Backstage | Pittsburgh | Pittsburgh City Paper: What does a dialect coach do?
Help shape two major things about an accent: accuracy of place and authenticity of sound. I structure a dialect that will bring everyone together to sound like they are from one world. It’s mostly based on place and geography, but social station is also a factor. There are lots of little nuances to help enrich the difference in characters.
1 comment:
This is interesting. Definitely much easier said than done. I am not an actress and I will probably never have to worry about learning different dialects/accents, so that's a relief. I've see a few shows where the accents were just so off, I could barely take the character and, ultimately, the show, seriously. I'm sure lots of actors and actresses find this challenging. They may have that one dialect/accent that they are really good at, but there are so many out there, I don't think anyone can master them all. Accents are tough. Especially when you are trying to have a natural flowing conversation, but your brain is processing all of these foreign translations. I struggle with my own personal accent. I grew up in the Turks & Caicos Islands so that is my natural accent. However, in primary school, I was taught by Jamaican and Guyanese teachers and I went to a British high school and was taught by British teachers. Because of this, the way I pronounce some words, the way I structure sentences, my inflections and deflections when I speak, the places that I put emphasis, etc... they are just all over the place. Now I live in America and this is also causing the way that I speak to evolve. Sometimes I hear myself speak and I'm just like, whoa, what was that. There just a lot going on with my accents and to top that off, depending on who I'm speaking to, my accent changes. Whether that be because I need them to understand me or because when I talk to family, for example, I have a certain accent for them. There are just so many layers to it. It's not like you hear someone say a word and you copy them. Which is why I don't agree with Brennan when she says, "you can glean by listening to the way someone speaks: their educational level, their level of street smarts." To a certain extent, yes, but to a certain extent, no. There are many variables that negates that statement. All in all, I think accents/dialects are very difficult and I don't think that it is something that you can get 100% accurate. Some may get close, but that's it. I remember taking french classes and having my French teacher constantly say that the French speak from the back of their mouths, and then taking Spanish classes and having my Spanish teacher say that we must speak from the front of our mouths. Fact of the matter is that I grew up speaking English so as much as I can fake it, I will never get it as right as a French nor Spanish speaker because that stuff is inborn.
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