Well. There is already news on the Pygmalion front. My director was unable to find a fellow to play the Mad Hrungarian, so she has asked me to double. This character does not appear in early versions of the play, but Mr. Shaw wrote him in so that the Ball and the actual imposture could be shown onstage. The character is a phoneticist, an early pupil of Henry Higgins, in fact, who in addition to teaching people to better their station by speaking proper English (like a lady in a flower shop) makes a very nice living blackmailing people who want to hide the pasts they reveal, unknowingly, through their accents.
He is called Nepommuck (in My Fair Lady, he is called Zoltan Koparte), and he is described as having marvelous moustache and whiskers. I shall insist on them. Which, alas, means shaving my own upper lip to play Alfie (I call him Alfie ’cos I know him so well, you see), but I shall make that sacrifice.
The plan, then, will be to begin the play in dirt and tatters, hie off to the dressing room (there is a proper dressing room at the playhouse, which will be a mercy) to wash off the theater dirt and apply the moustachios; I have all of the at-home scene and an intermission for that. Then, once I have proclaimed Eliza a princess, I go into the wings and peel off the mustachios, put on a swallow-tail coat (I’m hoping) and come in again as Rich Alfie. It’ll be tight, but I think it can be done. Unfortunately, I have no idea what a Hungarian accent sounds like. Ah, well. I suspect a MittelEuropean funny accent will do for half-a-dozen lines.
I hope to write later about the inclusion of the Ball scene; I was initially against it, but it does underline the point that Shaw makes in a variety of different ways: Society imposes a set of bizarre, arbitrary and stupid rules, and people enforce them sporadically and incompetently without understanding them at all. Alfred Doolittle the garbage collector is not welcome, but Alfred Doolittle the heir is welcome. Prof. Nepommuck is able to get rich off the secret accents of European society, because nobody else is able to even hear the differences that, were they to be exposed, would ruin the watchmaker’s son. Silly people don’t know their own silly business, as Higgins says.
Tolerabimus quod tolerare debemus,
-Vardibidian.
Well, if he blackmails people over their accents, I’d go with a Peter Lorre impression. I just saw him last night in “Arsenic and Old Lace,” and was reminded about how much joy he could bring to portraying a creep.
I think of Peter Lorre’s accent as more Viennese than Hungarian. Although, of course, he was Hungarian, and the only other Hungarians I can think of are the Gabors…
Thanks,
-V.
I’ve long wanted there to be a “phonetics for actors” book that would explain what you needed to know of phonetics in order to then pull off consistent accents. A chapter of background, then chapters on accents from different regions and countries with explanations (this is why a Hungarian person has these pronunciation characteristics) and practical tips (use a standard Czech accent, but a little more sing-songy and a different long A). It’s probably not going to come out in time to help you, given that in the past decade there has been precisely zero progress on it. It would be part of my “Linguistics, it’s actually useful!” series.
I should clarify that my example was entirely fictional, and has no basis in reality. Please do not attempt to modify a Czech accent at home without adult supervision, etc.
No book I could find, Michael, but I do have some good news. There is help.
I’ll be frank, though. The only reason I included that first link is because I wanted a third link, and the guy’s name is McAnally. There are so many places to go with that, I will let you choose for yourself and simply fade to black.
peace
Matt
I think you would want to use Higgins Universal Alphabet for that book.
I have seen some books on accents for actors, but none that start with the phonetics background, and honestly, none that appear to have benefited from linguistics scholarship. When you publish it, will it come with a CD? Or with its own mp3 player/USB drive and software?
Thanks,
-V.
mp3 files on-line, i’d guess, rather than a CD. though there’s a surprising amount of demand still to buy CDs of language examples even when the mp3 files are free.
All right. I am holding two books: The Dialect Handbook, by Ginny Kopf (second edition) and Manual of Foreign Dialects, by Lewis Herman. The latter is an incredibly racist book with a lot of details. The former lists Hungarian in a group of Eastern European dialects along with Czech, Slovak, Rumanian and Yugoslavian. Ms. Kopf suggests listening to Bela Lugosi, or to Martin Landau playing Bela Lugosi in Ed Wood, or to the Gabor sisters. Of course, they also refer to Zoltan Korpathy in My Fair Lady as Rumanian, when he is, of course, Hungarian (and is played by the Viennese Theodore Bikel) (and she misspelled the name Karpathy). I think I will put down Ms. Kopf’s book, which is good, because it’s difficult to type whilst holding two books, you know?
So. Mr. Herman (and his wife and co-author, Marguerite Shalett Herman) suggest that Hungarian is closer to Finnish than to the Slavic group. The Hermans provide a list of vowel changes and consonant changes, not in IPA (although they do list the IPA symbols on the endpapers, where they are doing a lot of good, I tell you what) but in a sort of eye language where, for instance, they say that the sound AY as in take become EHi as in tEHik. They also helpfully say that the s is sometimes changed to z medially, as in basement becoming bEHizmEHnt. This would be terrific, if only Nepommuck had to go to the bEHizmEHnt.
Let’s take the following line: I am your pupil: your first pupil, your best and greatest pupil. I am little Nepommuck, the marvelous boy. I have made your name throughout Europe. You teach me phonetic. You cannot forget ME.
Making the substitutions: AHi ehm yawr pyoopi’: yawr fir[rrr]ehst pyoopi’, yawr behst ehnd gr[rrr]AHitest pyoopi’. AHi ehm liddle Nepommuck, deh marv’lahz bAHi. AHi hehv mEHid yawr nEHime troohAHt Yoorawp. Yoo teach me phawnehtic. Yoo cehnnaht fawrgeht ME.
Doesn’t that make it easier?
Thanks,
-V.