia, New Zealand, South Africa), not with England.

I’ve heard it in the mouths of several English actors, includingNatalie Dormer (at 3:30) and a few actors in Game of Thrones, including Isaac Hempstead-Wright (Bran Stark).

So is /o/ moving forward in British English?

#2

What you’re describing is a lowering as well as a fronting.

Pure fronting of [əʊ] leads to [ə​ʏ]. The endpoint of the diphthong [​ʏ] being approximately as high as the former value [ʊ]. What I hear Dormer saying in the audio example you linked to is actually [ə​ʏ]. Fronted, yes, but still high at the end.

/o/ already got fronted in Valley Girl dialect back in the early 1980s. E.g., Moon Zappa’s famous enunciations. At 0:21 and 0:25 in this clip, we hear [øː​ʏ].

Being an American dialect, the diphthong is rounded all the way through, instead of the rounding beginning in the middle.

#3

Well, I wasn’t sure about the exact starting and ending points, but the fronting was clear. I accept your judgment that it’s a [ʏ].

Would you say that the first part of the diphthong [ə] is moving as well?

Has this been observed as a trend?

#4

It sounded like schwaness as usual to me.

#5

No Engilishers noticing this pronunciation?

#6

Not familiar enough with IPA to really follow the discussion. But I will observe that RP covers a range of different accents. The ones in your examples happen to be old-fashioned or at the “very posh” end of the RP spectrum, especially the Bertie Wooster one, which is an exaggerated pre-war accent.

#7

Well my first thought upon hearing Natalie Dormer speak was that she must be a New Zealander who has managed to mostly replicate an English accent, but was belied by her /o/. I was surprised to discover that she’s English. No one else had that moment?

#8

I can’t read the IPA, but I wonder if the shift you’re noticing is due to RP being influenced by Estuary English? The “o” sound in Estuary resembles the Antipodean variety.

#9

Ah, that is interesting input. Did you listen to the clip of Dormer and the way she says “I know how it goes”? Does that sound Estuarian?

#10

Her “o” doesn’t sound Estuary to me. I’m going to attempt a bit of IPA here and say that Estuary “o” tends towards [aʊ] (but at that extreme the accent is more like full-on Cockney).

#11

No - it sounds RP to me.