PT Ray Park

Apologies if this has been asked before. But why was Ray Park's voice dubbed by Peter Serafinowicz? Is it simply a case of his own voice being unsuitable/distracting? He is a Glaswegian, so a thick Scottish accent might not work, I suspect.

I have seen clips from the original SW that have David Prowse's voice, and his Brummie accent really doesn't work for Vader. Are there any similar clips for Park?

BTW, if you haven't seen Serafinowicz's Darth Vader sketches from his (totally brilliant) self-titled show you really should.

 

Yep. The exact wording is that his voice was "too squeaky"

Originally, Benicio del Toro (DJ in TLJ) was cast as Maul's voice, but he lost interest after most of Maul's lines were cut, so Serafinowicz was chosen afterwards

(On a mod note: don't wanna lock this since there's still some potential discussion, but I also think the broader topic makes it worthy of not being merged into the random questions thread, so. Maybe kinda reworking this as a thread relating to Maul's chimeric performance? Something like that? @heels1785 @cubman987)

 

I would love to hear a clip with Park’s voice! His accent isn’t crazy strong, but it’s certainly less fitting than Serafinowicz or Witwer’s.

 

Ray was cool as all hell. They should've kept his voice in it

 

As a non Native English speaker, I had never understood all this with the accents. However, what is important for every character and from I see in SW for Lucas himself is the tembre, the voice register: it should correspond to the character. David Prowse voice wasn't enough solemn and frighteng for Vader.
Maybe for several reasons Lucas considered the voice of Ray Park not exactly what he wanted for the character. For the record, a difference from others, I consider the naturally melancholic tembre of Hayden ideal for Anakin's character. I think that George had chosen him also for that.

 

A very interesting post. As a native English speaker I find it very difficult to accept distinct British accents in all fantasy films and not just Star Wars. It takes me right out of the moment. For me a perfect example is Bala-Tik's broad Scottish accent. Now I have absolutely no problem with the Scottish accent or Brian Vernel but as soon as Bala-Tik spoke my immediate reaction was "What's a Glaswegian doing in the GFFA"? From that moment on the whole scene just lost any form of realism or credence.

The same for me is when the Orcs in LOTR's start talking in a East London Cockney accent, again this just takes me completely out of the scene. Why have we got Cockney's in Mordor?



Therefore when creating fantasy worlds, for me accents are one of the single most important aspects in creating an immersive experience.

 

Well, speaking of this David Salo created words in the Black Speech especially for The Hobbit using Turkish and similar languages. I don't know this language but I know few words and I recognized them. So, are the orcs Turks? I know that they aren't and I know why he did that but still it is fact that I know (and ii wasn't only me in the cinema that reacted with surprise). I know that this question would look stupid to you but are you sure that the Orcs speak with East London accent? I ask this because the majority of these actors are from New Zealand or Australia and I'm surprised that they don't speak with their local accent: believe it or not but for foreigners like me sometimes is hard to distinguish some specific accents from others. My point is that one just cannot make a movie of such type relying on which accent exactly the audience recognize or not.
What makes me cringe in this aspect however is when the accent tries to "recompense" the real language like in English speaking movie we hear how the German officers talk between them in English with German accent: please, don't. We know that you are Americans/another English speakers trying to pass as Germans but the accent doesn't make the things realistic, it makes them ridiculous. Such things really make me cringe but I think in SW really the accents are not a thing.

 

Prowse did not have a Birmingham accent, he famously had a west country accent.

Carry on.

 

Just lock it and get it over with. Pointless to drag it out when it will be locked anyway.

 

Well, that's not a very positive attitude. I think the thread has plenty of potential

There's a fairly big difference between a masked character like Vader having a different body and voice performer, and a case like Maul, where they have to deal with lip sync issues when the voice actor dubs over Ray Park. That alone is fascinating, and with Maul's cameo in Solo and the idea he may very well appear in future live action media - Park and Witwer both love the role and are fully willing to give us some more Maul - I don't think it's a dead subject at all

 

Ray Park doesn’t have a Scottish accent, but he could have been dubbed for any reason really. He wasn’t a trained actor so maybe he didn’t deliver the lines as they wanted, maybe they already had a voice in mind for Maul and his just didn’t match that. Its not like it’s a Sam Jones kind of thing, so with Maul I think its just what they had in mind for the character before casting Park. I would imagine hes not too bothered about it anyway as 20 years later hes synonymous with Maul and hes a well recognised part of the SW universe and dare I say it one of the most iconic characters its created.

On a side note. Accents are a funny thing in films. One of my favourites is Where Eagles Dare, when Richard Burton and Clint Eastwood stroll through a check point in German uniforms chatting away in their English and American accents, no one stops them or thinks its odd they don't have German accents. Or Sean Connery in The Hunt for Red October too, a Russian with a thick Sottish accent. But in SW it doesn't matter at all how they speak, as theres no pre-conceptions or boundaries.

 

You make some very interesting and valid points but I can confirm the Orcs in LOTR definitely speak in a Cockney East London accent. In fact there's a load of info surrounding this on the internet.

Here's a forum discussing the Orcs Cockney East London accent with regards to gaming but does reference the Peter Jackson films and Tolkien's vision of the Orcs. You may just want to skim read though as it goes on forever!

https://www.giantbomb.com/middle-ea...y-are-orcs-orks-uruks-always-cockney-1496375/

I guess where you're from has huge influence on how you perceive and receive different accents in movies. Just for example if the orcs had a Scandinavian accent I would probably be completely accepting of this however I imagine the Scandinavian population may find this odd!

For me, the more familiar I am with a specific localised accent the harder it is to accept in a fantasy universe.

 

He is still with us but we won’t see him ever again. Unfortunate situation. Could have been handled differently. I was really looking forward to his future roles in the SW universe.

 

Did I miss somtehing?

 

google Ray Park Instagram

 

his wife said they were hacked.

 

Do you have a source for that? From what I've read, it seems that he was set to play the character in its entirety and was replaced with Ray Park when he dropped out.

http://flipthemoviescript.com/benicio-del-toro-star-wars-phantom-menace-movies/