If you’ve seen any of the videos or interviews with Austin Butler at the recent Golden Globes you may have noticed he still sounds a bit like Elvis. In fact, many people have noted that despite being from California, he still sounds like he’s from the Deep South.

For actors, learning a new accent is incredibly demanding. Accent assimilation is a rigorous process that often requires listening deeply to archive material, documentaries, movies and interviews and observing linguistic details.

Austin Butler in his role as Elvis shows how an actor must be acutely responsive to the specifics of an accent, role, script style and demands of the film.

The actor works with a dialect coach, starting months or years before filming. The coach provides source recordings (a real person, for example, Elvis) and an accent breakdown. The actor will listen to the sound samples at every opportunity for total immersion.

Significant practice and repetition are needed to integrate a new accent. Coaching includes layering all the elements to give an accent a solid foundation, slowly building from words to sentences, with the dialect coach providing continuous feedback until the actor is speaking in accent easily and consistently.

A little less conversation a little more action

In cases where an actor is portraying an iconic figure, such as Elvis, there is huge responsibility to be convincing in the role. This can lead to actors staying in-accent for many months or years.

Examples of performers in this situation include Jamie Foxx as Ray Charles, Natalie Portman as Jackie Kennedy, Meryl Streep as Julia Child, and Ben Kingsley as Gandhi.

British actor Idris Elba told the Guardian it took moving to New York and three years of practising to get his American accent believable for his role in The Wire.

Australian actor Nicole Kidman when rehearsing for Nine Perfect Strangers would stay in accent all day, including at home with her family. Over five months the actors she was working with did not hear her Australian accent until the day filming ended.

US actor Forest Whitaker, when faced with the challenge of Idi Amin’s accent in The Last King of Scotland, admitted he practised even when he wasn’t on set in an effort to stay immersed in the character.

There was one time into rehearsals that I dropped it because I had to go down and meet all the dignitaries, and it took me days to get it back. I was so frightened because I was there a month before and I was like, ‘this is not going to happen again, I am not going to lose this character’.

What is role spill?

Actors who live the part of a role, integrating accent, body, imagination and feelings may, post-production, experience role spill. This is known in the acting community as boundary-blurring: when the actor is finding it difficult to separate themselves from the character they’re playing and blurring the lines between professional and private roles.

Your voice is a direct expression of who you are and your experiences. The fusing of personal identity with characters is crucial to the craft of an actor. However, some actors can lose their “idiolect” (their individual way of speaking) and can retain features of accents they may have used for their character.

An actor that completely loses himself in a role is Gary Oldman. Originally from South London, but having spent many years living in America, he has had to relearn his English accent for a film character in Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.

Margot Robbie told Grazia magazine that during filming I, Tonya, she “genuinely thought” a conversation she was having with fellow actor Sebastian Stan who played Tonya’s abusive husband, was real. The feelings and emotions can become so intensive they felt like the actor’s own.

De-roling

The term de-roling refers to a technique which is thought to have originated within drama therapy and psychodrama to assist the actor in “disrobing” or letting go of certain physical character traits that are not their own once they finish performing.

It’s a process that can help actors shed intense emotions or characters, and it’s crucial to the health of an artist. This can be done by shaking out the body and doing physical activities such as jumping and running on the spot to shake off the character. In addition to this, it can include taking deep breaths and vocal exercises including humming to release vocal fold tension and let go of negative emotions. In theatre, the ensemble or cast can agree to de-role together before leaving the theatre.

It can be difficult to de-role for an actor who has invested significant commitment to a successful transformation of accent, body and character. It can take months for an actor to feel they have let the character go, especially if they felt a strong synergy and connection with the character.

Speaking about her role as Mare Sheehan in the crime series Mare of Easttown, Kate Winslet explained “it was the hardest thing to let go of” and “she got under my skin…”

Once an actor moves on to a new project or spends time with close friends and family they may revert back to how they sounded before – or maybe not. Varying your speech sounds is not likely to affect an actor’s work opportunities in the future – arguably the more fluid you sound the better.

Luzita Fereday, Lecturer in Voice at the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts., Edith Cowan University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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  She died of cardiac arrest at age of only 54. She was at the golden globes not even 5 days ago. We’re deeply saddened to learn that Lisa Marie Presley passed away at the age of 54. Our hearts are with her family and loved ones during this difficult time. Lisa Marie Presley was hospitalized on Jan 12 USA Time Jan 13 Asia Pacific Time at the age of 54. Prior to the medical emergency, she suffered the loss of her son Benjamin Keough in 2020 when he was just 27. Access Hollywood is looking back at the years leading up to Lisa’s medical emergency.

  Priscilla Presley, My beloved daughter Lisa Marie was rushed to the hospital. She is now receiving the best care. Please keep her and our family in your prayers. We feel the prayers from around the world and ask for privacy during this time.

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• Lisa Marie Presley was born on February 1, 1968 – January 12, 2023, was an American singer-songwriter. She was the only child of singer and actor Elvis Presley and actress Priscilla Presley, as well as the sole heir to her father’s estate. Presley developed a career in the music business and issued three albums: To Whom It May Concern in 2003, Now What in 2005, and Storm & Grace in 2012. Her first album reached Gold certification with the Recording Industry Association of America. Presley also released non-album singles, including duets with her father using tracks he had released before he died.

Presley was married to musician Danny Keough, singer Michael Jackson, actor Nicolas Cage, and music producer Michael Lockwood.

Priscilla Twiiter Annoucement: My beloved daughter Lisa Marie was rushed to the hospital. She is now receiving the best care. Please keep her and our family in your prayers. We feel the prayers from around the world, and ask for privacy during this time.
-Priscilla Presley pic.twitter.com/j5oNfNMYJx

— Priscilla Presley (@Cilla_Presley) January 13, 2023

Lisa Marie was born on February 1, 1968, to Elvis and Priscilla Presley at Baptist Memorial Hospital-Memphis in midtown Memphis, Tennessee, nine months to the day after her parents’ wedding. After her parents divorced, she lived with her mother in Los Angeles, California, with frequent stays with her father at Graceland in Memphis, Tennessee.

When her father died in August 1977, nine-year-old Presley became joint heir to his estate with her grandfather, Vernon Presley, and her great-grandmother, Minnie Mae Hood Presley. Upon Vernon’s death in 1979 and Minnie Mae’s in 1980, she became the sole heir and inherited Graceland. On her 25th birthday in 1993, she inherited the estate, which had grown to an estimated $100 million. In 2004, Presley sold 85% of her father’s estate.

In the late 1970s, a year or two after her father’s death, she attended her first rock concert when she saw Queen at The Forum in Inglewood, California. She gave Freddie Mercury a scarf of her father’s after the show, and expressed her love of theatrics.

Her parents divorced when she was four years old, and she was nine years old when her father died. Shortly after her father’s death, her mother began dating actor Michael Edwards. Lisa Marie was reportedly sexually abused by Edwards when she was between 12 and 15 years old. In an interview with Playboy magazine in 2003, Presley said Edwards had the habit of invading her private room intoxicated and was inappropriate with her. History Wikipedia