Connery ‘has worst film accent’
June 30th, 2003
Is Sir Sean Connery really the man with the worst film accent? It depends which you think is worse: being such a big star that you don’t even try to adopt the accent of your character, as Connery does in just about every role he plays nowadays, or trying but missing by a mile as with runner-up Dick Van Dyke’s woeful cockney accent in Mary Poppins.
I think Van Dyke would take the prize if it was my call.
July 4th, 2003 at 10:19 pm
What I find most amusing here is the sheer longetivity and impact of Van Dyke’s cock-up; Brits were talking about this when I was a young fan in the mid-Seventies, and, witness here, his awfulness still lives on. Sad, given his otherwise great talent, but his ill-choice here seems near immortal.
Oi!
July 4th, 2003 at 11:41 pm
That’s a good point. I’m sure the memory of modern contenders like Kevin Costner’s wobbly mid-Atlantic accent in Robin: Prince of Thieves will fade in time, but Van Dyke’s sterling effort has achieved immortality.
Come to think of it, I can remember one accent every bit as poor as Van Dyke’s, albeit one which was in a cameo role and arguably falls into the stars-don’t-do-accents category alongside Connery’s efforts. John Wayne’s single line of dialogue as the centurion in The Greatest Story Ever Told has to be a contender for the title of Most Distracting Line Reading Ever Delivered by a Major Star In a Cameo Role.
July 8th, 2003 at 7:36 am
“Cameo” is an excellent caveat, elsewise I might bring up Tony Curtis’s infamous “yonda lies the castle of my faddah, the king” and John Wayne’s interesting interpretation of Genghis Khan in The Conquerer. (I’m suddenly struck by the desire to do a digital remake of the latter, editing in William Shatner bellowing “Khaaaannnnn!” at the top of his lungs at Wayne; it somehow seems inexplicably necessary.)
But since you included the caveat, I shall, of course, now not bring up these subjects.
July 9th, 2003 at 10:59 pm
Gary, I think you should definitely do that Wayne-Shatner substitution. It’s a perfectly sensible idea - at any rate, for some values of the word “sensible”… :-)
Going the other way, I’m trying hard to imagine The Duke bantering with Bones and Spock at the end of an episode. It just doesn’t work: someone - probably Spock - would have ended up taking a right hook to the jaw.
July 16th, 2003 at 2:57 pm
I think Dick Van Dyke’s accent in Mary Poppins was wonderful! he did and awesome job! I think his accent was meant to be cute and it was. Mary Poppins is one of the greatest movies of all time.
GO DICK!
jessie