English (British) accents in the media

[memebag]

Agreed. The show just looks annoying.

I adore it. The "hero" is a funny, bitter, atheistic, fatalistic, know-it-all who never really gets his comeuppance. Just like me.

[Montrose1100]

The House guy is pretty damn good. But he's probably like your dad's age, and it is sort of a slow moving newtork show.

But what the hell is Valkyrie? Other than than the myth/opera?

My Mom is obsessed... I can't stand it. Every episode is the same.

(Operation) Valkyrie is the movie with Tom Cruise about a plot to kill Hitler. How could you miss all the commercials? I felt like they were everywhere.

[UrbaNerd]

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[Subdude]

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To me one of the most indecipherable accents is Scottish. For about a month once I shared an office with a Scot, and it must have driven him crazy because I kept asking him to repeat everything. Finally I gave up on trying to comprehend and just relied on smiling and nodding to everything he said.

[LTAWACS]

Usually, in the movies only animals (talking cats, dogs, chimps) and aliens have british accents.

[editor]

I've always heard them, but doesn't it seem that recently there has been a spike in the accents in non-british product commercials, the national media, tv shows and tv hosts?

It seems to be a trend. I guess because it's different?

Not because it's different. Because of economics.

There are a lot more cross-pond productions these days for a number of reasons. First, the cultures are similar enough that much of the subject matter is of interest to both Britons and Americans (History Channel, History International, Discovery Channel, etc...) so the TV production companies can make a show once, then sell it in the UK, sell it again in America, again in Canada, again in Australia, again in Singapore, again in New Zealand, Hong Kong, etc... So one production brings in multiple streams of revenue from different countries.

With the shift to digital production, a lot of the problems that used to be involved in changing formats from PAL to NTSC to SECAM, etc... are eliminated. Also, it's far cheaper to distribute a program via satellite from the UK to North America than it used to be. Even just five years ago you'd FedEx a tape across the Atlantic. Now if you're sending video to multiple destinations, it's far easier and sometimes cheaper to go satellite. And even that's becoming passe as more and more video is distributed via computer networks like Pathfire.

There are also more cross-border partnerships on the production side. Look at the Planet Earth series, which is a partnership between BBC (Britian), Discovery Networks (America), CBC (Canada) and NHK (Japan). They produce the video once, then have different narrators in different regions. In the American version, Sigourney Weaver is the narrator. In Britain it's David Attenborough. But not all productions will bother with the extra expense of hiring an American narrator, especially if David Attenborough is available because he's already so familiar to American ears through his work with WGBH/Boston, distributed through PBS for decades.

One tip-off to this sort of thing is when you never see the narrator or host in the locations where the action is happening. House Hunters International on HGTV is one I suspect does this. You never has Susanne Wong in any of the locations, she's always strolling around some generic American house for the introductions. That's because she cut-and-pasted into the series, as are other hosts in other territories. Again, the producers could have saved money by using the British or Canadian host, but it's also possible that it is not sold with any hosts at all -- it's sold intentionally for local hosts to be added. You can also see this in shows on channels like Spike that feature security camera video of crashes or crime, but a faceless American host. These are probably sold as a hostless package in a number of countries.

When I worked in TV one of my jobs at one station I worked for was to do the local host inserts for feature series that were distributed this way.

There used to be a weekend filler show on NBC or ABC featuring funny Candid Camera moments. It was on in the office one day and everyone was laughing. I always knew what the gag was in advance because I'd already seen it on the in-flight entertainment channel on Austrian Airlines a couple of years earlier.

There is also considerable cross-pollination of Canadians and Canadian content in American radio and TV these days. Again, the cultures are similar enough that most people don't notice. Canadians are more used to British accents than we are, so they don't notice them as much. And Americans sometimes mistake a heavy Canadian accent for a light British one. But most Americans don't realize that a lot of the programs on HGTV, Discovery, and similar channels are Canadian. That new show on HGTV with the angry blonde-frizzy-haired real estate agent lady is from Montreal. "How It's Made" on Discovery is Canadian as well. Just look at the credits at the end of the show and often there is a Canadian government logo because the show's producers got an arts or science grant to help fund the project.

"Football Night In America" on NBC is a rip off of "Hockey Night In Canada" which has aired on CBC Television since 1952, and on CBC Radio since the 1930's. I think NBC only stole the name, though.

We also hear a lot of foreign accents on American TV these days because work visas are so easy to get, thanks to companies like Microsoft. It is extremely difficult for an American to get a job in Canadian or British television. Virtually impossible in most cases. London may consider itself the capital of the world, and Paris may think it has a lock on culture, but when it comes to television, news, and many other forms entertainment, they all flock to America.

Remember, Peter Jennings is an admitted Canadian. And he's not the only one.

Many shows on TV in America aren't American at all -- they're foreign inventions. American Idol is the most obvious one. The ballroom dancing show on ABC is a BBC production. Survivor is British produced (FremantleMedia) by a Luxembourg company (RTL). These types of shows became VERY attractive after the Hollywood writers' strike. The writers scared the crap out of the TV companies and they vowed not to be put in that position again. So instead of strengthening their union by striking, the writers have less work these days because the TV companies are getting much of it from overseas suppliers who are more reliable.

So in summary -- the reason you hear more of the Queen's English on American television these days is because there are more foreign-produced programs on American television these days. The reason there are more foreign programs on your tube is because it cheaper and easier than ever before.

[memebag]

Excellent info, Ed.

One odd example is an Australian magazine show on The Science Channel that imports clips from Mythbusters to run as a weekly segment. The Science Channel imports the Australian show, so we get to see little bits of those wacky seppos (without the Mythbusters branding, I think) months after we've already seen the original.

[Montrose1100]

Wayne,

I may not be as dumb as you think. I've noticed the planet earth thing since it came out, even before the summer I went to Europe (every summer), the BBC logo and credits might be a little more obvious. & the film crew. Also, the Canada (usually Quebec) logo at the end of a lot of HGTV shows, and the fact the people say "ay". Usually the HGTV shows tell what city they are in during the first part of the show. And sometimes I question the people, like a high school teacher in suburban Atlanta buying a $300,000.00 house. But then again, I don't know teacher's credit unions...

But I'm mostly talking about shows filmed in the U.S. (Like MTV, CNN, etc.), having british hosts. But the info you posted is interesting, since I know you have a place in Media, But I'm talking about American products & shows that have British hosts/voices in commercials.