MTV Robert Pattinson Interview
I was asked by MTV to critique Robert Pattinson’s Spanish accent in his film, Little Ashes.
“What I’m hearing is actually a mixture. I’m hearing a lot of his Americanisms that he has learned,” said accent coach Claudette Roche, saying that Pattinson’s gig as Salvador Dalí is all the more difficult since co-star Javier Beltrán is from Barcelona. “Because he’s working with Javier, who is Spanish, it’s very contrasting. Javier has a very pure Spanish accent.”
“There is one good thing he did that really struck me, and it is something he does as an Englishman, as well,” said Roche, who is British and American and has trained actors such as Lolita Davidovich. “As an American, I say, for example, ‘I’m going “ta” the store.’ Most Americans don’t say ‘to,’ we say ‘ta.’ And in one little clip, he says ['I need to go further'] without saying ‘ta.’ People who learn English as a second language, like a Spaniard, learn it properly, and a little word like ‘to’ is a hard thing for them not to say properly. So [someone like Salvador Dalí] would say, ‘I am going “to” the store.”
