Tony Mastroianni Review Collection
Hogan Talks, Well Blimey, Just Like Every Limey
Cleveland Press February 9, 1966
"Americans think that all Englishmen talk like I do," actor Michael Hogan explained with patience mixed with a little surprise.
If all Englishmen don't talk like actor Hogan, they ought to. They certainly could do worse.
The very pleasant sounding Michael Hogan is a guest actor at the Play House, is appearing in George Bernard Shaw's "You Never Can Tell" which opens in the Drury Theater Wednesday evening.
"lt's a small part," he explained, "but every part of a Shaw play is good."
Like most Englishmen connected with the theater, Hogan is a man of many talents. He has spent most of his life as an actor, but he has directed and managed theatrical companies and has written for the stage, radio, movies and television.
His American screen credits are impressive. They include "Rebecca," "Nurse Edith Cavell," "A Yank at Oxford," "Woman on the Beach," "Hour Before the Dawn," "Appointment in Berlin."
Last week, Time magazine referred to an "explosion in the English theater," pointed out the many things that well known actors and actresses are doing there.
"THE SAME THING is starting to happen in the United States," Hogan explained. "The English theaters outside of London are comparable to off-Broadway and the English provincial theaters are like the Play House. I find it startling that this wonderful theater of yours has been in existence for 50 years. It doesn't seem possible.
"Diction was shaky in the states until a few years ago. It's improving. There are American accents and tones that are very nearly like English provincial dialects and these are being accepted in England now.
"When I was young I couldn't have made a living in England with the accent I had, but that's changing now. I was born in London and spoke Cockney.
"There are only about 5,000,000 Englishmen who talk like I do and about 60,000,000 who talk with an accent."
It would take an Englishman to know.
MOST RECENTLY Hogan has been acting in and around New York, has written a few television shows including one for Alfred Hitchcock (his old boss on "Rebecca") and the adaptation of Shakespeare's "Taming of the Shrew" for Maurice Evans.
Short Subjects: The Great Northern theater in North Olmsted opens March 24 with the Cinerama attraction, "Battle of the Bulge."
Showings will be on a reserved-seat basis.
