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Which British actor speaks the best American?

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I think an American accent is more forgiving because there are so many regional accents and dialects. Most of the time if someone is doing the USA accent I just roll with it because it could be from anywhere. I only live in Texas.
 
Rudelord said:
What's an 'American accent'?

It's a question that's always kind of confused me when it's asked since there's quite a few accents and dialects throughout the country.
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No shit, don't you think it's the same for most countries. it's literally just any of those.
 
Camp Freddie said:
Most British actors go to acting schools and practice American accents a lot. Many will literally have lessons in how to do it since relying on their natural accent means very little work will be available.
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This. A lot of British actors are formally trained for several years. (Ever notice how many British actors seem to also have serious stage careers?) American actors *might* go to an actor's studio or have acting coaches but it does seem like they put in a lot less schooling into acting. Brits get a head start by already having some real schooling in elocution. Learning a new accent is all about attention to detail and the discipline to practice practice practice.

And for my money, I'm always impressed with Kate Winslet's control. Hugh Dancy and Matthew Rhys do a great job, too. But Alison Wright of The Americans is probably my favorite because she fooled me for years: until she said one word strangely in the third season, I had no reason to think she wasn't American.

(Someone also mentioned Gillian Anderson. I don't actually think she's faking either British or American accents. I think it's a code-switch situation for her. She was born and raised partially in the US but moved to the UK in her teens and has lived extensively in both places in adulthood. She probably affected an accent in her youth but it became natural for her speak like that. Yet her American accent is also natural.)
 
ZackieChan said:
No offense, but don't you think the better judges of what sounds like a native accent are...natives?

I'm curious what the English think of Frodo and Sam, and Renee Zelweger in Bridget Jones.
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Genuinely, no I don't. I think you're severely underestimating the amount of US media consumed in the UK, so when we're constantly exposed to both accents it's very easy to tell the bad from the good.
 
Andrew Lincoln is pretty impressive, as a Brit I always try to spot when British actors accent breaks and thier roots come out. He is one that hasn't slipped up yet, at least to my ears, his accent and naturalisation is incredible. Even in the low key scenes it holds up.

My GOAT is tied between Laurie and Oldman though, both have gotten the accent locked down that you can tell it's second nature to them when they are on the screen.
 
I could tell Tatiana Maslany wasn't actually English, but I thought her Londoner accent was pretty bloody good on Orphan Black. I wondered if the English actor who played her brother had given her some lessons or something; imagine my surprise at finding out he was also Canadian :P
 
matthew_rhys.jpg
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I was shocked when I heard his normal welsh accent. He does an amazing job on The Americans.
 
Pagusas said:
I was always impressed with Hugh Laurie's accent in House.
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Syriel said:
Hugh Laurie

If the first thing you've ever seen him in is House and then you see an interview when he speaks with his native intonation, it's quite the difference.
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This.

I watched House religiously. Then i saw him on Letterman or Leno and when he opened his mouth my mind was blown.
 
Measley said:
Michael Fassbender.

His accent was so good in 12 years a slave I thought Brad Pitt was the foreign actor.

Hugh Laurie and Andrew Lincoln are also damn good at the American accent. I was shocked when they did interviews. Lincoln especially surprised the hell out of me.
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Fassbender isn't British.
 
I think Hugh Laurie gets a lot of props because before House he was basically an unknown to Americans, and so without knowing he's English, you don't really scrutinize and you'd just assume he's American because he comes off fairly natural.

Once you know he's British though, and how he sounds, you've glimpsed behind the curtain so to speak and you know what he's doing with his voice; it becomes less natural or good.

That's probably why Brits think Hugh Laurie sounds off and Americans are more accepting of his accent. And to be honest if he fools you the first time, he's done his job.
 
WinFonda said:
That's probably why Brits think Hugh Laurie sounds off and Americans are more accepting of his accent. And to be honest if he fools you the first time, he's done his job.
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Honestly my main problem he played pretty much the same role in Jeeves & Wooster, Blackadder and most of the Bit of Fry and Laurie sketches that I couldn't accept him as this apparent genius. The accent seemed okay? He didn't sound as off as Dominic West, anyway, small bar that is.
 
jond76 said:
I think an American accent is more forgiving because there are so many regional accents and dialects. Most of the time if someone is doing the USA accent I just roll with it because it could be from anywhere. I only live in Texas.
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You kind of contradict yourself there. There are so many regional accents and dialects, but actors doing an American accent can sound like they come from anywhere in the country?

The UK has just as many accents and dialects, but all I hear from American actors is a weird mash-up of Received Pronunciation and cockney. I think their only points of reference are the Queen and Dick Van Dyke.
 
EndcatOmega said:
Honestly my main problem he played pretty much the same role in Jeeves & Wooster, Blackadder and most of the Bit of Fry and Laurie sketches that I couldn't accept him as this apparent genius. The accent seemed okay? He didn't sound as off as Dominic West, anyway, small bar that is.
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As an American, I never even heard of all those shows you mentioned.

I also didn't watch House, like at all. But if you watched Fox in any capacity (the network House was on in US), then you saw a decent amount of House promos and heard Hugh talking in them fairly often. It probably helped that he was playing an eccentric doctor, so sounding a little quirky fit his character, but you would never think he was British from that level of exposure. Which is probably how most people in the US heard him the first time, or the first 10 dozen times if you watched something like 24.
 
ImpracticalPassword said:
But Alison Wright of The Americans is probably my favorite because she fooled me for years: until she said one word strangely in the third season, I had no reason to think she wasn't American.
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This is a great one. A lot of the ones mentioned in this thread seem to either rely on being overly stereotypical or are too put on to sound natural (like some sort of attempt to sound distinctive). Hugh Laurie in House is a bit like that after a little bit. Charlie Cox in Daredevil is another.

Wright's performance doesn't allow for any of that. She's great overall and it's a great accent.
 
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Marianne Jean-Baptiste - I thought she was American until she turned up in Broadchurch and I was like wtf!

But I could make an incredibly long list. Every scripted US TV show these days seems to be brimming with British actors, many playing Americans.

I think anyone who can do an accent like that is unbelievably talented - the combination of acting and maintaining the accent. It's not like they're concentrating on their accent so much that their acting suffers, if that makes sense. It just seems to be natural to them. But I'd imagine an American accent is one of the first things taught in stage school in Britain these days, given the opportunities in the US in scripted TV drama right now.

The UK seems to nurture an endless amount of talented actors, and it also helps that they don't command as much money as their American counterparts when they hit the US too. There are a bunch of extremely talented British actors that haven't gone across the pond though, Olivia Colman comes to mind. Her acting range is incredible.

Oh and let's not forget a classic British person playing an American:
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Blue Lou said:
I was amazed when it turned out Fraser's Daphne Moon's actress Jane Leeves was English. She sounded so unconvincing to me.
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That's because that wasn't her real accent. She put on a Lancashire accent even though she's from Essex. Mind blown, huh.
 
The guy in Justified playing Dewey Crowe (now in Quarry). I could not believe his real accent when listening to an interview haha.

Reversed example would be Brad Dourif. IIRC, as a method actor, he kept Grima's British accent while LOTR entire filming and afterwards he switched back to his natural accent. Bernard Hill told him it was the worst American accent he ever heard.
 
Kelly Macdonald in No Country for Old Men

Scottish actress, playing a Texas teenager (she was also older than the role too).
 
Red Liquorice said:
You kind of contradict yourself there. There are so many regional accents and dialects, but actors doing an American accent can sound like they come from anywhere in the country?

The UK has just as many accents and dialects, but all I hear from American actors is a weird mash-up of Received Pronunciation and cockney. I think their only points of reference are the Queen and Dick Van Dyke.
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Indeed. And not only that, there's the way accents change over very little distance.

For example, I grew up in a home with four distinct accents (Glaswegian, albeit soften by years in England, Sheffield, Coventry and Warwickshire). I sound approximately like this, but with northern-style As (the trap-bath divide, the geographical line which divides the northern short A and the southern soft A, pretty much goes through where I grew up). I went to University in Birmingham, where people sound like Ozzy Osbourne.

It was 18 miles door to door.
 
jond76 said:
I think an American accent is more forgiving because there are so many regional accents and dialects. Most of the time if someone is doing the USA accent I just roll with it because it could be from anywhere. I only live in Texas.
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It's really easy to pick up on unnatural American accents if they start to mix different pronunciations. It's of course the same for British folks listening to Americans trying British accents. An example of a really unnatural American accent is probably Emma Watson in The Perks of Being a Wallflower. Sheesh.
 
How about American actors who do terrible American accents i.e. Brad Pitt in 12 years and Inglorious Basterds.

Or American(er... Canadian) actors who do terrible British accents like Mike Myers (also Inglorious Basterds)
 
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