french accent?

Question

hi,

i have chosen to do a perfomance and the chararcter i am playig is a french bombshell lol

have you got any tips for a french accent?

Answer 1

Your r's must come from the back of your throat, not the tip of your tongue.
You cannot pronounce the h's, so hold will sound just like old, and hear will sound just like ear.
You cannot pronounce the th's. So a hard th will sound like z (they-->zey) and a soft th will sound like s (math-->mass).
You should not aspirate your p's, so they should sound almost like b's, but not quite.
The long i sound should be really elongated. So the word I should sound almost like eye-ya.
Say prepositions (at, to, and...) really fast, don't put any sort of stress on them at all.

Answer 2

Elongate the vowel sounds and try a "nasel" sound. Also you could watch a few actors who are french speaking english, hop down to your local video store and see if you can find "Bogus" or "The Professional". As for a female vs male accent, there's not much difference really, just pitch your voice comfortable for the performance. Good Luck!

Answer 3

Two of the best known dialect coaches, both of whom have published numerous accent lessons on CD, are Gillian Lane-Plescia and David Alan Stern. Links to their websites:

http://www.dialectresource.com/

http://www.dialectaccentspecialists.com/store/

Answer 4

It is up to the director to teach his actors what they do not know. To do less than that would be not doing his duty.
To do a stage dialect one must learn the basic sound changes from English and always use them in the lines. It takes someone who knows that they are doing to teach a dialect. Good luck.

Answer 5

When I hear 'French bombshell,' I immediately think of Minnie Driver playing Carlotta in the movie version of Phantom of the Opera. If you haven't seen it, watch her parts. Very divalicious. =P