Incognito

WELCOME, ACTORS!

INCOGNITO by Nick Payne, directed by Allison Arkell Stockman, Constellation Theatre Company, February 9 – March 12, 2023.

 

Navigating this site: This is one long page containing breakdowns for all the accents we’ll use in the show. For ease of navigation, you can jump to each individual accent using the links below, next to your character’s name.

 

A Heads Up: The storytelling is the most important thing, and linguistic detail should never get in the way of that or stress you out! I’ve tried to note only the major features of each accent in these breakdowns, but because there are so many accents, there’s still a lot of detail here. If you open this page and feel remotely stressed, close it again, and we’ll do the accent work together in rehearsal in a more manageable way! If you look at any particular accent breakdown and say, “Wait a minute, I want more detail” — I’m happy to provide.

If you only have time to work on one thing for each accent, focus on Posture, and we’ll tackle the weeds of Pronunciation together.

I use the International Phonetic Alphabet to describe sounds/shapes in the mouth. If IPA helps you target sounds, go nuts! But it is 100% not necessary to learn an accent. If IPA isn’t your thing, ignore the symbols and just listen to the recordings.

 

Woman 1

 

Woman 2

      • Margaret Thomson: London, UK – England 59 IDEA sample
      • Lisa-Scott Hannigan: Anywhere, USA
      • Sharon Shaw: Hertfordshire, UK – England 28 IDEA sample
      • Patricia Thorn: London, UK – England 101 IDEA sample

 

Man 1

      • Thomas Stoltz Harvey: Kansas, USA – Where he is from is less important than era; let’s start with actor’s native dialect
      • Otto Nathan: Bigen, Germany – no longer a speaking role!
      • Victor Milner: Hertfordshire, UK / Classical RP
      • Jon Williams: Cardiff, UK
      • Anthony: London, UK – England 101 IDEA sample
      • Richard Walsh: non-speaking

 

Man 2

      • Hans Albert Einstein: Bern, Switzerland
      • Henry Maison: London, UK – England 59 IDEA sample
      • Freddy Myers: Anywhere, USA
      • Michael Wolf: Maine, USA– Where he is from isn’t as important as a contemporary sound; let’s start with actor’s native dialect
      • Ben Murphy: London, UK – England 101 IDEA sample
      • Greg Barraclough: Hertfordshire, UK / Contemporary RP

 

London, UK

This is the one accent all the tracks in the show share. We’ll aim for an “Estuary English” sound (not quite “Received Pronunciation”/Standard British, not quite Cockney or the more contemporary Multicultural London English). This accent will become the base for all the other UK accents in the show — I hope this will help make code switching more manageable for the tracks that use multiple UK accents.

 

Model Accents

England 101 and England 59 from The International Dialects of English Archive. These two speakers differ in a few important ways, but for our purposes, we’ll focus on the features they share that we definitely want to use for our London accents.

 

Posture

“Vocal tract posture” is the general “home base” shape your mouth returns to, from which it can find the sounds of the accent most economically. “Posture” is kind of a misnomer because it’s not like any of us is ever frozen in our home base; it’s a dynamic resting place that shifts and changes.

    • This accent is placed further forward in the mouth than General American, so you might need to think about moving your resonance forward in your mouth and activating your lips and the tip of your tongue more than in your native manner of speaking.
    • We’re not going all the way to the crisp, forward resonance of “RP,” but we’re also not resonating in the back of the mouth as much as in Cockney or General American.
    • You know those giant straws you need to drink a really thick malted milk shake? Imagine holding one of those on the front of your tongue. Your jaw is forward and raised, your lips are rounded a lot, and your tongue may even be resting slightly further forward in your mouth (think about reaching forward toward the straw with the middle of the body of the tongue).
    • Sometimes “filler sounds” like uh and uhm give a good indication of the speaker’s home-base posture. Below are England 101 and England 59’s filler sounds, first at regular speed, then slowed down 50%:

 

Pronunciation: Consonants

/t/ → t̻

Between vowels, this is usually a [t] rather than the General American [ɾ], but might be placed on the blade of the tongue and might have some extra aspiration (a bit of extra air): [t̻]. At the ends of words, England 101 usually uses [t̻] with almost a bit of friction, think a “ts” sound. England 59 often uses a glottal stop [ʔ] at the ends of words and between vowels.

 

/l/ → [ɫ] or [ʊ]

After vowels, this is what is sometimes called a “dark /l/”: [ɫ]. The tongue tip may not reach the gum ridge at all, producing a vowel sound like [ʊ].

 

H-dropping

This one probably depends on the character. Probably Martha and Patricia pronounce the /h/ at the start of words. Anthony might drop an initial /h/.

 

/ɹ/ → [ɹ̹]

The /ɹ/ after vowels is dropped entirely, except when a final /ɹ/ is followed by a vowel sound, as in “clear off.” Then you might hear a “linking R” similar to the General American [ɹ] but with more lip rounding: [ɹ̹]. You’ll also use this more lip-rounded [ɹ̹] at the beginning of words or syllables as in “rain“.

 

Pronunciation: Vowels

BATH → [ɑ]

Words in this set are realized as [ɑ]. (Think “father” in General American.) You’ll still use the same General American [æ] sound (think “cat“) for words in the TRAP set. Here’s a list of BATH words, with hats off to dialect coach Eric Armstrong for this great resource.

 

    • THOUGHT → [ɔ̹]
    • Round your lips a lot: [ɔ̹]. Depending on where you’re from in America, you may also have to raise the back of your tongue a bit — we’ll find it together!

 

    • LOT/CLOTH → [ɒ̹]

Again, round your lips a lot: [ɒ̹]. Depending on your North American accent, this might be a sound you never use.

 

GOOSE → [ə̯u]

There’s a teeny weeny centralized onset to this vowel: [ə̯u].

 

FACE → [ɛɪ̯]

(Possibly the sound many Americans use in PRICE, or just a bit higher.)

 

PRICE → [a̹ɪ̯]

The onset here is probably more lip-rounded than in your American accent: [a̹ɪ̯]. But not quite as far as the [ɒɪ̯] of Cockney.

 

MOUTH → [æʊ̯]

 

GOAT → [a̽ʊ̯]

Rather than using a central onset for this diphthong, like the [əʊ̯] of RP, go for a more forward, open onset: [a̽ʊ̯].

 

Liquid /u/

Use [ju] in words like new, knew, student, duke.

 

“R-Coloring”

The /ɹ/ after vowels is dropped entirely, as in the sets NEAR, SQUARE, START, NORTH, FORCE, CURE, and LETTER. A “linking /ɹ/” might be used when the next word begins with a vowel (“clear off“) or an “intrusive /ɹ/” might happen even when two vowels abut each other without an “R” in the spelling: “Teresa is” could become “Teresaris“.

 

Bath, UK

Model Accent

England 108 from The International Dialects of English Archive.

 

Posture

    • Unlike many UK accents, this one is R-colored, perhaps even strongly so. (This means speakers do pronounce an /ɹ/ after a vowel.) We’ll retain a few key vowel sounds from London, so even if the only thing you change is layering R-coloring back in, you’ve gone a long way toward differentiating the accents.
    • Like London accents, this accent is more lip-rounded than General American. However, it is not as far forward and close as London. It shares a more open jaw with General American, and resonance is more toward the dome of the hard palate, rather than all the way forward toward the front teeth, as in London.
    • This accent might feel like you are “doing less,” because the posture might be closer to your native manner of speaking than London.

 

Pronunciation: Consonants

    1. T – Hang on to the /t/ usage from London.
    2. L – Same as London after a vowel, unless followed by a word that starts with a vowel, as in “yell out“. Then use a “clear /l/”.
    3. H – Same as London, there’s variety here. Let’s try retaining H’s at the start of words for now.
    4. TH – This sound has more vocal energy than in General American, so that when unvoiced, it may sound like a little extra puff of air escapes, [θʰ], and when voiced it may almost become the plosive [d].
    5. R – At the beginning of words and between vowels, the /ɹ/ is close to an Irish, retroflex tongue shape: [ɻ]. This accent does have R-coloring, so the /ɹ/ is not dropped after a vowel, with a few exceptions (see Vowel section below).

 

Pronunciation: Vowels

    1. Sets that share London pronunciation: THOUGHT, LOT/CLOTH, MOUTH, liquid /u/.
    2. BATH/TRAP – These sets are merged and use [æ], like General American.
    3. FACE – Similar to General American: [eɪ̯]
    4. PRICE → [ʌ̯i]
    5. GOAT – Closer to RP than London: [əʊ̯]
    6. R-Coloring – For the most part, keep R-coloring after vowels, and the /ɹ/ may even be a “hard /ɹ/”: the tip of the tongue curled up and back toward the palate. The speaker in England 108 occasionally drops R’s in the LETTER set, as in “water.”

 

Hertfordshire, UK

This accent is as close to RP as we’re going to get. If you’ve already got an RP/Standard British in your pocket, let’s use it, and if any of my offers are different from what you’re used to, ignore them! If it helps you differentiate from Anthony’s London sound, we can go all the way to a conservative RP for this character. (The speaker in the model accent, England 28, is more contemporary, but we can layer in a few sounds to suggest that Victor is an older generation.)

 

Model Accent

England 28 from The International Dialects of English Archive.

 

Posture

    • Very far forward resonance, even some nasality. That old vocal warmup “The lips, the teeth, the tip of the tongue” is a useful one!
    • Lips are very active and rounded. There may even be some tension through the cheek muscles, the buccinators.
    • The tip of the tongue pulls heavy duty, especially for gum-ridge plosives [t] and [d].

 

Pronunciation: Consonants

    1. T – This is probably the most important sound for American audiences to recognize this accent as “Standard British.” Every T, especially between vowels and at the ends of words, is unvoiced and aspirated: [tʰ].
    2. L – Unlike London, an /l/ at the end of a word will not become a vowel: the tongue tip does meet the gum ridge.
    3. R – This is a non-rhotic accent, so we’ll drop the /ɹ/ after vowels, except when a final /ɹ/ is followed by a vowel sound, as in “clear off.”

 

Pronunciation: Vowels

    1. BATH → [ɑ]
    2. THOUGHT → [ɔ̹]
    3. LOT/CLOTH → [ɒ̹]
    4. STRUT → [ɐ]
    5. GOAT → [əʊ̯]
    6. FACE → [eɪ̯]
    7. PRICE → [aɪ̯]
    8. HAPPY → [ɪ]
    9. Liquid /u/ – Use [ju] in words like new, knew, student, duke.
    10. “R-Coloring” – /ɹ/ after vowels is dropped entirely, as in the sets NEAR, SQUARE, START, NORTH, FORCE, CURE, and LETTER

 

Cardiff, UK

Model Accent

Wales 2 from The International Dialects of English Archive. This interview also has some yummy Cardiff sounds.

WelshPhonetics1_8_23: This PDF is Jon Williams’s longer scene transcribed with some possible Welsh pronunciations.

 

Posture

    • This accent is not as far forward as London and RP. Think about placing the resonance in the middle of the mouth, letting is glide over the hard palate. The jaw can be more relaxed than in RP, perhaps similar to General American.
    • The lips are also less active than in London and RP. This is not a particularly lip-rounded accent, a feature it also shares with General American.
    • Welsh tends to have a lilting intonation pattern. I think that has to do with vowel length in particular. It has fewer diphthongs than RP (see in particular the FACE and GOAT set in the Vowel section below), but these pure vowel sounds can be lingered on for emphasis, so the accent sounds more fluid and connected than staccato and percussive.

 

Pronunciation: Consonants

    1. T – Hang on to the /t/ usage from London, maybe glottalizing more often at the ends of words, and adding strong aspiration before a vowel.
    2. L – This is quite different from London. At the end of a word, this will be a “clear /l/”: [l]. The tongue tip meets the gum ridge and the middle of the body of the tongue stays relaxed, rather than scooping down toward the lower jaw, as in the American “dark /l/”: [ɫ].
    3. R – Before a vowel, as in tree or rain, many Welsh speakers tap the R: [ɾ]. The speaker in Wales 2 doesn’t tend to do this, maybe because he’s of a younger generation, but we might choose to do this to demonstrate the time period.

 

Pronunciation: Vowels

    1. Sets that share London pronunciation: LOT/CLOTH, THOUGHT (very lip-rounded compared to General American)
    2. GOAT – A diphthong in London, RP, and General American, this becomes a monophthong in Wales: [o:]
    3. FACE – Also a monophthong in Wales: [e:]
    4. PRICE – Another monophthong in Wales: [a:]
    5. BATH/TRAP – These sets are merged and use [a]
    6. GOOSE → [ʉ]
    7. STRUT → [ə̹] The central schwa vowel [ə] with a lot of lip rounding. This pronunciation is also heard in Liverpool, if that’s helpful.
    8. KIT → [ɛ] This is possibly a less important sound; we can use it occasionally, but it’s not an essential shift to characterize Wales.
    9. MOUTH → [əʊ̯]
    10. “R-Coloring” – /ɹ/ after vowels is dropped entirely, as in the sets NEAR, SQUARE, START, NORTH, FORCE, CURE, and LETTER. Between vowels, we might use a “linking R”, perhaps [ɾ].

 

Sydney Australia

Model Accent

Australia 34 from The International Dialects of English Archive. This Rose Byrne interview is also fun!

 

Posture

    • The mouth can be very open, with a very released jaw (maybe even more so than General American) and a lot of space at the back of the mouth. Even though many vowels are placed more forward than General American, there is still resonance in the back of the mouth.
    • There is probably more nasality than in other accents in the show. The openness of the back of the mouth might help with this. The back of the tongue may even be slightly spread, so that resonance has to travel upward and release through the nose.
    • A coach I worked with offered this image I found helpful (ignore it if it doesn’t work for you): think about a boomerang when you pronounce vowels — the sound comes way out and then returns. It’s almost like you’re releasing and then swallowing vowels.

 

Pronunciation: Consonants

    1. T – This feature might be the same as in your own American accent, becoming a [ɾ] or even [d] between vowels or at the ends of words. Also dropped entirely when /t/ comes after /n/, as in twenty.
    2. L – Use a “dark /l/” [ɫ] in all positions, even the start of words.

 

Pronunciation: Vowels

    1. THOUGHT – Very lip-rounded: [ɔ̹]
    2. LOT/CLOTH – Very lip-rounded: [ɒ̹]
    3. BATH/PALM/TRAP – BATH/PALM are differentiated from the TRAP set, as in RP. Here’s a useful list of BATH words. TRAP is a little higher than in General American, maybe [ɛ] and BATH/PALM take the forward vowel [a].
    4. DRESS – A little higher than General American, perhaps [ɪ].
    5. KIT → [ɪ̝] not quite [i]
    6. GOOSE → [ʉ] This vowel is perhaps a bit more forward than in General American, and not as lip-rounded as in London.
    7. GOAT → [ʌʉ]
    8. MOUTH → [æ̽ʊ̯]
    9. Liquid /u/ – Use [ju] in words like new, knew, student, duke 
    10. R-Coloring – The /ɹ/ after vowels is dropped entirely, as in the sets NEAR, SQUARE, START, NORTH, FORCE, CURE, and LETTER. In LETTER, it might be replaced with [a] rather than [ə].

 

Bigen, German

Model Accent

Germany 8 from The International Dialects of English Archive.

 

Posture

Because this is a second-language accent of English, we don’t have to be as consistent as a native speaker might be. Posture becomes much more important: speakers often retain much of the posture of their first language, which is what creates the sound variation when they speak English.

    • Compared to General American, this is a very forward accent, in terms of resonance.
    • The jaw setting is the most important aspect of the posture: the jaw is advanced and close. In other words, think about sending your lower jaw forward and perhaps keeping it more closed than you might be used to in your own American accent.
    • An advanced jaw will cause the tongue tip to land more forward on the gum ridge or even on the back of the front teeth for sounds like /t/, /d/, and especially /s/ and /z/. This creates a sense of breathiness in the accent.

 

Pronunciation: Consonants

    1. Devoiced /z/ and /d/ – Partly because of the jaw setting and also because of phonetic aspects of the German language, speakers often devoice alveolar consonants, so /z/ becomes [s], /d/ becomes [t], and /d͡ʒ/ becomes [t͡ʃ], especially at the ends of words.
    2. TH-alveolarization – The sounds /θ, ð/, usually spelled “th,” don’t exist in the German language, so speakers might approximate them with [s, z].
    3. R – The American or English [ɹ] is another sound that doesn’t exist in the German language, which uses both an alveolar trill [r] and a uvular fricative [χ, ʁ] for this phoneme. Let’s tell the story that this speaker has been speaking English for many decades, so he may be able to achieve [ɹ], but perhaps with more tongue tension, maybe all the way to [ɻ].
    4. W – This may be realized as [v], and vice versa: /v/ may become [w].
    5. T – Most Europeans learn Standard British English rather than Standard American English. So let’s use an unvoiced [t] between vowels and at the ends of words, rather than an American [ɾ].
    6. L – This is definitely a “clear /l/” [l] rather than a “dark /l/” [ɫ].

 

Pronunciation: Vowels

    1. BATH/TRAP → [ɛ]
    2. GOOSE → [u̹] Probably much more lip rounded than General American.
    3. GOAT – Something closer to the pronunciation in German might be [o], which could creep into English pronunciation. Or the speaker might aim for the English phoneme and overshoot, landing on [ou̹].
    4. FACE – Similarly to the GOAT set, the speaker might undershoot and use [e] or overshoot and use [e̯i].
    5. Liquid /u/ – Use [ju] in words like new, knew, student, duke.
    6. R-coloring – Let’s keep R-coloring after vowels, but it might be slightly effortful, so an R-colored vowel might sound like two separate syllables, as in “square”: [ɛ.ɚ].

 

Bern, Switzerland

Model Accent

Switzerland 4 from The International Dialects of English Archive.

 

Posture

Let’s use the German features outlined above, and pepper in a few details to make it specifically Swiss. The most striking of these is…

    • Nasality: I’m noticing that a lot of the pronunciation features are the same between Germany 8 and Switzerland 4, especially the consonants. But the resonance for the Swiss speaker is even more forward than the German, really focused in the nose.
    • “Circumflex” intonation: There’s a kind of up-and-down, lilting pitch pattern to this speaker. I don’t want to lull the audience with something too uniform, but we can potentially play with it when it serves the text.

 

Some USA Features: New York, Chicago, Maine, Kansas

The American accents in this show are the ones I have the most questions about. I never want the audience to be thinking about the accent rather than watching the scene, so we’re leaning toward subtle shifts for the American characters. Let’s start with your native manner of speaking. If you have regional features that obviously place you in a geography different from your character’s, we’ll work together on shifting those. Otherwise, here’s just a peppering of some of the biggest features from these regions that we could use if we’re feeling spicy.

 

NEW YORK

Model Accent from IDEA: New York 8

    • Very forward resonance, with a lot of consonants placed on the blade of the tongue or dentalized, so that consonants /θ, ð/, /t/, and /d/ sound “thick” or “heavy.”
    • R-coloring might be lighter or dropped entirely.
    • THOUGHT → [oə̯]
    • TRAP → [ɛə̯]

 

CHICAGO

Model Accent from IDEA: Illinois 12

    • Think about lowering the jaw and flattening the tongue. The mouth is wider than it is tall.
    • PALM → [ä] as in Chicaaago
    • THOUGHT/LOT/CLOTH merger – These sets are merged and tend to use [ɑ]
    • “Hard /ɹ/”– You might use a “hard /ɹ/” [ɻ] after vowels, especially in the START set.

 

MAINE

Model Accent from IDEA: Maine 2 for how little we could do or Maine 1 to hear a more historic Downeast New England sound.

    • I’m tempted not to do too much at all for this character, given that the “Downeast New England” sound isn’t crucial for characterizing him. (He’s not a lobsterman.) I’ll point out that even in Maine 2 there’s some “fronting” of vowels — vowels moving forward in the mouth — and maybe even some nasality.
    • If we decide to go nuts, the dropping of R-coloring is probably the most important feature.

 

KANSAS

Model Accent from IDEA: Kansas 8

    • Given that what we most need to focus on for this character is not where he’s from, I’m tempted not to lean into that western sound too much. What is useful here, particularly for giving us a more historic feel for the character, is the use of “hard /ɹ/” [ɻ] — the back of the body of the tongue bunches strongly while the tongue tip curls backward. The /ɹ/ may simply sound “stronger.” But this also pulls resonance toward the middle of the mouth, giving us this very characteristically western American sound.