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Has America run out of Actors ?

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Butts

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I only ask as I am watching Damien Lewis playing yet another American in Homeland on Channel 4.

Tom Wilkinson seems to pop up as an American more often than he does as a Brit these days in Films and TV productions.

I went to see The Raven and that was full of British and Irish Actors playing yanks.

Strange world :p
 
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Bungle73

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America seems to like bringing in UK actors and having them play Americans. Hugh Laurie in House, Joseph Finnes in Flash Forward, Kevin McKidd in Journeyman, Dominic West in The Wire and Andrew Lincoln in The Walking Dead spring to mind. There's probably more.
 

michael769

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There has been a fairly significant influx of British acting talent into Holywood of late.

It has always been the desire of many British Actors to make it big in Hollywood, but historically few ever succeeded, with many notable big names failing miserably. This seems to have changed over the last 5 years or so with more and more making the transition.

It may be that the success of the likes of Hugh Lawrie in House and others means that Holywood is taking British actors much more seriously and giving them a fairer crack of the whip that they might once have received.
 

bnm

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You'll note that the majority of these actors are appearing on American TV shows and not in Hollywood movies. Much rarer to see a British actor playing an American in a film.
 

Schnellzug

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Wel, it's a fair return for all those times when Americans tried to pretend to be Cockerneys. :p And don't forget that only recently, we had Meryl Streep playing a Great British Icon.
 

Barton Keyes

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Wel, it's a fair return for all those times when Americans tried to pretend to be Cockerneys. :p And don't forget that only recently, we had Meryl Streep playing a Great British Icon.

That would be overrated Meryl Streep playing the even more overrated Mrs T.

Never understood why film producers make things difficult for themselves by casting foreign actors who then have to cope with an accent as well as everything else. Gwyneth Paltrow and Renée Zellweger are very convincing at being English though. As for Sean Connery...
 

185

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When you see the likes of Adam Sandler it's hardly surprising they're borrowing Brits and Aussies.

I hate him. I really do, almost as much as FirstGroup. And thats bad.
 

Geezertronic

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Although with Hugh Laurie and House, didn't the director think we was an American based on his convincing accent in his demo tape?
 

WatcherZero

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Reportedly the cause of the imbalance is theatre being much stronger in this country than in the US meaning British actors are a lot more skilled, a lot of US stars come to the UK to do theatre or TV to improve their skills and find 'challenging' parts rather than the usual US sitcom drivel.
 

NY Yankee

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Guys, ever heard of Ed Westwick? He's from the UK and he appears on this popular American show called Gossip Girl (but he hides his English accent).
 

Butts

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How did he manage to win an Oscar for The Untouchables, where he played an allegedly Irish character with a broad Scottish accent? I blame the Americans.

He seemingly never changes his accent that much whether James Bond , the Irish NY Cop , A Russian submarine commander etc etc.

He's big enough to get away with it :p
 

NY Yankee

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If it makes you feel any better, the guy playing Peter Parker in the new Spider-Man movie, Andrew Garfield, is British.
 

Badger

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How did he manage to win an Oscar for The Untouchables, where he played an allegedly Irish character with a broad Scottish accent? I blame the Americans.
Had this discussion with an American friend before and they said they couldn't tell the difference between the accents :oops: they called it a "Scots-Irish Accent". (Which is incorrect, Scotch-Irish refers to Ulster Scots)
 
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