Sunday, September 20, 2020

Boston Accent

 

September 19, 2020

 

I watched “Spenser: Confidential” today. If you’ve never read a Spenser book, it’s a passable movie. Actual Spenser fans might be irritated with Hawk being portrayed as a marshmallow; and God forbid that Spenser look rugged instead of smooth-featured; but that’s Hollywood for you.

What I find just as annoying as the Hawk personality debacle is the fact that only one person in the entire movie has anything approaching a Boston accent. A movie set in Boston, rife with Boston cops and Boston citizens, and nobody speaks Bostonian? (It was the same way in the TV series with Robert Urich and Avery Brooks.) And the woman with the accent, although brave and clever and tough, was made to look just a little lower-class than the star. (She was, however, a huge improvement over Susan Silverman, so that’s a plus.)

 

Don’t be afraid, Hollywood. We’ll be able to understand what they’re saying. Instead of just having a few shots of the city, let us get the whole picture—accent and all.



No comments: