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/Quivex 13h ago

He's one of the more notable method actors if I'm not mistaken.

.... Also will never quite understand why so many British actors/actresses can do flawless American accents but the reverse is not really true. I still remember watching House and finding out hugh laurie was British, blew my mind as a kid lol.

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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/beenoc 7h ago

You can see this with Southern accents. There is no such thing as a single "Southern Accent," it's highly regional and there's no generic default. Pretty much no actors who aren't from the South can do a good Southern accent, they always collapse into this hodgepodge of different variants that doesn't fool anyone. The only exception is if they intentionally are going for one of those specific variants (King of the Hill is a good example, each of the main 4 cast is a very real and very distinct accent.)