On Fringe:
Anna Torv is Australian
John Noble is Australian
Joshua Jackson is Canadian
Anna Torv is Australian
John Noble is Australian
Joshua Jackson is Canadian
UK actors playing Americans
- Thread starter Deckerd
- Start date
Yeah, but Dominic West's attempt at a Baltimore accent was distractingly bad, especially in the first season. He sounded like he was from Boston at best. Of course, this was probably only noticeable of you're from Baltimore...and then it was.
The beautiful thing about the series was that they never pinned down where McNulty was born and grew up. All we do know is that at some point, his father worked on the docks, and he went to college at Loyola College in Maryland for a year. So his non-Baltimore accent isn't quite as silly.
You're right that Elba was spot on, though.
And if you thnk Streep does any of them well I have five words for you
"the dingo at my baby"
In point of fact, Marsters has indicated on a number of occasions that his Spike accent is actually based on Head's natural accent. His Received Pronunciation accent as Giles is as fake as Marsters's.
Of course, Landau has the excuse of Drusilla being insane....
* * *
Personally, I find it amusing that of the casts of the two most recent Batman films, six are is English (Christian Bale [Batman], Michael Caine [Alfred], Gary Oldman [Commissioner Gordon], Tom Wilkinson [Carmine Falcone], Colin McFarlane [Commissioner Loeb], Linus Roache [Thomas Wayne]), two are Irish (Liam Neeson [Ra's al Ghul], Cillian Murphy [Scarecrow]), one is Australian (Heath Ledger [The Joker]), and only four are American (Katie Holmes [Rachel Dawson], Morgan Freeman [Lucius Fox], Aaron Eckhart [Harvey Dent/Two-Face], and Maggie Gyllenhaal [Rachel Dawson]) -- even though, of those characters, only Alfred and Ra's are non-Americans.
Of the three biggest behind-the-scenes guys, Christopher and Jonathan Nolan are both English/American, and one is American. And all this for folks working on one of the most quintessentially American icons.
Though that applies in the comics worlds, too. Two of the most memorable tales about Batman and Superman -- Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader? and Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?, respectively -- were written by the Englishmen Neil Gaiman and Alan Moore.
Except Canadians don't have an accent (unless you happen to live on the east coast), so typically they don't have to change the way they speak.
Going the opposite way, American David Anders played the British baddie Sark on Alias -- I was flabbergasted when I found out he wasn't really British.
I'll also agree with TerriO that Claire Danes did a fine English accent in Stardust. One of my favorite movies in recent years.
Yeah, but it makes it more symmetrical if I include him. His voice isn't necessarily different, but he's not American either. Which means none of the main actors are actually Americans even though all their characters are.
Except Canadians don't have an accent (unless you happen to live on the east coast), so typically they don't have to change the way they speak.
Everyone has an accent, don't be silly. It's just that most Canadians have an accent that that is similar to the American Midwestern accent (which is basically the United States's equivalent of Received Pronunciation).
Beat me to it! I was astounded that Mr. Roache was English. Thought he was born and bred in NYC till I looked him up on IMDB! His accent is excellent.
His real accent is the same as Spike's, a working-class London accent. His character in "School Reunion" wasn't working-class, so he used a Received accent. As for using that accent in interviews, it's probably the same reason lots of Americans with Southern accents suppress them when speaking in public: because a more "standard" or formal accent is considered more respectable.
Why should that be surprising? Every year, there's a huge new crop of shows. Some are headlined by famous names but there are always a ton of nobodies in key roles. I've never noticed any indication that HBO gives a flip about casting big names. That's more prevalent on the networks. In fact, I find it frustrating when fairly well known actors that I happen to like a lot - Ben Browder, Peter Coyote, Dean Stockwell - don't show up on my TV radar anymore.
I doubt more than five percent of the viewing public knows or cares anything about the pedigree of actors, or that it factors into anyone's casting decisions. Too much is riding on other attributes of actors - their talent, their looks and most importantly, that ineffable ability to get people to keep tuning in. Sometimes producers don't even care if their American accent can pass muster, that's how little it matters compared with that Q factor thing.
Dominic West (McNulty)
Marsters is from my high school. He's been acting since he was a kid, seems like anyone that is acting for a long time is able to change accents easier. You have to do a lot of listening as an actor so there's a lot of things like that, that are easier to pick up. Plus they all have people that teach them accent.
I was suprised to hear the guy who plays Bill on True Blood speaking with a English accent when interviewed.
And then there's Anna Paquin (Sookie), who was born in Canada and raised in New Zealand. I haven't been able to get the True Blood DVDs yet; has her Southern accent improved at all since the X-Men trilogy (where it was pretty atrocious)?
And Jared Harris, who has a recurring role, is of Anglo-Irish descent (he's the son of the late Richard Harris).
I watched an episode and her accent didn't sound bad at all. Of course, I'm not southern..
Similar threads
