Ivan Borodin

I'll be teaching a class on accents and dialects at Los Angeles City College

Dialect Training for Actors

February 27 - March 20, 2010

4 consecutive Saturdays 12:30pm - 2pm

Class fee $ 60 (plus $20 material fee, paid at first class)

Call 323 953-4000 to enroll (extensions x-2650, 2651, 2652, 2653) - Yes, LACC takes credit cards.

At Los Angeles City College - Community Services

Located near Vermont and Melrose Avenues.

Enrollment deadline: February 15th (sometimes they stretch it a bit later - call soon to get in)

Having taught this fun class since 1996, I'm proud to offer you the opportunity to learn four dialects during the fall.

The class runs in the following format:  I hand out the class materials; sometimes only four pages, other times a 20 page booklet.  I then run through the basic sound changes the accent of the day, drilling students on their ability to pick up the vowel and consonant changes.

I call on everyone several times per class.  With smaller classes (@ 6 students), you could be called on up to a dozen times.  I can never predict how large the class will get, but even in larger groups, everyone gets involved (unless of course, you prefer to not be called on.  No problem obliging that request.)

By the way, the entire class is conducted in the accent of the day.  So if we're covering the Cockney accent one day, I teach the entire class speaking like Ozzy Osbourne.  And so do the students.  This kind of immersion leads to rapid learning.

After the material is covered, we begin improvising.  I usually tell an anecdote or read an article, and ask the class for their opinions.  Using the accent, the entire class participates in the discussion.

You should see how quickly people pick up the dialects.  It's simply astounding to me.  And I've been teaching this class since 1996.

And we have a ton of laughs while we're doing it. 

You know why we're laughing?  Because it's a silly subject.  Think about it.  Putting on a foreign dialect.  You can't get any sillier than that.  And that's how it needs to be approached.  With a grain of salt.  With an open mind.  With a flexible attitude.

Later in the lesson, I review the sound changes (especially the ones that the class seem to be missing.)  Before you know it, the hour and a half is over.

But here's what's great about the class:  Included in the price of the class materials ($20), you receive my Speak with an Accent Compact Disc.  Using that disc, you can preview and prepare the accent that is scheduled for the following week.  So you walk into the next Saturday already feeling confident.  And boy, the whole class just vibrates with the accent of the week.

Okay, some frequently asked questions.

Question:  What accents are you going to teach?

Well, this semester I'm thinking about starting off with French, in honor of Inglorious Basterds, but for the next three weeks it's up to the class.  What do I mean by that?  Well, I need to see who's enrolled.  If I have ten New Yorkers in class, I can't teach the New York dialect, can I?  I usually pass around index cards and ask each student to write down what they're most interested in, then I post on my website what we'll cover the following week.  By the second meeting, I've set the schedule, so you can prepare for the upcoming weeks.

Keep something in mind.  Even though you feel you may never need to learn certain accents, experience has taught me that actors are often called on to do all sorts of dialects.  If I were African-American, I wouldn't consider learning an Irish Brogue a waste of time.  Remember Forest Whittaker in 'The Crying Game'?  And ever heard of voice-overs?

Question: Where are the classes?

This class is offered at Los Angeles City College, which is a nice campus on Vermont and Melrose, between Silverlake, Hollywood, Koreatown, and Hancock Park (sort of.)  Sometimes they move it to an even nicer building on Wilshire, near Vermont.  Saturday afternoons in the Fall, you shouldn't have any problems with parking or safety issues.  By the way, there is a police station on campus, occasionally two hundred feet from my classroom.

Question:  I want to take your class, but I only want to learn one specific accent.  Will you accomodate me?

Probably not.  This is a general class on dialects.  I'm looking to please the highest number of students, so I'll pick the dialects based on the index cards submitted during the first class.  If you're only interested in one dialect, you might fair better with a private lesson. 

You might look on this website at my Speak with an Accent CD or at the remaining dialect tapes (I'm slowly phasing them out) and see if I cover what you're looking for.

Q:  What's your background?  How'd you get into all this?

Check out my profile, written by Jeffrey Loy, that appears on this website.

A better question might be:  What do I get from teaching?

Well, I'm thrilled to help other people get good at accents.  Having been so darn bad it when I started doing them myself, I know exactly what you're going through when you struggle with a dialect.  This class will help you find your way.  I hope to see you there.