Jonathan LaPaglia Quotes

When I first came to the States, I thought I had a perfect American accent, and then I was abruptly becoming aware that it wasn't. So I did have to work on it a little bit, but I was hesitant working on it because I thought it was good.

The accent got lost somewhere along the way. I'm a little embarrassed about it. When I arrived in LA I assumed I'd be able to put on the American accent. It proved difficult so I had six months working with a dialect coach and it's become a habit.

Auditioning for a couple of years, 99 per cent of the time you are doing an American accent.

When I'm doing an accent, you shouldn't notice it for a while, if I'm doing it right.

I had a dialect coach to get an American accent, and then another dialect coach to come off it a bit. There is something deep and mysterious in the voice when it isn't too high-pitched American.

I have spent too long training myself to speak with an American accent, it's ingrained. I spend 16 hours a day on set speaking with an American accent. Now, when I try to speak with an Aussie accent, I just sound like a caricature of myself.

I could do an American accent, if I were immersed in the accent, meaning if I were living back in Los Angeles and rehearsing and auditioning the whole time.

I think it's sort of a rite of passage for a British actor to try and get the American accent and have a good crack at doing that.

When I arrived in L.A., I assumed I'd be able to put on the American accent. It proved difficult, so I had six months working with a dialect coach, and it's become a habit.

I've played American characters so many times now, it's so natural to me. But when I play American, I stay in the American accent from the minute I get the job till the minute I wrap.

When I'm working in America, I wake up with an American accent and stay with it all day till makeup comes off. I just want everyone to be at ease, and not have the show's creators think, 'Oh my god, he's so English, why did we hire him?'

Most of the roles that I go for are Americans, so the first thing I had to do was pin down the American accent - which is obviously in 'Blue Crush 2.'

My accent fades away I guess when I sing. It's real weird. I guess singing is pretty much a universal language like you sing however everyone else sings and that's with an American accent. I sound very different when I talk.

I am an actor and I don't have any language barrier. If I get a Tamil film, I will learn the language. It's not a problem.

The thing about villains is most people play them with the shifty eyes and all that, whereas I play them as good guys. 'Cos everyone thinks they're a goodie, don't they?

I've always felt that to deliver a song successfully, you have to be an actress. A good actress becomes the part, just as a good singer becomes the song.

I used to love watching Angela Lansbury and other people when they were doing voice-overs for Disney shows. You'd see them doing these wild gestures in front of the microphone. I used to think, 'Is that really necessary?' What you realize when you're doing it is that that's the only way.

When you act, you want to emote and think in that language. I don't enjoy the process of doing a film in a language I am not good with.

There's always a certain kind of homework you have to do when there's an accent involved.

It's a bit odd to have a daughter who sounds American.

I felt so out of place at the Miss India pageant. I had just come back from America, and I was told I needed to lose my American accent and learn the Queen's English, so I had to enunciate my vowels and speak well and eloquently. Giving up a New York accent is pretty hard.

Can I eventually take classes and eliminate my accent? Sure. I guess anybody could. But this is who I am, and this is what I got. And there are millions of people who sound just like me. Millions. It's not like this is some novelty.

That's what's so great, I get to play any character in the world. And I think that's one of the things that makes doing 'Comedy Bang Bang' or other improv podcasts so fun, as well as my own, is that you can really explore a character deeply for a long period of time that is nothing like yourself.

I just can't imagine having to do an accent all the time - like, in your whole career.

I'm so envious of certain actors that have that natural facility to hear a cadence and the rhythm of an accent, that it goes into their brain and just comes out. Chameleon voices.