Lack of English accents in Sweeney Todd - WTF?- Page 3

[Scripps2]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 4:33pm

"At the top of the hole sit the privileged few
Making mock of the vermin in the lower zoo"

I see how that can be perceived as being about class but Sweeney is rather more nuanced than the East End versus Belgravia class structure of My Fair Lady and Upstairs Downstairs.

I say that because traditionally Turpin is a working class name. The Judge is probably nouveau riche or an astute social climber.


Updated On: 8/23/12 at 04:33 PM

[tazber]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 4:34pm

Phyllis, less of the personal attack please, I'm just having a discussion here

Says the guy who called me the "Meryl Streep of assholes".

I mean, it's true and all, but still....don't be such a hypocrite.

Updated On: 8/23/12 at 04:34 PM

[Reginald Tresilian]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 4:39pm

Maybe that's just because you're really good at accents.

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 4:40pm

Why does everyone keep calling Len Cariou an "American actor"?

He's not American.

He's never been American.

He's a Canadian actor, born in 1939 in Winnipeg to a French Canadian father and a mother from Ireland. He didn't even move to New York until he was 37.

He's one of the most renowned actors Canada has produced. He played Prospero in The Tempest at the Straford Shakespeare.

I think the man could have done a British accent if he wanted to.

Unless you're saying that ALL Canadian actors are incapable of using British accents?

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 4:43pm

I've never seen Michael J Fox attempt one!

[Reginald Tresilian]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 4:46pm

This is reminding me of how odd I always found it that ONLY Bob Gunton had a Spanish accent in "Evita."

Maybe Hal Prince has notions about who should and shouldn't have an accent. I certainly don't see the logic.

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 4:48pm

I always thought that was weird, too, how Peron was always the only one with an accent in the Prince production. They are singing and speaking in English, even though we know in real life they'd have been talking Spanish. Why does ANYONE need an accent in that?

Why, in the Parent Trap, did Hayley Mills and Hayley Mills speak with a British accent when their characters were from California and Boston?

[ChiChi]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 4:50pm

Reginald. Exactly! I've been asking the question of the current revival: Why have Ricky Martin do a fake American accent if you are going to have Michael use a latin one. It makes no sense.

[best12bars]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 4:59pm

I actually do believe it was a conscious choice for all of the actors in the original run (you can add Walter Charles to the list) to refrain from using an accent, and the more I think about it, "class" has everything to do with it.

That's probably why I found it jarring to hear Depp pull out his East Ender Whitechapel accent yet again. It made the character lower class and common.

And actually so many of the great classic tragedies are about a protagonist's fall from a "great height." Kings and such, in Shakespeare and Greek tragedy. I'm not talking about "death of a salesman," I'm talking about death of a king.

By making Sweeney "common" or identifying him with any accent or "class" you make that fall a lot less steep. He fell from the curb into the gutter? Instead of from a castle tower into the moat.

It may only register subconsciously with an audience, but I'll bet there was a clear decision made about it during the original creative process. Especially with Hal Prince and his Dickensian treatment of the classes in everything from the show curtain to the workhouse foundry set.

Updated On: 8/23/12 at 04:59 PM

[tazber]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 5:03pm

That's always been my impression too, besty.

I mean I can't believe that if Hal Prince wanted an accent Len Cariou would have not have complied.

[SonofRobbieJ]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 5:05pm

'By making Sweeney "common" or identifying him with any accent or "class" you make that fall a lot less steep.'

No...you just make it a different fall. Michael Ball was absolutely terrifying AND heartbreaking because his accent timed him to his surroundings. Instead of the role feeling epic, it felt human...and it moved me immensely. Which is why the show is brilliant. It can withstand varying interpretations. I remember how shattered I was by Peters' Madame Rose. What was once a 'fabulous monster' (to quote Michael Feingold) was now a very human woman who was crushed by her delusions. It wasn't for everybody. But for me, it allowed me into the piece in a way I hadn't before. Same with Ball's Sweeney.

[best12bars]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 5:10pm

I was talking about tragedy in the "classic" theatrical sense, which was always from a great height (royalty, gods, and rich people), not in the sense of how deeply a human tragedy about "poor folks" can bring up an emotional response.

I think Hal Prince was definitely thinking in the "classic" and grand sense with his entire original production. It rippled through the whole thing.

Updated On: 8/23/12 at 05:10 PM

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 5:19pm

I always find it so odd when people talk as if Bernadette was the first person to "humanize" Rose.

I found Angela Lansbury's Rose to be "a very human woman who was crushed by her delusions." I found Tyne Daly's Rose to be "a very human woman who was crushed by her delusions." I even found Linda Lavin's Rose to be "a very human woman who was crushed by her delusions."

I even found Bette Midler's Ro--um...never mind that. But Bernadette was not the first to humanize Rose.

[SonofRobbieJ]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 5:21pm

Sure. I don't disagree with that. But I think for Sweeney Todd that's more of an imposed directorial concept than something that is inherent to the piece. Because, in the end, Sweeney is a poor man who was trampled on by society, not a king falling from a great height.

[Kad]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 5:21pm

"My final point is clearly that most American actors CANNOT do English accents.."


...uh huh.

You know, most of your "discussions" generally involve you aggressively asserting you are right and everyone who disagrees is wrong.

[best12bars]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 5:38pm

Sure. I don't disagree with that. But I think for Sweeney Todd that's more of an imposed directorial concept than something that is inherent to the piece. Because, in the end, Sweeney is a poor man who was trampled on by society, not a king falling from a great height.

I agree with that. There is nothing in the writing of the piece that suggests it must be played or directed like that. I've seen interviews with Sondheim when he was surprised by Prince wanting to go "bigger" with his concept, when in Sondheim's head it was always a "smaller" piece.

But I applaud Hal Prince for following through with his "grand, classic" production in every sense. He allowed Mrs. Lovett to be obviously "common," because she's not the protagonist and the story isn't about her "tragic fall." And I don't necessarily think he gave Sweeney a "kingly" status by not giving him an accent. It's almost as if he took the character out of the class system entirely to make him more accessible as an "everyman." He does not come off as "low" or "common," however, and an East End accent on Sweeney, especially in that era, was absolutely that.

[binau]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 6:15pm

"The argument can be made that either (a) Todd is back from 15 years in Australia where he probably had to "lose" his accent or be taunted for it"

I mean sure it can be made but is this very plausible? Some older Australians, even those that are born in Australia persist to call Britain 'home', so I imagine when Australia was an early british settlement a lot of the settlers probably still considered Britain 'home', so I don't know why they'd taunt someone for having a british accent (which was probably closer to the local accent at the time then, than it is today). And hypothetically if for some reason he was 'taunted' to lose the accent, why would it default to an American/Canadian accent?

[PalJoey]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 6:28pm

My final point is clearly that most American actors CANNOT do English accents

Funny...

We watch a lot of British TV on PBS and BBC-America, and we always laugh at the pathetic attempts of most British actors to do American accents.

They either make everyone sound painfully exaggerated Southern belles or else they sound like a combination of Brooklyn and Chicago, as if every American character is from Streetcar or Guys and Dolls.

[MusicalBoy]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 6:39pm

There will always be Nina Ariandas,
there will always be Kerry Butlers
and there will always be those in between.

[sparrman]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 6:52pm

In 1999, in a TV series called "Mentors", Len Cariou played Alexander Graham Bell, who was Scottish. Anyone ever seen it? Did he use an accent? How was it?

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 7:08pm

I found Angela Lansbury's Rose to be "a very human woman who was crushed by her delusions."

Thank YOU, PalJoey. She most certainly was!

***

I'm surprised that so many posters here are talking about "an English accent" as if there were only one. Given the different classes represented in SWEENEY TODD and the fact that people from all over Great Britain were pouring into London during the period of the plot, I can well imagine that an "accent-perfect" production would be a cacophony to American ears.

The half-dozen Cockney characters and the faux-Italian barber are probably enough to give the right amount of local color. It's not a documentary.

Updated On: 8/23/12 at 07:08 PM

[SonofRobbieJ]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 7:47pm

Well, PalJoey and Gaveston, I would have loved to have seen Lansbury's Rose...alas, it was the year I was born. I'm certain I'd agree with you.

I did see Daly when I was fifteen...as a fifteen year old, I thought she was wonderful.

I never said she was the first person to humanize the role. You know me. You know I wouldn't say that. All I was trying to say is the alchemy of Peters' talent and who Peters is as a person came together in the role of Rose to make me see the show in a different way. Perhaps it was also where I was in my life at the time. But I came out of the show with a new appreciation for the piece, the actress and theatre in general.

Which is all I can hope for when I see a show. And when I step on stage and perform a show. Which I do. Often. Sometimes to nice words from the Times. Sometimes to vile words from John Simon. So...I think you know I wasn't slighting anyone when I was stating that the Mendes' production of GYPSY brought me to a different understanding of the piece.

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 7:49pm

"Why does everyone speak English in Les Miserables or Fiddler on the Roof or The Sound of Music?"

Because - presumably - you are seeing the show in an English speaking country and performed by an English speaking company.

In addition, French, Yiddish and Austrian accents would not be employed in Les Mis, Fiddler and Sound of Music because, generally, if a play is being performed in English and takes place in a non-English speaking country (or substitute language X/ takes place in a foreign non-X speaking country) then the accent to be used will be the accent of the country in which the play is being performed (an exception of course being if the cast includes actors who speak with a different accent).

When is the last time you saw A Doll's House being performed in Norwegian accented English? Or the Seagull being performed in Russian accented English? Or Twelfth Night being performed by American actors with English, or worse yet, Illyrian (what did Illyrians sound like?), accents.

Now, as to Sweeney, and to OP's question, were the libretto of Sweeney substantially comprised of non-sung dialogue, it is almost certain that English accents would have been used, at least for the dialogue. But it is sung through. Or almost completely sung through. That being the case, it hardly seems necessary that the singers would affect English accents. As a matter of fact, I often listen to English singers who don't sound English.

Lansbury's more apparent English accent might be due to dialect - Cockney I would guess in Lansbury's interpretation - being more important to that character than to any other. The same may be true of Ken Jennings' Tobias, whose English accent I remember being quite apparent. And, as has already been said, Lansbury is English. Being English, it would be strange for her to assume a non-English accent in an English language musical set in England.

[GavestonPS]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 8:06pm

Sorry, Robbie, I didn't mean to pile on. I was more applauding PalJoey's comment than arguing with what you had posted.

Full disclosure: I was the production coordinator when Angela reprised her GYPSY in Fort Lauderdale and Miami Beach in the winter of 1976-77. It remains one of the best productions on which I have ever worked and I am very biased in its--and her--favor.

I didn't get to see Peters, but I trust you and I am happy to take your word on her performance.

[wonkit]

Posted: 8/23/12 at 8:08pm

qolbinau - Australia was initially a penal colony for English convicts. If Sweeney had an English accent, he may have preferred to sound "neutral" and abandon his "englishness." It wasn't like you could jump on a plane and return "home" to England. Once you got to Australia, that was pretty much "it" for life.

So my assumption was merely an attempt to describe one "backstory" for a non-accented Sweeney. He had spent all those years trying to be an anonymous person until he could fight his way back. And had good reason to keep his identity under wraps once he returned.