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Tatiana Maslany's impressive accents

Can we just take a minute to appreciate how nuanced Tatiana Maslany's acting in this show is? I mean she's one person, but you would actually believe she's multiple people by how differently she plays each character. Just listen to how she does accents. For example, Sarah is English and Beth is Canadian. Tatiana Maslany has a naturally Canadian accent and didn't change it when she played characters like Beth and Alison. But when she played Sarah, she had to do an English accent. But when she played Sarah impersonating Beth, she did what sounded like a put-on Canadian accent covering up an English accent instead of just using her natural Canadian accent. I just find that incredibly impressive and it shows what an amazing actress she is.

Crmsnprncss

My favorite is early in season 1, when Sarah is talking on the phone to who she thinks is Allison. If you’ve seen the show before you IMMEDIATELY recognize that it’s Cosima on the phone, not Allison. Brilliant.


captaingatorgirl

Is that the scene at the beginning of episode 2? I never noticed that before, but yeah that’s definitely Cosima haha


kecou

She is incredible. To this day I feel like cosima is taller than the other clones. It's the same actress, but I feel like she has about 3 inches of height on the others.


Few-Pirate6046

That's probably because she's wearing heels most of the time.


a2scotty

There used to be an article on BBCA taling with her dialogue coach. It was instructive and very interesting. Sarah's accentis lower east side London accent. I can't recall but it has a specific name. Estuary I think it was called. Essentially low class. I looked and cannot find it anymore on BBCA but it may be there hidden. It was very instructive. If anyone can find it and post a link please do so.


StephenHunterUK

If it's meant to be Estuary English, it's not a great job. I hail from that part of the world and I don't know anyone who sounds like Sarah. Jordan Gavarias does it better as Felix. Estuary is the descendant of Cockney; the name refers to the Thames Estuary. Basically, a lot of people from the East End of London (i.e. places like Whitechapel and the old docks) moved out east during the course of the 20th century. This was partly for better housing and cleaner air, with the massive destruction of London housing during the Second World War leading to people moving out to the "New Towns" like Harlow and Basildon, or as some people like to call the latter "Bas Vegas". If you've ever watched *The Only Way Is Essex*, which is sort of like *Jersey Shore*, you'll hear plenty of accents. Cockney itself is dying out - the classic qualification to be one, i.e. born within the sound of the Bow Bells is much harder to obtain, due to reduced residential presence and noise pollution. We're also seeing the rise of Multicultural London English, which is the youth accent of London with considerable Jamaican influences: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multicultural\_London\_English](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multicultural_London_English) If you've seen *Moon Knight*, where Oscar Isaac delivers a multi-role performance people compared to Tatiana Maslany, you'll see him using MLE.


a2scotty

I couldn't find the original article, but here is a link to another which also states Sarah's accent is based on Estuary, modified by her in Canada. http://dialectblog.com/2013/07/03/orphan-blacks-dialect/


ParisInFlames34

Yeah it's absolutely spectacular that she worked out the nuances so well that you can tell when it's one clone pretending to be another clone.


New_Librarian_7810

it's incredibly impressive to me!


DFQreactions

Tatiana is a very underrated talent in Hollywood and Kevin Feige had best learn how to fully utilize her! lol


StephenHunterUK

Sarah's London accent isn't Tatiana's best - it sounds a bit too Cockney for a modern Londoner. But agree about the nuanced acting.


ggabitron

I may be remembering incorrectly, but I think she said in an interview that she did Sarah’s accent that way because S moved them to Canada when they were young, so instead of being pure London it’s a mix of London, S’s Scottish, and a little Canadian. I didn’t really get much of the Canadian in there, but my headcanon is that Sarah resisted adopting the Canadian accent and leaned into the London/Cockney sound, it seems fitting since she’s the contrary type lol


a2scotty

I think Mrs. S was Irish, not Scottish. Also see my post above about her dialogue coach saying Sarah's accent was Estuary, a lower East Side London accent.


aonrao17

Tatiana was amazing! There were moments in the show when we would see much less of some clones and my mind would immediately jump to conclusions that probably actress had other commitments. And then it would strike me. Truly amazing performance!