Book and Tape. Listen to the tape while following the text and learn the dialects and speeches. A must package for every actor and actress seriously pursuing their craft.
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Editorial Reviews
From the Publisher
The readings and instructional text are by Dr. David Alan Stern, dialectician to the stars: Lynn Redgrave, Jack Klugman, Edward James Olmos, Oscar winners Olympia Dukakis, Genna Davis and others. The monologues are by Roger Karshner. Mr. Karshner is a published playwright. His works enjoy widespread productions throughout the United States and Canada. His play "The Dream Crust" was selected by Burns Mantle as one of America's best.
About the Author
Roy Karshner
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
26 of 27 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Stern's work is by no means Seminal,
By A Customer
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Dialect Monologues (Vol 1) (Paperback)
I own nearly all of Dr. Stern's Accent/Dialog books and tapes, including "Dialolect Monologues" I and II and over 20 of his individual accent/dialect tapes (example: Acting With an Accent/Norwegian & Swedish). While I do feel that it is worthwhile to own Dr. Stern's tapes in order to complete one's libary of accent/dialogue books and tapes, I do not feel that Dr. Stern's tapes are the best of the bunch. If I could only choose one author's accent/dialogue tapes I would not choose Dr. Stern's. Dr. Stern's system has several flaws. The first flaw is that Dr. Stern is a "one man band", meaning the only voice you will ever hear is Dr. Stern's. By contrast, two of the three other accent/dialect systems I own include lots of recordings of actual natives speaking the dialects. The second flaw is that Dr. Stern chooses dialects that bias towards educated middle class. For example, his tape on New York City accent does not teach the normal Brooklyn/Bronx dialect of the "Dese and doze, toity toid street" variety, but instead uses as his standard a sort of mildly Jewish middle class Manhattan accent as the single dialect he teaches on the tape. Similarly, his tape on the Polish dialect sounds so sanitized and educated that its really hard to tell what accent it is other than being mildly European and educated. Similarly, his Italian tape is of a European, educated person instead of the lower class Italian that one would expect to hear included on a tape devoted to Italian. A third and severe flaw in Dr. Stern's single-dialect tapes is that he repeats every exercize first in standard American and pauses for the student to repeat it, and then says the word or sentence in the dialect and pauses for the student to repeat it in the dialect. This effectively wastes about a quarter of the tape, as it doesn't teach anything to hear and repeat the words/sentences in standard american. A forth flaw is that Dr. Stern is obsessed with his pet theory that each dialect must resonate from a unique portion of the mouth cavity. Dr. Stern wastes from ten to twenty minutes of each of his hour long single-dialect tapes going on and on about the point of resonance of the dlalect. This is mind-numbingly boring to hear more than once, so one ends up fast forwading through it when listening on subsequent ocasions. The two accent/dialect systems that I recommend are not currently offered by Amazon so I will not give their names. Hopefully at some point Amazon will expand their selection of accent/dialect tapes. It would also be extremely useful if Amazon had a cross reference system in place so that one could show all video tapes or recordings that, say, give examples of a Cockney accent, an Irish accent, etc. For example, the 1938 video of Shaw's Pygmalian is an excellent example of Cockney, but one must figure this out on one's own as Amazon does not list videos by the accent/dialects they use.
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Totally useless,
By
This review is from: Dialect Monologues (Vol 1) (Paperback)
It is amazing that a supposed authority on accents, Dr. Stern, would be associated with this book (and especially the cassette that goes with it.). He is - allegedly - a dialect coach to the Stars. It may explain some of the atempts at foreign accents that have recently come out of Hollywood. The accents on the cassette are nothing short of embarrassing - A cringe a minute. I asked a fellow actor to listen to the French accent and guess what it was: He guessed Spanish! If you want a first rate book on accents, buy Robert Blumenfeld's "Accents - A Manual for Actors". Now where do I go to get my money back?...
7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Dialect Monologues,
By Griffin Mckay "griffinkay" (Midvale, UT (USA)) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Dialect Monologues (Vol 1) (Paperback)
This is a good source for those already familiar with the dialects contained therein. David Alan Stern is obviously a very talented man who is capable of accurately portraying different accents. All sounded authentic to me, although once in a while the Boston and Irish dialects sounded a bit put on to me (but seeing as how he has a doctorate in speech, Dr. Stern probably has more of an ear for authentic dialects than I do). The book also contains some helpful hints (though if you're learning the dialect for the first time, I would recommend his tape series, Acting With An Accent or Robert Blumenfeld's Accents, A Manuel for Actors. All in all, the book and the tape are very helpful in allowing one to hear the rhythm of different accents as well as speech patterns and vowel and consonant substitutions.
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