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Seth Rogen was asked if having kids would make him 'happier.' He answered honestly.

Men almost never get questions like this.

via Stephen McCarthy/Collision via Sportsfile/Wikimedia Commons

Seth Rogen on stage during the opening night of Collision 2019 at Enercare Center in Toronto, Canada.

Breaking news: There's a big double standard in Hollywood. Childless women in the public eye are often plagued by the question: “So, why don’t you have any children?” It’s a deeply personal question that cuts right to the bone, and there can be many answers. But, if the woman doesn’t want children and says so publicly, she is bound to face some judgment.

"[I don't] like [the pressure] that people put on me, on women—that you've failed yourself as a female because you haven't procreated. I don't think it's fair," Jennifer Aniston told Allure. "You may not have a child come out of your vagina, but that doesn't mean you aren't mothering—dogs, friends, friends' children."

On the Monday, March 6 episode of “The Diary Of A CEO” podcast, host Steven Bartlett asked actor Seth Rogen why he’s childless, and it was a rare moment where a man in the public eye was challenged on the topic. Rogen gave a thoughtful explanation for his and Lauren Miller’s decision to be child-free.

Rogen and Miller were married in 2011.

seth rogen, seth rogen kids, set rogen comicon, set rogen wife, seth rogen family, actors Seth Rogen speaking at the 2016 San Diego Comic Con International, for "Preacher", at the San Diego Convention Center in San Diego, California.via Gage Skidmore/Wikimedia Commons

“There's a whole huge thing I'm not doing, which is raising children,” Rogen told Bartlett. The host attempted to play devil’s advocate and asked Rogen if he considered whether having children might have made him and his wife “happier.”

“I don't think it would,” Rogen responded.

Then, as if anticipating the question, the “Pineapple Express” star upended one of the arguments that people who have children often make: that people who don’t have children have no idea what it’s like.

“I've been around obviously a lot of children; I'm not ignorant to what it’s like…Everyone I know has kids. I'm 40, you know? I know,” Rogen said. “Some of my friends have had kids for decades. Some people want kids, some people don't want kids.” He added that many people seem to have kids without considering the issue.

“I mean, a lot of people have kids before they even think about it, from what I've seen, honestly,” he said. “You just are told, you go through life, you get married, you have kids—it’s what happens.” Rogen and his wife have only grown stronger in their decision and they believe that it has helped their relationship.

“Now, more than anything, the conversation is like, ‘Honestly, thank God we don’t have children,’” he continued. “We get to do whatever we want. We are in the prime of our lives. We are smarter than we've ever been, we understand ourselves more than we ever have, we have the capacity to achieve a level of work and a level of communication and care for one another, and a lifestyle we can live with one another that we've never been able to live before. And we can just do that, and we don't have to raise a child—which the world does not need right now,” Rogen concluded.

lauren miller, seth rogen, lauren miller husband, seth rogen wife, childfree, golden globes Seth Rogen and Lauren Miller at the 69th Annual Gold Gen Globes Awards.via JDeeringDavis/Wikimedia Commons

Rogen received a lot of pushback for his comments, and two years later, in an interview with Esquire, he addressed the criticism and doubled down on his decision. “People really had strong takes on it, being like, ‘F**k this f**king guy,'" he said. “Well, if you hate me that much, why do you want more of me?” He also addressed those who asked, "Who's going to care for you when you get older?"

“Is that why you’re having kids? Because I have two things to say: One, that’s very selfish to create a human so someone can take care of you. And two, just because you have a kid, I hate to break it to you, that doesn’t mean they’re going to do that,” he said.

Everyone has the right to choose whether or not to have children, and no one has the right to judge them. Rogen and Miller have thought their decision through and should be applauded for living how they see fit. It’s cool to see Rogen with such a thoughtful opinion on the matter. It’d be even cooler if celebrities never had to discuss the topic in the first place.

- YouTube www.youtube.com

This article originally appeared two years ago. It has been updated.

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The secret alphabet actors use that lets you pronounce any word in any language or accent

Ever heard of a "voiced alveolar flap?" Me neither.

Canva Photos & By International Phonetic Association - CC BY-SA 3.0,

Actors and elite language learners have a secret tool that rapidly accelerates their pronunciation skills.

There's a lot of talk around bad or unconvincing accents in Hollywood movies. Lines, scenes, or entire films that just don't quite sound right. But there are just as many, or more, examples that are absolutely brilliant.

One of my favorite recent examples is Tom Holland in the Spiderman films. Holland is British, and sounds like it in real life. Yet in the Marvel movies, he perfectly passes for a young American kid speaking plain old English. I can't imagine how much work it must take for him to (seemingly effortlessly) sound like an American! Andrew Garfield (ironically, another Spiderman) also does a commendable American accent, as does Idris Elba. Meryl Streep is world-renowned for her accent work in movies. Cate Blanchett is another actress that's consistently lauded for accurate dialects. The list goes on and on.

Have you ever wondered how certain actors get so good at accents? Of course, they have coaches to help them but do some people just have a natural ear for replicating dialects?

Well, yes, some people do have a natural ear and talent for accents. But there's an incredible phonetic tool that some actors use to master their accent work. It's a special alphabet that anyone can learn, and it can enhance your ability to speak any language fluently and convincingly.

And most people have never heard of it!

Learning any language, even your own native language, requires a fair bit of memorization. Pronunciation cues aren't always obvious in the written language. Duolingo astutely points out that the u in 'dude,' 'put,' and 'putt' makes a slightly different sound in each word.

We know the e at the end of 'dude' makes the long u sound. But what explains the difference between putting (like golf) or putting (as in, to put) and the difference between pudding and puddle?

Unless you've memorized the near-entirety of the English language (the way we do slowly as we grow up surrounded by it), you'd have a nightmare of a time trying to pronounce it all properly. Add in tongues, accents, and dialects that alter the rules as we know them of language, and you can imagine how difficult it would be for, say, a person who grew up speaking Spanish trying to learn a specific flavor of New York English.

This is where the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) comes in. It's a universal organizational system that categorizes all the different possible vowel and consonant sounds the human mouth can make, and writes letters and words according to those sounds—not any one specific language's writing system.

So, when it comes to that pesky letter u, when using the IPA you won't have to guess what sound it makes based on the letters that surround it.

The three U sounds would all be written differently: /u/, /ʊ/, or /ʌ/.

Conversely, there are several combinations of vowels in English that all make the same sound. 'Bead,' 'tree,' 'key,' and 'chic' all have the same vowel sound in the middle despite different spellings. Confusing! With the IPA, however, that sound would be written as /i/ regardless of what letters make up the sound. It's all about the mouth!


@vox.to.verba

Reply to @thechronictrekkie #ipa #internationalphoneticalphabet #linguistics #linguistic #appliedlinguistics #ipachart #phoneticalphabet #phonetics #phoneticsandphonology

The phonetic alphabet is incredibly detailed in its cataloguing of sounds. There are terms and annotations that refer to the shape and position of your mouth and tongue as you create the sound, words that describe how much air you're letting out, whether your tone is rising or falling. It's absolutely incredible.

For example, the voiced alveolar tap is something of an "r" sound that involves tapping the tongue on the roof of the mouth. That's not to be confused with the voiced alveolar flap which has the tongue slightly curled before tapping. Fascinating!

Imagine being an actor trying to learn an Irish accent for a role. You can listen, and be coached, by a native speaker. But it might also be extremely helpful to break your lines down into the specific sounds and mouth shapes you'll need to master in order to sound truly authentic.

accents, language, accent, english accent, foreign language, ESL, speech therapy, phonics, phonetics, actorsNot Not exactly a light read, but if you're serious about mastering your pronunciation the IPA can be a huge help.International Phonetic Association, CC BY-SA 3.0

You don't have to be an actor trying master an accent to learn the IPA and make good use of it.

Studying the IPA for a language you're trying to learn can rapidly accelerate your pronunciation. Phonetic spellings not only tell you the shape and movement of your mouth, it can also tell you which syllable in the word should get the emphasis and how your vocal tone should change throughout the word. That kind of learning can take you from someone who can merely stumble through a few sentences in a chosen language, to someone who can truly converse in it.

The phonetic alphabet is also heavily used in speech therapy. Therapists will create a phonetic transcription of a sample of speech in order to determine the nature of any errors or difficulties. That allows them to create a targeted treatment plan to address those specific errors.


@englishnativetongue

Now I know my IPA I hope you learned with me today! 🎶 The English International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) Song I saw @CoffeeCupEnglish do this song and I just had to try my best and recreate it with an American accent! #englishlanguage #englishlearning #ipasong #nativetongue

English is such a funny and tricky language. For every rule (of which there are many), there are twice as many exceptions. It's a wonder anyone can ever learn it.

And yet, English is the third most spoke language in the world, and one of the most universal. It's an extremely common second language for people in all corners of the globe, which sure is convenient for those of us born in America.

Somehow, I never knew there was an easier way to learn how to pronounce things. A way to bypass all of English's nonsensical rules and unspoken peccadilloes. If only the International Phonetic Alphabet wasn't such an eyesore on paper, maybe we could ditch the written version of English entirely. Then, of course, I would be out of a job!

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Brit shares the one-word 'dead giveaway' that American actors can't do an English accent

“There is one word that is a dead giveaway that an English character in a movie or a TV show is being played by an American."

via Warner Bros Discovery

Peter Dinklage on "Game of Thrones"?

When it comes to actors doing accents across the pond, some Americans are known for their great British accents, such as Natalie Portman ("The Other Boleyn Girl"), Robert Downey, Jr. ("Sherlock Holmes"), and Meryl Streep ("The Iron Lady"). Some have taken a lot of heat for their cartoonish or just plain weird-sounding British accents, Dick Van Dyke ("Mary Poppins"), Kevin Costner ("Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves") and Keanu Reeves ("Bram Stoker's Dracula").

Some actors, such as Tom Hardy (“The Drop”) and Hugh Laurie (“House”), have American accents so good that people have no idea they are British. Benedict Townsend, a London-based comedian and host of the “Scroll Deep” podcast, says there is one word that American actors playing characters with a British accent never get right. And no, it’s not the word “Schedule,” which British people pronounce the entire first 3 letters, and Americans boil down to 2. And it’s not “aluminum,” which British and American people seem to pronounce every stinking letter differently.


@benedicttown

The one word American actors aways get wrong when doing an English accent

What word do American actors always get wrong when they do British accents?

“There is one word that is a dead giveaway that an English character in a movie or a TV show is being played by an American. One word that always trips them up. And once you notice it, you can't stop noticing it,” Townsend says. “You would see this lot in ‘Game of Thrones’ and the word that would always trip them up was ‘daughter.’”

Townsend adds that when British people say “daughter,” they pronounce it like the word “door” or “door-tah.” Meanwhile, Americans, even when they are putting on a British accent, say it like “dah-ter.”

“So top tip if you are an actor trying to do an English accent, daughter like a door. Like you're opening a door,” Townsend says.


What word do British actors always get wrong when doing American accents?

Some American commenters returned the favor by sharing the word that British actors never get right when using American accents: “Anything.”

"I can always tell a Brit playing an American by the word anything. An American would say en-ee-thing. Brits say it ena-thing,” Dreaming_of_Gaea wrote. "The dead giveaway for English people playing Americans: ‘Anything.’ Brits always say ‘EH-nuh-thin,’” marliemagill added. "I can always tell an actor is English playing an American when they say ‘anything.’ English people always say it like ‘enny-thin,’” mkmason wrote.


What is the cot-caught merger?

One commenter noted that the problem goes back to the cot-caught merger, when Americans in the western US and Canadians began to merge different sounds into one. People on the East Coast and in Britain pronounce them as different sounds.

“Depending on where you live, you might be thinking one of two things right now: Of course, ‘cot’ and ‘caught’ sound exactly the same! or "There’s no way that ‘cot’ and ‘caught’ sound the same!” Laura McGrath writes at DoYouReadMe. “As a result, although the different spellings remain, the vowel sounds in the words cot/caught, nod/gnawed, stock/stalk are identical for some English speakers and not for others.” For example, a person from New Jersey would pronounce cot and catch it as "caht" and "cawt," while someone from Los Angeles may pronounce them as "caht" and "caht."

To get a better idea of the big difference in how "caught" and "cot" are pronounced in the U.S., you can take a look at the educational video below, produced for a college course on linguistics.


- YouTube youtu.be

American actors owe Townsend a debt of gratitude for pointing out the one thing that even the best can’t seem to get right. For some actors, it could mean the difference between a great performance and one that has people scratching their heads. He should also give the commenters a tip of the cap for sharing the big word that British people have trouble with when doing an American accent. Now, if we could just get through to Ewan McGregor and tell him that even though he is fantastic in so many films, his American accent still needs a lot of work.

This article originally appeared last year.

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Emma Thompson's witty, heartfelt tribute to Alan Rickman is one for the ages

May we all have a friend who shares our quirks this lovingly and articulately.

Photo credits: Elena Ternovaja (left), Marie-Lan Nguyen (right)

mma Thompson and Alan Rickman starred in seven films together.

Actor Alan Rickman gave us so many memorable characters, from the terrorist Hans Gruber in Die Hard to the oft ill-tempered antihero Severus Snape in the Harry Potter films, to the unfaithful husband who broke Emma Thompson's heart in Love Actually.

Though he was often cast as a villain, Rickman's distinctive voice and irresistible screen presence made audiences love him. He brought a unique human touch even to his most odious bad guy characters, a quality that makes perfect sense when you hear Thompson, his friend and co-star in seven films, talk about his character in real life.

In a moving tribute upon the release of his diaries in October 2022, Thompson shared insights into the virtues and quirks that made Rickman "blissfully contradictory."

Alan Rickman, actor, autographs, famous, photoAlan Rickman signing autographs at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, January 2011. Photo Credit: Marie-Lan Nguyen via Wikimedia Commons

Thompson is at the top of her award-winning writer game here, and her words about Alan Rickman are filled with heart, wit, respect, admiration and love. It's truly a eulogy for the ages.

Watch (or read the full transcript below):

- YouTubeyoutu.be

People love Thompson's tribute to her friend and some have even shared their own stories of their encounters with Alan Rickman:

"A close friend of mine bumped into him in a theatre in London many years ago. My friend instantly recognised Mr Rickman and from nowhere, instantly found the courage to ask him for his autograph. Having neither pen nor paper for this, he asked Mr Rickman if he would mind waiting a moment whilst he collected the items from somewhere, anywhere! The moment became at least 10 minutes or so, and when my friend ran back to a now empty theatre foyer, he noticed one solitary figure. Mr Rickman had waited patiently for my friend to give him what he asked for."

"I was lucky enough to work with him on a film. At lunchtime I joined the line for a meal and as I payed and went to turn to look for a table, someone knocked into me from behind and my drink went flying. I turned and it was Alan, he apologized put his hand on my shoulder and said let me get you another. He came back with a cup of tea and I was so overwhelmed. I was shocked how he was so down to earth and a real gentleman."

"I meet him once in Boots and said hello, he realised it was a reflex to recognising a known face. He picked up an item we both were looking at, smiled and said “well hello there are we going to arm wrestle for this?” That deep tone rendered me mute, I realised it was Mr Rickman and instantly denied needing this forgotten thing, apologised for well nothing really, smiled and backed away. He was a giant of a fellow on and off the stage and will be missed."

"Everything she said is true. I was fortunate to have dinner with him and his wife and his drama teacher. He was charming and friendly and shared some great ideas about directing, which I use today in my theater group. He is missed by many."

Indeed he is.

Here's the full transcript of Thompson's tribute:

"The most remarkable thing about the first days after Alan died was the number of actors, poets, musicians, playwrights and directors who wanted to express their gratitude for all the help he'd given them. I don't think I know anyone in this business who has championed more aspiring artists nor unerringly perceived so many great ones before they became great. Quite a number said, latterly, that they'd been too shy to thank him personally. They had found it hard to approach him. And of all the contradictions in my blissfully contradictory friend (hold on, Thompson), this is perhaps the greatest this combination of profoundly nurturing and imperturbably distant.

He was not, of course, distant. He was alarmingly present at all times the inscrutability was partly a protective shield. If anyone did approach him with anything like gratitude or even just a question, they would be greeted with a depth of sweetness that no one who didn't know him could even guess at. And he was not, of course, unflappable. I could flap him like nobody's business and when I did he was fierce with me and it did me no end of good.

He was generous and challenging, dangerous and comical, sexy and androgynous, virile and peculiar, temperamental and languid, fastidious and casual, the list could go on. I'm sure you can add to it. There was something of the sage about him, and had he had more confidence and been at all corruptible, he could probably have started his own religion.

His taste in all things from sausages to furnishings appeared to me anyway to be impeccable. His generosity of spirit was unsurpassed and he had so much time for people I used to wonder if he ever slept or ever got time for himself. A word not traditionally associated with Alan is gleeful, but when he was genuinely amused he was absolutely the essence of glee. There would be a holding back as the moment built, and then a sudden leaning forward and a swinging around of the torso as a vast, impish grin flowered, sometimes accompanied by an inarticulate shout of laughter. It was almost as if he was surprised by himself. It was my life's mission to provide those moments. I remember Imelda Staunton nearly killing him by telling him a story about my mother and an unfortunate incident with some hashish—it's a really good story, I won't tell it now—I've never seen him laugh more before or since. It was a bit like watching someone tickling the Sphinx.

One Christmas Eve party I had a sprig of mistletoe hanging up at home, and I was loitering under it and turned to find Alan bearing down on me. I lifted up my chin hopefully. He smiled and approached. I puckered. He leaned in under the mistletoe and a sudden change came over his face. His eyes started to glitter and his nostrils to quiver. He lifted up a hand, reached in, and pulled a longish hair out of my chin. 'Ow!' I said. 'That's an incipient beard,' he said, handing me the hair and walking off.

That was the thing about Alan—you never knew if you were going to be kissed or unsettled, but you couldn't wait to see what would come next. And the trouble with death is that there is no next. There's only what was, and for that, I am profoundly and heartbrokenly grateful. So the last thing we did together was change a plug on a standard lamp in his hospital room. The task went the same way as everything we have ever done together. I had a go. He told me to try something else. I tried. It didn't work, so he had a go. I got impatient. I took it from him. I tried it again. It still wasn't right. We both got slightly irritable, then he patiently took it all apart again and got the right lead into the right hole. I screwed it in with a screwdriver. We complained about how fiddly it was, and then we had a cup of tea. Took us at least half an hour, this thing, and he said after, 'Well it's a good thing I decided not to become an electrician.'

I'm still heartbroken that Alan's gone, but these diaries bring back so much of what I remember of him. There is that sweetness I mentioned, his generosity, his champion of others, his fierce, critical eye, his intelligence, his humor. He was the ultimate ally in life, art, and politics. I trusted him absolutely. He was, above all things, a rare and unique human being and we shall not see his like again."

Alan Rickman, actor, fans, famous, photoAlan Rickman posing for a fan at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, January 2011.Photo Credit: Marie-Lan Nguyen via Wikimedia Commons

This article originally appeared last year. It has been updated.

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