I can`t help to notice that Roger Moore pronounce certain words like: last, ask and et cetera in a American way? Why must he do that? The Saint is after all a British character and a British show. Strange.
Bad sound kills good movies
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I don`t think i understand what you mean. Can you rephrase that?
Bad sound kills good movies
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I see. I have watched the first 12 episodes, and i didn` hear Roger using any Australian accent.
Bad sound kills good movies
Prior to the series, Moore spent several years in the US playing American characters in films and on especially TV. Since the Saint's producer, the late Sir Lew Grade, was planning to try and sell the series across the Atlantic, Moore purposely carried over his so-called "Mid-Atlantic" accent into the series in order to make the character more palatable to American audiences. Once the series became sufficiently popular, he reverted to his own speech patterns.
He's not alone in this practice. If you listen to many of David Niven's performances during the 50s and 60s, he uses certain American vowel sounds too.
"Duck, I says..."
Ok, that explains it.
shareOkay . . . but what was Cary Grant's accent?
"Duke of Death, I says."
Hey Duke,
Same mix, but with a noticable twang of Bristol accent that gave his delivery a unique quality. (Noticable if you're a Brit, that is).
"Duck, I says..."
kducklin2 -- Thanks for that info. I always wondered if Cary Grant's accent was a real one. Being just an ugly American, I have been trying to pay attention to the different accents of the English, and I'm not very successful at identifying each one. I recently saw Katherine Zeta Jones, and I noticed that the Welsh accent is really a beautifully sounding one.
I like the term "Mid-Atlantic" accent.
"English Bob is not a coward"
Considering that Grant spent most of his adult life in the US it's a wonder that any shred of his British accent remained. But the characteristic West Country burr is there.
Funnily enough, I recently acted in a production of "Hamlet" at the Matrix Theatre in Los Angeles. I had a small scene with Richard Chamberlain (drop that name) and during rehearsals we got chatting about the fascination Americans have with so-called standard British English, whereas in fact American English is pretty much the accent with which Brits spoke in Shakespeare's lifetime. This is also the reason why Scots and Irish actors are generally very good at American accents - there's so much of the 17th century still left in their speech cadences.
My own favourite accent is Northumberland. If they ever screen a Brit police drama called "Inspector George Gently" (it might air sometime on Masterpiece) give it a watch. Mind you, they'll probably have to subtitle it.
"It's not fair...I was building a house..."
I know what you mean about subtitles. When I watch the older British TV series like "The Saint", "Secret Agent" or "The Avengers", the words seem to be pronounced so properly and are easily understood. But I have been following the series "Ashes To Ashes" on BBCA, and many words and phrases go over my head. I noticed that in the first season they used subtitles, and it helped a great deal.
"Deserving has nothing to do with it."
That's an interesting comment you made about American English being closer to the English of Shakespeare's lifetime (known as Early Modern English), than modern-day British English. I didn't know that, so I did some research and learned the reason. When the British immigrants came to America in the 1600's, it froze the venacular of the time over here, while the Brits kept evolving into their present parlance.
I have never heard of Northumberland. Where's that?
"We've all got it comin' to us kid."