- Hello.
My name is Sammi, and I am from Paris, France originally.
From Atlanta, Georgia.
From Sydney, Australia.
London, England.
Moscow, Russia.
There's been a lot more,
but those are the ones that come to mind.
My name is Sammi Grant, I'm a dialect coach
and I'm legally blind.
(people speaking at once)
A dialect coach is someone who teaches actors accents.
I can do accents from around the world.
I don't really even have a count anymore
because I've taught so many.
I mostly work for the stage.
I've started dabbling in television.
One of the reasons I think that I took to voice work
and dialect work is because I'm more in tune with hearing.
So people are always like, “Oh, you have heightened hearing.”
I don't like that phrase
'cause it sounds like we have like superhero hearing
like we're Daredevil or something.
Oh, you're just like Daredevil.
No.
But I do have more a tuned hearing.
I use my hearing more than a sighted person
because I have to.
For a London accent, placement's really important
so the placements like really forwards in the mouth.
So there's the southern accent that lacks the R.
The Australian accent quite different
than the British accent
so they don't really say like, buttah,
it's a little more like butter.
Transatlantic accent is very dramatic.
It's what you hear in those old time movies.
It's kind of like a, well, well I don't know,
is he ever gonna love me?
Well I just want him to love me.
But if I'm too expressive maybe he won't, I don't know.
For Russian accent you want to sort of feel like
you swallow some in back of the mouth.
This is very stereotype,
but like the Jewish New York mother.
This is what I do a lot with my friends.
You know, kind of like the, why don't you call me?
You know I sit around and wait for your calls all day
and you never call me.
I don't mind, it's okay, you know, just whatever.
I just pay for your college tuition, it's okay.
It's a pretty in depth process teaching someone an accent.
I get sent this script and I try to gather everything I can.
So that goes much beyond just, where does this take place?
It also factors in time period
and education level, class level,
and I also think about the gender of my character.
And then I talk with the director to sort of you know
touch base on their concept for the voice of the show.
And then I kind of go on a hunt
for authentic speakers.
Once I've gathered all that information
I present it to the actor.
We're now surrounded by so many voices
that are emotionless.
You know by these automated voices that sound very fake.
Where it's like, I'd love to help you,
I'm a computer that's here to help you
with whatever you want all the time.
I love meeting new people and hearing their voices.
I, you know, immediately go into dialect coach mode
and I wanna sort of imitate them.
I just wanna like experience their voice
and experience what their vocalizing.
(people speaking at once)