Peter Firth #2

[watchstrap]

Peter's offduty voice is RP (received pronunciation) not a public school accent. I point this out for the benefit of forum members from overseas who may not know the difference. It's more that just 'speaking posh'. With a public school accent (think Prince Charles, Bryan Ferry, David Cameron), the sound is very nasal and the mouth hardly moves. Hence the phrase 'stiff upper lip'. RP is a well spoken but more rounded sound. The mouth moves a lot more because each word should sound clear and fully pronounced.

I started watching Spooks round about S3 and then went back a couple of years ago and watched S1 and S2. Something that struck me in the very first episode was that Harry definitely had a public school accent. I wondered if that was part of the back story PF was given on Harry and decided to play it that way. Harry doesn't sound so posh now.

Back to the subject of PF's voice (like I need encouragement ), when he started out regional accents were considered a bit limiting, where as now they are all the rage. I would agree with the comment previously made that he changed his voice to increase his chances of work.