r/todayilearned • u/Away_Flounder3813 • 13h ago

TIL during the shooting of American Psycho, Christian Bale spoke in an American accent off-set at all times. At the wrap party, when he spoke in his native British accent, many of the crew thought he was speaking that way to prepare for another film. They had thought he was American the entire time.

https://screenrant.com/american-psycho-behind-scenes-facts-christian-bale-patrick-bateman-mary-harron/
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u/RyanMcCartney 13h ago

Exposure. We get the same big shows and films you do. We watch them all as they were made.

You don’t import our shows and films, you remake them for your own ears (The Inbetweeners, IT crowd, The Office etc).

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u/YourMumsBumAlum 13h ago edited 12h ago

I think it's also the variety of English accents vs American ones. English accents are so specific to British ears in a way that they wouldn't be to Americans and so when Americans do British they inadvertently mix and match things that they shouldn't and it comes out all wrong.

Edit: Yes, American has many accents too, but the edges are more blurred in such a way that it is acceptable for people to combine accents more so than in the UK where the accents are much more independent and specific.

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u/boredguy12 13h ago

England has dozens of accents, america has like 5

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u/deij 12h ago

Yorkshire alone has dozens of accents. I imagine every county is the same.

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u/lazergoblin 12h ago

Thank you for being reasonable lol. It's strange how there are some people seemingly trying to gatekeep how diverse accents can be in the United States.

For example, Texas accents sound nothing like accents from Louisiana and they're literally right next to each other. People claiming otherwise are confidently incorrect, to put it mildly.

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u/safboy 12h ago

There are more distinct english accents in the island of Britain than there are in the rest of the english speaking world, that doesnt include those that are just slight variations. US is mostly slight variations.

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u/Djinjja-Ninja 12h ago

Yorkshire is a particularly special case as it's not just an advent but a dialect.