Times of London Online Edition
June 10, 2005
Outside the box: divided by a common language
By Holden Frith, Times Online
Hugh Laurie, a man best know for his portrayal of blithering British incompetence, has embraced the spirit of the TV makeover. Like a contestant on Channel 4’s Faking It, he’s ditched his upper-class stammer and become a "cantankerous, cynical medical genius with a pronounced limp and borderline Tourette’s," according to Sarah Vine’s review of House, the new hospital drama in which Laurie stars. Another Times critic, Paul Hoggart, was impressed by the actor’s mastery of an American accent, and so is Barbara Barnett from Chicago.
"He rarely, rarely slips, even on words that are immensely difficult for an English actor to do," she writes. "What makes Hugh's achievement so great is that, as the main character, he has to sustain it endlessly for months and months. Ian McShane does a creditable job in Deadwood, but as part of an ensemble, he doesn't have nearly the accent burden that Hugh has to carry, week after week."
D Pitts from East Windsor, New Jersey, agrees that Laurie’s accent is impeccable. "In addition, he flawlessly catches the rhythms of our speech: the asides, parenthetical phrases, quips and interruptions that characterise our delivery. His bit on an American doing a bad British accent was hilarious and endearing!" Hilarious and endearing? Not entirely against type, then.
"It's truly painful to listen to a bad accent," writes Margaret Maxwell from Boston (the American one, not the one in Lincolnshire). "Most Brits sound like they think all Americans come from Texas. Renee Zellwegger is best in the opposite direction. My husband (who is British) was floored to find out that she wasn't from the UK. She had both the accent and the inflection down perfectly, we both thought, for Bridget Jones."
While House is winging its way eastwards, Footballers’ Wives seems destined to cross the Atlantic in the opposite direction, courtesy of BBC America. Opinion is divided as to whether this is a fair exchange: the verdict on Conrad, Chardonnay and co ranged from "really good" to "crap", via "entertaining trash" and "Dallas without the intellectual input".
Tanya from St Albans had this to say: "omg i just luv footie wives and i luv desperate housewives but footie wives is so kl so they'll luv it just like i do! XxX Mmwa XxX."
For those of you who don’t do text-speak, this translates as: "Goodness gracious, I adore Footballers’ Wives. I’m equally enamoured of Desperate Housewives, but Footballers’ Wives is incomparably invigorating. Our American cousins will be bowled over by it, just as I am. Respectfully yours."
Following Andrew Marr’s suggestion that newsreaders are paid too much to read from an Autocue and Michael Buerk’s intriguing allegation that one newsreader is more concerned with his nasal hair than his script, Lauren Holton from London comes to the defence of the anchors.
"Reading the news is more difficult than it looks and I don't object to the salaries paid," she writes. "Just observe the appalling Autocue skills of many non-news presenters. Kelly Brook, Tim Kash and Reggie Yates are all abysmal." Anyone who saw Nicholas Parsons' floundering attempt to present Have I Got News for You a few weeks ago would be bound to agree.
But Tom Williams is less sympathetic. "If the BBC wants to economise, sacking a few air-headed newsreaders would be a good start," he writes from Oxford. "Why do they need three people to read the morning news? One male and one female at a desk, batting alternate sentences and cosy little in-jokes from the Autocue, then handing over to Moira (or whoever) for the rest of the news. Anna Ford manages to present the lunchtime news entirely on her own and does a first-class job, without all the distractions generated by three newsreaders.
"Incidentally," he adds, "I am not desperate to catch a glimpse of Natasha Kaplinsky's legs."