The Accent Says It All

Here’s how Emily Soell came by her Brooklyn accent, an accent she has used from time to time in roles at The Sharon Playhouse.

“I am a born-and-bred New Yorker,” she tells me during a break in rehearsal for “My Fair Lady.” By that she means a born-and-bred Manhattanite. That outer 

boroughs twang she can affect on stage did not come naturally. It was through a deep friendship with one Ann Burbank whom Soell, age 10 or so, had met at summer camp. Burbank had a Brooklyn accent. Soell brought it home with her. Soell’s mother promptly sent her to a speech therapist to get her Manhattan daughter back.

So, here’s how Emily Soell came by still another accent, one required of any actor playing Mrs. Higgins, Professor Henry Higgins’s mother in “My Fair Lady.” Soell went to Google and typed in “How do you learn an upscale English accent?”

She followed the advice and in no time Soell was spending quality time with her idea of the best practitioners of theatrical English: Maggie Smith and Helen Mirren. Soell learned to enunciate at the front of her mouth. She learned to say Ascot to make it sound like biscuit. And, toughest of all, she has mastered the word “girl,” which in upscale British English sounds a bit like “gel,”with some coaching from director Richard Stafford.   

“I listened to Maggie and Helen, and I listened to the music of it.”

And, by George (Bernard Shaw), I think she’s got it! 

“My Fair Lady,” directed by Richard Stafford, and starring Rufus Collins as Henry Higgins and Lee Harrington as Eliza Doolittle, runs at The Sharon Playhouse through July 5. For tickets and information, call 860-364-7469 or go to www.sharonplayhouse.org

To read an early review, go to www.tricornernews.com on Friday, June 19. The print review will run in The Lakeville Journal newpapers next week.