What is your opinion of British accents as portrayed in US TV shows?

Question

Appologies to all in the US offended by Hugh Laurie!

Answer 1

the thing that kind of annoys me is in those shows whenever british characters are on, especially in sitcoms, the accent is either posh english or cockney london english. very rarely are there shows with mancunian, scouse, scottish, brummie accents. frasier was one example of a show where one of the main characters was from northern england in manchester, as opposed to london in the south. also, when american actors and actresses attempt the posh or cockney accent most in america would assume that all brits speak like that when that's untrue. and likewise, most see britain as one country when in fact it is made up of england, scotland, wales and northern ireland and has different regional accents, just like in parts of southern north america

Answer 2

On the whole they are terrible but it is not only english accents that are a problem. Fake American & especially Scottish accents are awful too.
For example, on the sitcom "Still standing" the guy (who's name I have forgotten) is British & puts on the worst American accent I have ever heard.
American shows seem to think that all Scottish people sound like Billy Connelly & all Englishmen sound like hugh Grant.
I have never understood why they employ people who's own accents are wrong for the part, when there are thousands of actors & actresses that speak the way the part requires naturarally that would probably be perfect in the part.

Answer 3

1st, there is no such thing as a British accent, as England, Scotland and Wales all have completly different accents.

The best English accent I have heard (on a movie, not a Tv show) is Rennie Zelweger in Brdget Jones Diary. She was very convinsing.

Actually Josh Hartnet's Yorkshire accent is pretty good, he only went off the mark a couple of times (can't remember the name of the film though)

Answer 4

Terrible!

One of the best (or worst) examples was in an episode of Frasier when Daphne's (who's supposed to be from Manchester) brother turned up - if I remember played by Anthony Lepaglia - and he did a really bad stereotypical cockney accent!

So funny!

Answer 5

Horrible, will actually make you cringe. I think one of the worst although it was a movie and not a TV how was Renee Zellweger in the Bridget Jones Diary movies. Not that she is a horrible actress, and give her credit for trying but the accent was truly atrocious, so are all the 99.9% of the ones that try.

Answer 6

I used to work with an Englishwoman,who told me the best way to detect a bad English accent was to pay attention to how a person pronounces their t's.She said the English tend to use a hard t,whereas Americans use a soft t(example better-Americans tend to say bedder).

That seems to be a good rule of thumb.

Of course,British actors doing southern accents are hilarious.

Answer 7

Good?
My favorite is Craig Ferguson doing an English accent on the Drew Carey show (he's scottish)

Answer 8

Does it really matter? Who would know? I mean can anybody say they've heard every kind of British accent. Besides I can understand the need to hide behind the British

Answer 9

Generally dreadful. The worst I ever remember were Spike and Drusilla's in the second series of Buffy. V V Bad, think Dick Van Dyke in Mary Poppins

Answer 10

Well then, how about Hugh Laurie doing an American accent & trying to cover up his British accent, so you Brits think that's okay