Why didn't they just make Picard British when they cast Patrick?
- Thread starter ED-209
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Do you have a photo of him from the time?
I mean all I did was google "Actors who were considered to play Picard" that led me to that Memory Alpha page with the names. I'm not familiar at all with the actor.
I looked at his IMDB page, and it seems the most well known thing he was in around the time TNG started was a Bond movie called "A View to a Kill", I've never had interest in Bond Movies, so I dunno how good he was in it or whether he has an accent in it.
I also don't know how to attach pictures in this forum, but here's the IMD page with photos of him from that movie;
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0090264/characters/nm0000872
(he's the guy with slicked back, dark hair and receding hairline)
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You know what?
I'd be curious to see the alternate universe series where he got the role...
You know what?
I'd be curious to see the alternate universe series where he got the role...
I'm honestly very happy with the character Picard evolved into after season one. And his character is one of the big reasons why I have always preferred TNG to TOS.
Considering that Mr.Bauchau is the same height as Jonathan Frakes and generally looks a bit more physically imposing than Patrick Stewart I think he might have become a more classic, more action-oriented character.
I wonder if this version of Picard would have made Riker (even more) redundant?
We knew the difference between English and French accents in the 1980s.
I feel like you need to call ahead before you visit Jet. She seems like the kind of person that'd be annoyed by a bunch of people from the next century just showing up in her workshop.
What a delightfully awkward scenario
He might come across as too FrenchYou know what?
I'd be curious to see the alternate universe series where he got the role...
So the name "Jean-Luc Picard" was inspired by real-life Swiss explorer Jacques Piccard...there was an instance on the character being of French ancestry, but really didn't look too far outside of America to cast the part...seriously considered casting an African or African-American actor for the role (even Avery Brooks was said to be considered, but was thought to be unavailable at the time)...and eventually settled on British actor Patrick Stewart because he just happened to be in America at an UCLA reading event that TNG producer Robert Justman was also attending?
Given the real-life odyssey of the role, it may not matter what nationality or accent Picard had...
Given the real-life odyssey of the role, it may not matter what nationality or accent Picard had...
I still say either Picard or Riker should have been non-caucasian. Preferably Riker, because it would suck to lose Patrick Stewart.
The only time I can recall it actually being pronounced 'Pickert' was by that landlady in Time's Arrow, and that was to a comedic purpose. Most of the time it just was prounounced 'Picard' the way I would expect an English speaker to do when without a clue this is supposed to be a French name.
As for mispronouncing a French name .... well, back when I lived in France, most French I met never made an effort trying to pronounce my name the way it 'should have been' and simply used the French conventions. Can't really get worked up over such things.
What I find funny is the Terminator, I mean he can speak perfectly imitating not only the voices but also the speech patterns of the cop whose car he stole after hearing him say a couple of words and Sarah's mother after I guess hearing her say a few words too but when he speaks as himself it's in this thick German accent! I mean what were they thinking? Let's make this android killer that speaks like he's from another country, that will help the infiltration.
I exaggerated the last name, because I didn't know how to convey the difference between how Picard was pronounced on the show vs the way the name ought to be pronounced in writing. With Jean-Luc it was easy, with Picard not. Maybe I should have written "Picart" or "Picarte"
I'm not getting "worked up", I just find it silly.
Plus...your experience was in real life, dialogue in a show is something altogether different form real life conversations.
If you have a French character on a show that is set in a future in which humanity has become more inter-mingled, I think the effort can be made to pronounce his name correctly.
Actually, when you say "Picard" in French, the "D" is silent. Nobody on the show says it correctly, least of all, Picard himself.
Yes...that's what I said, thanks for repeating it. And as I also said, in the German dub they say his name correctly, both Jean-Luc and Picard. I just have no idea of how to write that phonetically in English.
I don't think it's possible to write it in English phonetics, which explains why English people can't say it. For an adult, it would take months of practice. A child would do it faster, if they're young enough.
Some English words can be really hard to pronounce for a French person.
I have some tongue twisters in my native language that you could spend a lifetime trying to pronounce and you'd still be spotted as a foreigner when you did. I've read an interesting theory about something like two hundred phonemes that if they were taught to a child before the age of five would allow them to speak any language without an accent. The thing is, by the time most people learn a second language it's already too late.
No I'm pretty sure it is possible. The only part I'm having trouble with is the French "u" sound.
Plus I was talking about how to convey to keep the d in Picard silent.
That is nonsense. It does NOT take "months of practice" to pronounce Jean-Luc Picard reasonably well. I'm not talking about learning proper French pronunciation or a flawless pronounciation, I'm talking about pronouncing one single to an acceptable degree.
It does NOT take "months of practice" to say "Shaw" instead of "John" or to keep the d in Picard silent. That just needs a few minutes of being told how to pronounce it, and that's already a good approximation already 2/3s of the name.
Phonetical and dubbing.... Fortunately Finnish television doesn't do dubbing except in kids cartoons.
Pronouncing is also interesting, maybe....? I would estimate that in Finnish language words are written and pronounced exactly the same way in more than 90% of the words.
Pronouncing is also interesting, maybe....? I would estimate that in Finnish language words are written and pronounced exactly the same way in more than 90% of the words.
Two things;
"Shaw" sounds different from the French "Jean", it sounds like "chant" which in French means song as in "Le Chant Du Cygne".
There is no possible way to say "Jean" by using English phonetics and the approximations sound like someone with a lisp.. at best. The vowels also are all wrong. The French vowels don't have an equivalent in English, and vice versa I must add.
The way the English say "Picard" even if they keep the "d" silent is quite different from the way the French do.
the "ar" in Picard is particularly hard to master. If you want to make it seem French you have a lot to learn.
English people who kinda sound like they're French but not quite are those who learned the tongue before seven or eight at most, after that, they are too far gone. That's also true of French people trying to speak English.
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