English Actors

Whether you're preparing for a role on stage or screen, the ability to speak with a clear and authentic RP accent can be invaluable. But learning the ins and outs of this prestigious accent can be challenging, especially if you're not a native speaker. That's where our course comes in. With expert instruction and clear, concise lessons, we'll guide you through the basics of RP pronunciation and diction, helping you to develop a confident and authentic speaking style.

From watching his colleague get shot in the testicles by a jealous producer to running Hollywood's most successful television studio, Harris Katleman had a front row seat in the development of the television industry. Through a number of hilarious accounts, Harris Katleman shares his journey from office boy to talent agent to television producer, and finally to studio head at both MGM and 20th Century Fox. Along the way, we meet industry giants including Rupert Murdoch, Bob Iger, Barry Diller, Marvin Davis, Kirk Kerkorian, Mark Goodson, and Lew Wasserman.

Surprisingly, this is the first full-length biography of the legendary comic who was the creative half of the universally loved duo Laurel and Hardy. Based upon scores of interviews with family and friends (including the intimate diaries of Virginia Ruth Laurel, whom Stan married three times), Stan tells the very human story of Laurel’s struggle to survive against difficult odds, personal and professional.

In this intimate and often surprising personal portrait, Joseph McBride challenges the conventional wisdom that Welles' career after Citizen Kane, widely regarded as the greatest film ever made, fell into a long decline. The author shows instead how Welles never stopped directing radical, adventurous films and was always breaking new artistic ground as a filmmaker. McBride is the first author to provide a comprehensive examination of the films of Welles's artistically rich yet widely misunderstood later period in the United States (1970–1985).

A powerful force in theatre since the 1970s, Williamson's plays have uniquely explored the pulse of our Australianness. After five decades of chronicling the blunders, mishaps and messes that he and his fellow Australians got themselves into, Williamson has penned his long-awaited memoir, Home Truths. It reveals the story of the man behind the work

Master the quick, sharp tones of the East London accent with An Actor’s Guide to the East London Accent. Often associated with the Cockney dialect, the East London accent is energetic, lively, and packed with personality. Whether you’re working on a character for stage, film, or voice-over, this course will teach you how to confidently use the key features of the accent, including dropped consonants and clipped vowels.

Dolly Parton is best known for her musical prowess, but there is so much more to her character than people realize. Nowadays, she is the epitome of old Hollywood glamor. She is pretty well known for getting a lot of cosmetic surgery over the years in order to keep up the gaudy, glamorous image we’ve come to know and love. Even through all this she’s still modest. What people may not realize is that her early life was anything but glamorous.

When Becky, a housewife with screenwriting dreams, attracts the interest of Felix, a Hollywood star, the two quickly become friends. Though the sexual tension is obvious, Becky has no intention of cheating on her husband - but would Felix cheat on his wife? As their friendship blossoms, rumors and suspicion threaten to derail their platonic love.

Ava is a tribute to a legendary life. Authors Kendra Bean and Anthony Uzarowski take a closer look at the Academy Award-nominated actress' life and famous screen roles. They also shed new light on the creation and maintenance of her glamorous image, her marriages, and friendships with famous figures such as Ernest Hemingway, John Huston, and Tennessee Williams.

From best-selling author Julie Klam comes a lively and engaging exploration of celebrity: Why celebrities fascinate us, what it means to be famous today, and why celebrities are so important. “When I was young I was convinced celebrities could save me”, Julie Klam admits in The Stars in Our Eyes, her funny and personal exploration of fame and celebrity. As she did for subjects as wide-ranging as dogs, mothers, and friendship, Klam brings her infectious curiosity and crackling wit to the topic of celebrity.

Mastering the Texas Accent is an essential audiobook for actors seeking to develop a genuine Texas accent, ideal for film, theater, and voiceover roles. This guide provides an in-depth exploration of the Texas dialect, starting with the foundational elements that give this regional accent its unique character. Listeners will learn how to modify vowels, drop certain consonants, and adopt the characteristic Texas drawl that makes speech from the Lone Star State instantly recognizable.

He was the unlikeliest of presidential candidates - dismissed by opponents as a movie actor, a right-winger trying to undo the work of liberals stretching back to Franklin Roosevelt. Yet Ronald Reagan made it to the White House, taking office in a time of economic turmoil, waning prestige abroad, and a general dampening of the American spirit. Reagan's patriotism, wit, and optimism lifted the nation and brought it through several crises.

Cowboy Stuntman chronicles the life and achievements of this colorful Texan and Olympic gold medal winner who spent a half century as a Hollywood stuntman and actor, appearing in 10 John Wayne movies and doubling for a long list of actors as diverse as Robert Culp, Michael Landon, Steve Martin, Strother Martin, Robert Redford, and Roy Rogers.

Where does one go from up? Adam’s TV show is ending, and he discovers his fame as Bud Thomas makes it difficult for him to find acting jobs. To make matters worse, his boyfriend, Cliff, almost immediately lands a role. Adam is accustomed to being mobbed by fans, hounded by reporters for interviews, and receiving invitations to the biggest events in Hollywood. Overnight, it all begins to slip away, and Adam struggles to find his place in the entertainment industry that’s forgotten him overnight.

This is a story about revenge against Russia. Revenge using a bomb, and not just any bomb but the most powerful bomb in the world. In 1961 Russia built and exploded the biggest thermonuclear weapon in the world, a monster 58 Megaton bomb. They also secretly built a second bomb which they stored at a nuclear storage facility where it remained forgotten for 28 years.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Lonesome Dove, Larry McMurtry follows up Books and Literary Life with this final installment in his memoir trilogy. Tinged with his wry humor and Texas swagger, Hollywood is McMurtry’s anecdote-filled take on Tinseltown from the year his Horseman, Pass By was adapted into Hud (1963) to the year he wrote the screenplay for the Oscar-winning Brokeback Mountain (2005).

Ambrose Palmer, an aspiring actor, journeys through the circles of hell of a brutal industry. We follow him, his lovers, and a small clan of novice performers as they weather the storms of the acting profession. But behind the sex and hilarity lurks the desperation of Thatcher’s England.

Hollywood’s hottest heartthrob Liam Sullivan has escaped the paparazzi and celebrity gossips after a sensational tragedy, reexamining his high-flying lifestyle and his priorities. In disguise, traveling through the Smoky Mountains of North Carolina, he encounters a rail-thin, starving woman who has lost everything but the dilapidated cabin where she once lived with her grandmother in happier days. Raina Donovan is determined to make her stand there, but winter is coming, and Liam cannot desert her until he can make her safe, however much she tries to make him leave.

Hilarious, charming, and self-effacing, meet Edmund Pegge, one of Australia's most prolific supporting actors. Traveling between England and Australia and working on stage, in film and on television for over 50 years, Ed Pegge knows all the tricks and all the trials of a working actor's life. He regales us with tales of the good times that intersperse the actor's lean spells.

Bring the rustic charm of England’s West Country to life on the stage or screen with A Guide to the West Country British Accent. This course is ideal for actors, voice-over artists, and performers who want to perfect the sounds of this distinctive British accent from Devon, Cornwall and Somerset.