"Stage English" in Irene Worth obituary

[Clark Whelton]

My understanding is that 'stage English' had the same function in Britain
that 'radio-TV English' does in America today... provide common standards
for people with different speech patterns.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Steve Kl." <stevekl at PANIX.COM>
To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
Sent: Tuesday, March 12, 2002 4:25 PM
Subject: Re: "Stage English" in Irene Worth obituary


> On Tue, 12 Mar 2002 Bapopik at AOL.COM wrote:
>
> >    The obituary for Irene Worth in today's NEW YORK TIMES
> >    (www.nytimes.com) mentions that she learned "Stage English."
> >    Stage English?  Any one of you teach that?
>
> No, but I picked it up along the way in my background as an actor. The
> only thing I can think of that seeped into my regular speech was the "hw"
> pronunciation of "wh" words, which was something completely unknown to me
> before acting. One of my acting profs at Michigan State was a contract
> player from Columbia in the 50s and very much used stage diction when
> teaching.
>
> Someone at the recent ADS meeting (or was it 2 ago?) did a paper
> comparing the r-fulness and r-lessness of actresses over the past several
> decades... I don't know if she spoke of "stage English" per se, but it's
> that kind of thing. Acting coaches who teach diction for the stage would
> be the people who impart that kind of knowledge.
>
> -- Steve Kl.
>