Why do older american movies and shows often have a british sounding accent?

Often times when I see old movies (pre WWII) it sounds like many of the men have almost-British accents, even though they were born-and-bred Americans. I don't hear it in any modern movies or shows. Has anyone else noticed this and what it is?|||that's the Trans Atlantic accent, better explained here...





Mid-Atlantic English, (trans-Atlantic accent) is a cultivated or acquired version of the English language that is not a typical idiom of any location. It blends American and British without being predominantly either. It is also used to describe various forms of North American speech that have assimilated some British pronunciations and vice-versa. These pronunciations were, at one time, common in English-speaking theatre and film, and were also found among members of the upper classes of American society. It is also commonly used by Anglophone expatriates, many of whom have adopted certain features of the accent of their place of residence.


Mid-Atlantic English was popular in Hollywood films from the 1930s and 1940s, and continues to be associated with people such as Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn, William F. Buckley, Jr., Christopher Hitchens[citation needed] , George Plimpton and Franklin Delano Roosevelt. In the United States, it is often known as a "Boarding School accent".


People speak Mid-Atlantic English in one of three ways:


Learn to speak with the accent intentionally (such as for stage, used by many Hollywood actors of the past). A version of this accent, codified by voice coach Edith Skinner, is widely taught in acting schools as American Theater Standard.


Develop it by spending extended time in various Anglophone communities outside one's native environment, most typically in North America and the United Kingdom.


Learned at a boarding school in America before the 1960s|||I was about to ask that!





I guess it's because the American accent wasn't fully American back then. I mean, most Americans spoke with a quasi-British accent back then; that is just how the American accent sounded like.





Another reason is because the American accent was too annoying and low class sounding, so they wanted the actors to have a more refined accent.|||It may be a coincident. In most American movies they take care that the accent of the character is according to the personality she.he is depicting. Actors usually take acting and elocution lessons, to get rid of their native accent and adopt the one suited for the character being pictured..|||I cant do much 2 answer your question but maybe this video may help?





http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iN614ZqIH鈥?/a>|||for americans and british they are not too much different , in the uk some people say american accent , some americans say british accents|||I remember Buffy the Vampire slayer. That had a lot of british characters.