What are your tips on doing a British accent? Does alcohol help ? - Blurmac

What are your tips on doing a British accent?

Learning a British accent that is non-native to you can be extremely difficult. An actor friend of mine had an audition for role that required a Mansfield accent. It’s not an accent you hear much on TV and is a hybrid of South Yorkshire, Derbyshire and Leicestershire. Like other people have mentioned, accents change every 10 miles or so. Someone in Sutton in Ashfield has a noticeably different accent to someone in Shirebrook. (It does to me, anyway.) I tried all night to teach my actor friend, who originates from the West Midlands, his lines in the accent of a Mansfield miner. Immediately, he deepened his voice. I asked him why. Mansfield voices - even miners - have a range of pitches. He couldn’t help it.

He couldn’t master the way we say, “the”. In short, we don’t really say, “the”. It’s only perceptible to the trained ear.

Take it to the bin = Tek it tu(t) bin.

Add in the dialect and you can understand why I was once asked if I was Danish.

At home, I speak Standard Mansfield. At work, I speak Standard English with northern English vowels. That means that I speak grammatically correct English, don’t use dialect, but look sounds exactly the same as luck.

On the other hand, when I’ve had a drink, I’m convinced my Belfast accent is amazing. Ten minutes in the company of a Scouser, and I think I’m Cilla Black - and that’s without a glass of wine. Birmingham (Brummie) is particularly contagious, and I’ve been known to do a decent Geordie accent. Cockney - easy innit?

Obviously, I embarrass my children and my friends find it hilarious, because only I think my accents are brilliant. My nickname isn’t Dick Van Dyk for nothing.

Have a Nice Day.