Well if we’re going THERE…“Thirteen Days” unfortunately opens with Kevin Costner speaking. My very first thought was, “Oh God…am I going to have to hear THAT for two hours?”
There’s an American Broadchurch? Is it called that? I’ve seen Broadchurch on BBCA (a TV station, BBC America), but I don’t recall ever seeing an “American Broadchurch,” or something like that, as an offering on any station. Off to IMDb after this.
We could have a whole thread of Americans trying to do other American accents badly. Sometimes I wish they’d try, though. I’m waiting for the Rizzoli and Isles episode where they explain that Jane went to boarding school in Texas from age four to age 14, or something, to explain her accent. The parents get a pass, because they could very well be NY transplants living in Boston, which isn’t that far off, and the brothers sound OK-- I don’t think anyone has said exactly where Dr. Isles grew up, except that she DID go to boarding school, but Angie Harmon being from Texas makes my brain hurt, and otherwise it’s such a good show.
Hugh Laurie sounded great. He sounded not just American, but like he was supposed to be from the part of New Jersey he was supposed to be from. I always assumed he must have been copying a specific individual. As far as having an annoying voice, well, House was annoying. I didn’t find Gillian Anderson’s voice annoying, even though she did have a bad case of mid-Western flat vowels, like she was biting down on them before they could get all the way out of her mouth, but a LOT of people in American talk that way.
As far as whether her natural accent is British or American, it probably depends on where she is. I sound more mid-Western when I’m living in Indiana, and more New York when I’m living (or even just visiting) there. I lived in Manhattan and Queens until I was 14, and then in Indiana until I was 24, then I was in New York for a few years, back in Indiana for a few more, back in New York until 2003, and have been in Indiana ever since. I really don’t have a “native” accent anymore. People from Indiana don’t think I necessarily sound like I grew up there, but they don’t peg me for New York, which is a really distinctive accent. I know it comes back to me as soon as I have been there for about 12 hours, though, and I use different vocabulary-- although sometimes I still mess up. I suggested someone who lived in an apartment building in Indiana have a “stoop sale,” which is a New York expression for a moving sale. In Indiana where even poor people often live in houses with garages, such sales are called “garage sales,” and even people who live in apartment buildings or town houses talk about having “garage sales.”
When I first got here (Indiana) I had a lot of trouble parsing out what sounded like a Southern drawl to me back then (now it just sounds ordinary). Someone with a particularly rural aspect to her speech said to me what for all the world sounded like her house “wasn’t far,” and it was really the beginning to a story about the time her house “was on fire.” When I didn’t show the correct concern, I confirmed what a lot of people thought about New Yorkers being uncaring.
Anyway, my point is, that Gillian Anderson can simultaneously have a British and an American accent. Although, I’d like to hear from some UKers who watched the clip if that accent does in fact sound natural. Her American accent sounds fine to me.
If you want to talk about someone who never even tried, how about Angela Lansbury? When she did Jessica Fletcher, I suppose she thought people would accept her English accent would pass for a New England accent, and it sort of did, given that she’s lived in the US for a long time, that her accent has faded a little, but I wonder if the whole reason for choosing Maine as the setting for Murder, She Wrote was that Angela Lansbury couldn’t possibly pass as being from pretty much anywhere other than Maine, New Hampshire, or Vermont, or maybe, possibly Northern Massachusetts.
On the whole, I think that Brits do pretty well when they do American accents on American productions. Otherwise, they don’t get the part, because there are too many American actors. The bad accents are going to be on single appearances on episodes of UK shows.
That said, sometimes actual American actors who appear on UK shows either seem to get chosen for their annoying voices, or get told to exaggerate their accent. Mo Gaffney on Absolutely Fabulous was flatter and more nasally than her normal voice, and so was Cynthia Harris as Wallis Simpson on Edward and Mrs. Simpson. In fact, I thought she was a British actor doing an American accent, her accent was so obnoxious. But she’s just like that. She was also Paul’s mother on Mad about You.
On the other hand, I’ve seen her on Top Gear, speaking with a British accent. I think she’s a reverse John Barrowman - American native, but spent enough time in the UK in her childhood to pick up a British accent and can code-switch on demand.
Well, now that we’ve sorted out Gillian Anderson’s accent, I can only say that I’m glad for her dual citizenship; she can affordably get the much needed surgery on her deviated septum.
Moore lived in Boston for awhile and said there were people who actually spoke that way. I believe her.
Arnold Schwarzenegger? He’s been in a bunch of movies where his character’s background isn’t necessarily explicitly stated to be born-and-raised American, but has a name like Ben Richards or John Kimble. Of course, you could make the case that he wasn’t really trying.
Liam Neeson’s American accent isn’t that great. Not glaring, but there’s just something a little off about it.
I don’t know if this counts as “mainstream”, and it’s been a while since I’ve seen it, but I remember being baffled by Paterson Joseph’s accent in the BBC show Jekyll. I didn’t even realize that the character was supposed to be American at first, I couldn’t quite understand him and thought he just spoke in a super bizarre way. He’s a good actor that I’ve seen in other British TV shows, but I guess he was going for an over the top character and no one noticed or cared that the accent was so over the top as to be unrecognizable.
When did Liam Neeson ever try to do an American accent?
There seems to be an odd tendency to hire non-American actors for US cop shows. I’m thinking of the DA in Law and Order, a few of the actors in Without a Trace, The Mentalist, etc. It’s an odd trend. If the producers want to hire particular actors, I can’t for the life of me understand why they insist the actors put on fake and unconvincing accents. It would be just as easy to create characters with non-US backgrounds which would allow the actors to speak naturally.
Refresh my memory please: which DA in L & O?
The DA (or maybe ADA?) was named Cutter. He was in both the original Law and Order and in SVU.
That’s one thing I liked in Kindergarten Cop–even though there was no explanation for Kimble’s accent, when his partner showed up pretending to be his sister, she spoke with an accent. He looked a little shocked.
Anybody else remember when Lucy Lawless had a flawless fake “generic” American accent on Xena, while Renee O’Connor, who was from Texas, had a regional accent, and was actually harder to understand (for people not from Texas) than Lawless?
Without a Trace was odd, with it’s two Australian, and one British actors, but they all sounded good. The two who were supposed to be from New York really sounded like they were from New York, and the one who was from the mid-West sounded like she was from the mid-West.
That’s the character I was going to mention.
[spoiler]https://youtu.be/a7R2NhgEeg0?t=3m34s[/spoiler]The clip is in a spoiler box since there’s gore and it might be considered NSFW.
There’s a new show, Powers, starring Sharlto Copley. His character is from Seattle, with no explanation given for why he’s got a South African accent.
Paula Malcomson winds up sounding like Carmela Soprano.
In the current show The Americans, Matthew Rhys has a passable American accent but it definitely slips at times. It amuses me because he is supposed to be playing a Russian who can pass for American. So his fake accent actually is meant to be fake.
Another character on that show, who is meant to be a real American, is played by a British actress. Her “American” accent doesn’t sound at all authentic to me.
Andrew Lincoln (Rick from The Walking Dead) gets plenty of grieve for his accent. Especially since he is trying to play a southern Sheriff, which would be hard to pull off even for an American.
Yes, it was called Gracepoint. It was the exact same murder and they had 99% the same solution. I didn’t bother watching it since Broadchurch was awesome, but I heard it was decent, but less compelling.
Oh, my heavens. It’s called “Gracepoint” and it’s nearly identical to Broadchurch, even starring David Tennant as “Emmett Carver” in the Alec Hardy role. I honestly can’t say that his American accent is bad, it’s just wrong. His Scots accent is charming. He looks the same, acts the same, says the same words, but it’s WRONG.
[pout] ninja’d by **Mahaloth **[/end pout]