The Bus

She doesn't even sound Australian in this interview:






Compare that to Nicole Kidman:



I still think she does the best accent. Her non-acting voice is irritating. Like an Aussie Fran Drescher (who is Welsh).

Lastyear

Lot of good American accents on TV-Hugh Laurie on House,Aiden Gillen and Dominic West on The Wire come to mind.

UAIOE

I know Jason Statham had a terrible "American" accent in "The One".


Gary Oldman, however, seems to be the gold standard when it comes to being British and doing American accents.

FiveO

Damian Lewis in Band of Brothers did great work covering up his english accent.

Luther Heggs

Rich Fulcher is a former UCB member from Chicago, but he is indeed absolutely awful. I love the Boosh, but Fulcher's presence is always a beating. That points to another trend: American comedians based in the UK who invariably suck.

Merkin Muffley

This is a tough subject...both countries have varying accents which tend to mask authenticity.

What exactly is a "British" accent? As an American, I can tell the difference between Irish, Scottish, and British. By the way, holy crap, James McAvoy at the Oscars? That dude is so freaking Scottish, he sounds like a crazy Mike Myers character. Anyway, I can tell that Eric Idle and John Cleese have different accents. And that John Oliver sounds a lot like Eric Idle. But I don't know where they're from.

And it's worse in America. Americans even have a hard time doing American accents. Boston, Minnesota, Maine, New York, Chicago, Texas...all have VERY different accents. I'd imagine that a British person can obviously tell the difference between the accents in Fargo and No Country For Old Men. TOTALLY different, but all "American."

I live in the South, and there are dozens of accents just around here. Knoxville, TN sounds different from Charleston, SC. But I guess most British people doing an "American" accent would try something general and un-localized, like a central U.S. accent...maybe something plain from Colorado.

Yavin

More importantly, who are better at portraying Canadian accents? Eh?

MartinBlank

I was shocked to see that it took as long as it did before he was mentioned...but I guess he's "slumming it" on television

james2025a

I think that it all boils down to the actor in question. I tend to think that it is easier for an english actor to do an american accent than it is the other way round. Notable actors doing great accents from the other country are:

Gary Oldman (He is amazing at any accent and any character full stop)
Angelina Jolie (Tomb Raider/ Sky Captain - i thought she did a pretty good job on both)
Brad Pitt (Snatch - pretty good Irish accent)
Christian Bale (Does a good American accent overall)
Damien Lewis (Does a great accent especially in Band of Brothers)
Ralph Fiennes (Good job in Quiz Show)
Hugh Jackman (Not english but good at accents both US and English)
Colin Farrell (Minority Report - He does a good american accent in most of his US movies)

There are those that just do terrible jobs:

Renee Zellwegger (Bridget Jones - sorry but this didn't work for me at all for me)
The cast of Blackhawk Down (The actors here give the worst american accents possibly ever.....)
Dick van Dyke (.....with one exception)
Ray Winstone (The accent in The Departed was horrible)

james2025a

The thing with Hugh is that anyone that has grown up in the UK has become totally accustomed to his english accent and to hear him put on a US accent is just plain weird. I actually think that its average at best. He has one of those upper crust english accents that is very difficult to totally eliminate.

james2025a

This is very true. The problem is that just like probably every country, England has numerous different accents depending on where you come from. People in London sound completely different than people in say Liverpool, Leeds, Newcastle, Devon, Cornwall, Manchester or Birmingham. Each part of the country has a very distinctive accent. The only one ever portrayed in movies is the kind of southern london type generic accent without much of an accent at all. It cannot be easy to do a real english accent. I have met people from other cities that even i cannot understand, so to have someone from another country try and emulate them must be tough.

james2025a

Actually another great one has just come to mind.....Daniel Day Lewis. He did great accents in both Gangs of New York and There Will Be Blood.

Nick Martin

TV related, but I had no idea that ANGEL star Alexis Denisof is American, because he's so convincing as a Brit, and more recently Jonny Lee Miller - a Brit playing American lawyer Eli Stone. I can't imagine him with a British accent. I'll have to find something he's in where he speaks normally.

thecrackedjack2

Actually to those people who say Brad Pitt in Snatch. If you watch and listen to the extra materials, you'll see that he is actually quite horrible with it.

He couldn't master the proper accent. So, they gave him the Pikey (SP) character instead. What he speaks in that movie is gibberish, not based on any real accent.

So, while he makes the character convincing, he is not very good with accents.

GreenVulture

I have yet to hear a single American actor speak with an accent that sounds anything other than "I am an American actor who is desperately trying to sound like a natural Brit/Aussie/Irishman/whatever but am failing miserably with my horribly affected accent." Whereas I've heard many non-American actors pull off great to passable US accents.

I see a lot of people choosing Christian Bale, and I dunno; his accent was okay in American Psycho, but I remember there being certain words and letters where his UK accent popped out. I'm still trying to figure out why so many think he's a master with accents though, since in every post-Psycho role where he has to play an American, all he does is very, very, very, very slight variation on his Patrick Bateman accent.

thecrackedjack2

Johnny Depp in From Hell. At least I think so.

UAIOE

Trainspotting

aintnosin

And wasn't Marsters basically making fun of Anthony Stewart Head's accent?

printerati

I didn't recognize Sick Boy as Eli Stone. I also didn't recognize Kelly Macdonald as being the wife in No Country For Old Men (and didn't detect an accent, either).

Smithers

Sean Connery's Scottish accent is horrible






















jokes people, just jokes

UAIOE

One of the greatest mysteries is why Sean Connery was in a movie called "Highlander" and somehow manages to be a non-Scottish character.

jchamoun

Jonny Lee Miller is English. He does a very convincing Scottish accent in Trainspotting.

The Bus

UAIOE

Shows how much I've seen "Trainspotting".

I'll have to recommend "Dracula 2000" for 100% English Johnny Lee Miller.

Merkin Muffley

This whole thread goes out the window when you're watching John Adams. You've got Americans and Britons all together playing Americans and Britons from 230 years ago with odd hybrid accents...so we really have no idea how they're supposed to sound.