MovieChat Forums > Versailles (2016) Discussion > Casting

Casting

posted 9 years ago by t-l-s
7 replies | jump to latest

Ok, i understand why the did this in English, its more marketable but the casting is still strange

Why cast British actors? Why not cast French actors speaking English... its not like any of the actors are well enough known to have star power...and i am sure some young French actors would like the exposure to the english speaking film studios

Then they cast British actors for the three leads - King, his brother and his mistress - all who are meant to be French... then they cast a swiss actress to play an English princess... how odd

[–] theeclecticist 9 years ago

I thought that, too. Surely there are enough young French actors who speak English well enough and the English actors they did cast--particularly in the lead roles--are relative no-names. So why not French?

[–] avia2 9 years ago

I quite like the casting - having a Francophone Henriette among Anglophone actors reflects how the real Henriette was an Englishwoman among Frenchmen. Likewise having a foreign actress play Queen Marie-Thérèse.

The only one I don't understand is why the young doctor sounds foreign when her father sounded very English.

[–] Crazyonyou 9 years ago

The accent of the actors doesn't bother me, I know they're not really those characters and if they're not speaking French why would it be better if they had French accents speaking English?

[–] theeclecticist 9 years ago

For me personally, I find it a little jarring to have characters speaking with similar accents (british, generally) and then suddenly, another character speaks with a very different accent (French or Canadian/American, for example) when they are all supposed to be of the same nationality. I momentarily mistake that character for a foreigner--at least until I got used to the characters and the various accents and didn't notice them as much anymore. I still find it a little distracting at times, though.

I guess I'm just curious why a French production didn't seek out French actors. I'm not necessarily criticising them for it, just find it rather curious. It's not like the British actors they cast have any star quality or are particularly special. So why not feature French actors in a French production? A certain minimum percentage of the music played on French radio must be French, so I just assumed French-produced television might have to cast a certain minimum of French actors! ;-)

[–] wendyhull-52071 8 years ago

Personally, I think they should've had French actors who speak English, or atleast have some of them involved.

[–] carolcoleman64-315-809110 8 years ago

America here.....I wish all shows had British actors. I really LOVE their accents, lol.

[–] hour100 8 years ago

Hi
There were French actors in Versailles and during a doco of the making they were interviewed and oddly enough spoke French for the Interview one of them was Lizzie Brocheré who played Claudine.

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