The Yanks ... I Mean, The British Are Coming!

As I settled in to watch the new fall season TV shows I had TiVo'd last night, it finally dawned on me that many of them had one thing in common; they all starred British actors doing American accents. Or "Britishers", as the US media increasingly continues to label them for some reason, which annoyingly makes them sound like some kind of cute breed of hunting dog.

Casting Brits in shows over here is nothing new, I know, but I have to admit I have struggled with some of the choices made by Hollywood over the years. Probably the most famous example is the multi-talented Angela Lansbury.


As a little girl, I loved her in Bedknobs and Broomsticks and when I got older, I really loved her turn as the bloodthirsty pie shop owner in the musical Sweeney Todd. But as the sweet, crime-solving grannie in the ubiquitous Murder She Wrote? Not so much ...

Al 'swears-a-lot' Swearengen, the evil, rotten motherf*cking bad guy on Deadwood is Ian McShane?! But...but...but...he's the dashing antiques-dealer-divvie-with-a-heart-of-gold Lovejoy, for chrissakes!

I kept waiting for Al to reveal that he's actually a nice guy and save the day, or at least admire the provenance of the pianoforte in the saloon, but sadly he just kept pistol whipping the whores in the whorehouse.

Hugh Laurie as the curmudgeonly doctor House?!!! This really, really gets to me, as much as I love the show. If you didn't know, he was already quite famous as a comedian in England, starring with comedy partner Stephen Fry in their own sketch series and the excellent Jeeves and Wooster, not to mention his hilarious turn as the total buffoon George in the Blackadder series. His American accent, in my opinion, is still a little dodgy, and I keep expecting him to shout out "What-ho Jeeves!" at any minute. But I suppose it's only a fair trade for Dick Van Dyke's excruciating Cockney accent in Mary Poppins.

So what fresh faces have we got amongst this year's offerings? Let's see, Journeyman stars Kevin McKidd, who's actually Scottish, but we won't hold that against him. He was fantastic as Lucius Vorenus in Rome and is the only reason I decided to give this new show a try. His Yank accent is decent, although he tends to mumble, but sadly the show is a poor man's version of Quantum Leap. They should have just made another series of Rome for him, dagnabbit.

Then there's Anna "first-lesbian-kiss-on-a-UK-soap" Friel, starring as 'Chuck' in Pushing Up Daisies. It's an excellent dark comedy and she's very good in it - you would never know she was English. But I still look at her and think, lesbian! And Scouse lesbian at that. It's sad but true; if you break through in an iconic role in showbusiness, typecasting is a real problem, folks.

In the remake of The Bionic Woman, the title role is played by beautiful Michelle "also-had-a-lesbian-kiss-on-a-UK-soap" Ryan. Hey, wait just a sapphic minute! Is Hollywood only willing to cast English women if they've played a hottie dyke on a soap? Is this some pervy casting director's private little game? What's up with that?

At any rate, her accent isn't bad, but as for acting chops, she's blown off the radar by on-screen rival Katie Sackhoff, who is American and has never lesbian kissed anyone that I am aware of, so she's clearly lucky to have gotten the job.

Then there's Damian Lewis, who stars in Life. Thankfully, he's a man and was spared having to pass the seemingly mandatory overseas-lesbo-kissing test required for the ladies. But here's a twist - I had no idea he was British, nor did I ever suspect! I mean, c'mon, he was Capt. Winters, the ultimate American good guy in the WWII drama Band of Brothers!!!!

From what I understand, the rest of the cast - even those pervy casting directors - didn't know he was English either, so good is his adopted accent. He actually sounds like he's from a distinct region in the US, rather from some undetermined monotone spot in the mid-Atlantic (hello Hugh Laurie, I'm talking to you). A tip of the hat to you, Damian. If your career ever flounders, you can open an elocution academy in LA.

I suppose I am in the minority here in the US in being able to not only recognize stars from the UK but to have actually seen their work over there and over here. But I'm telling you, if any of these new shows are hits, we can expect even more of an invasion from across the pond as those pesky Britishers trample each other to get over here to steal our women, land, and tea and take our jobs....

This alarming trend must be nipped in the bud immediately before some dim bulb at NBC starts scraping the bottom of the television barrel and offers Jade Goody a contract. Yikes!

Becks

Does anyone really care that David Beckham is playing soccer (football to the rest of the known world) in America? If you believe all the press and hype he's getting over here, you would think we, as a nation, begged him to come over and save us from the boring old American soccer we all totally ignore the majority of the time anyway.

But I mean, honestly. Do you, person who is reading this blog right now, really give a rat's patoot? I don't.

And bringing Skeletor along for the ride is just too much. She should go eat a sandwich already before all that's left of her are her fake boobies.

I once saw Becks at the Midland Hotel in Manchester, along with Ryan Giggs and Eric Cantona (now I am dating myself for sure) at a Man Utd gala, and he sure is a good looking man. But I still don't care. Soccer will never be a powerhouse sport in the States like it is everywhere else; we like winners or losers. All that nonsense about playing 90 minutes for a nil-nil game is just crazy-talk.

I mean if Pele couldn't make a dent here, nobody can.

Foul Weather Friends

I have had numerous emails from my friends over the pond regarding my recent post about missing England. All of them, to a one, made the point that the weather has been practically apocalyptic for the last couple of months. Floods, torrential rain, cold weather, the works. I think there was even a tornado somewhere thrown in for good measure. Rachel in Manchester made the comment that, "if you had been here for the last month, you would have been screaming to get out!". My ex-mother in-law went so far as to describe this summer in Blighty as "November".

Thank you all for reminding me why I left, I feel much better! Now if I could just get my Yorkshire Puddings to not be a total disaster, I could make my own pub lunch and get over it!

Mr. Manchester

On the back of my last post about missing Manchester, I was saddened to learn that Tony Wilson has died. For those of you who haven't a clue who he was, you can read all the details here.

For those of you who can't be bothered to read the details, and I know you're out there, he was the mind behind Joy Division, New Order, Factory Records and the much missed Hacienda*. He was the man that created the "Madchester" scene and was the subject of the movie "24 Hour Party People". If you lived in Manchester during 70's and especially the late 80's and early 90's, you couldn't escape him. It was generally agreed by all that he was loudmouthed and arrogant, but there was no doubt that he loved his city, huge ego notwithstanding.

I was rather fond of him myself - I met him many times and he was always good for a laugh. He was extremely charismatic; he wore bespoke tailored suits, often in white, had floppy hair that he liked to flip back dramatically when he made a point, and really didn't care if you were glad to see him or not.

I was sitting with a group of workmates (that included Peter Hook from New Order) in the Granada TV bar one night when he swanned in and spotted us. "Hooky!" he cried and grandly swept over to our table. "Fecking c*nt"!" Hooky replied in a not-at-all-joking way. Tony didn't miss a beat, but continued to talk as if Hooky was glad to see him. The man had brass ones, for sure. As he left, Hooky said with obvious affection, "what a twat!".

R.I.P.


*The Hacienda is now a block of flats - such a waste of a good club.

The Mancunian Way

I had a dream last night that I was on the number 41 bus going down Wilmslow Road in Manchester. Perhaps it's the fact that it's been 103F here for the last three days; my mind said "screw this, we're going somewhere cooler, even if we just ride a bus". But it made me really miss England.

When I first moved back the States, I was pretty homesick for Blighty for quite some time. Then I gradually got back into the American swing of things and those pangs subsided.

But today, they're back with a bang.

I want to be called 'chuck' by a complete stranger; go to The Beech in Chorlton; drunkenly eat gravy and chips from the chippy; go to Rusholme and get a cheap but tasty curry; play softball in the pissing down rain; watch Countdown and Coronation Street; have a roast beef and Yorkshire pudding Sunday lunch at Ye Old Cock Inn; hear someone say 'put keckle on luv'; walk out on the street and hail a black cab just to go 2 blocks; order a pizza at Cocotoo's; walk the dogs at Fletcher Moss; watch the drag queens parade by on Canal Street; catch a movie at the Corner House and then have a pint; and most importantly, see all my friends again.

Ta-ra for now, I'm going to make a Ploughman's Lunch and pretend I'm somewhere else for a bit.