American English Intonation & Rhythm with Tanya from THE WHITE LOTUS

I love White Lotus, both seasons.

Because I think the acting is superb, the dialogue is hysterical,

and the story is just so much fun.

"I think I'm gonna be a little emotional."

"I love you."

"It's tropical Kabuki."

Today we are going to practice American intonation and rhythm.

I'm going to teach you how to stress words in English and how to use the

melody of your voice to do that.

And we are going to do that while analyzing some scenes played

by Jennifer Coolidge, who is playing Tanya in the White Lotus.

Now, before we start analyzing the speeches, I wanna tell you something about

the intonation and the rhythm of English.

The intonation and rhythm of English are designed to serve

the message of the speaker.

Meaning, that the words that are more important are going to stick

out differently than the words that are a little less important that are

there just to connect the main ideas.

So words that are more important, that drive the meaning – also called stressed

words or operative words – are usually stretched out and are different in pitch

so that they are captured by the listener.

Whereas words that are reduced are reduced to a schwa, the vowel itself

is reduced, and they're connected.

Let's look at the first scene and see what that looks like.

"My POOR MOTHER."

'My POOR MOTHER'.

Now here all the words are stressed, so she stretches each one of them and

even takes small breaks in between.

'My poor mother'.

"She DIED in JUNE."

'She DIED in JUNE'.

Now, listen to the rhythm.

It's not 'she died in June'.

Not every word receives the same beat, but the stressed words are longer,

and the reduced words are shorter.

'She DIED in JUNE'.

'in' is reduced.

'She died in June'.

It's very melodic, she's almost singing it.

"And she LOVED the OCEAN."

'And she LOVED the OCEAN'.

Now the word 'loved' obviously sticks out here.

And how does she do that?

She goes higher in pitch: 'And she LOVED the OCEAN', and she stretches it not

only by elongating the vowel, but also elongating the consonants - loved, loved.

So you can use all the sounds in a given word to emphasize it.

'And she loved the ocean'.

'an-shee', right, that is a little faster.

"Just LOVED it."

'Just LOVED it'.

And again, 'it' is reduced, right?

So the word 'LOVED' is longer, has more volume, and higher in pitch.

"My poor mother, she had a BEAUTIFUL HOUSE in CARMEL."

'My poor mother', she repeats what she just said, but a little faster.

'had a BEAUTIFUL HOUSE in CARMEL'.

BEAUTIFUL, HOUSE, CARMEL.

It's really easy to detect the words that are stressed.

BEAUTIFUL, HOUSE, CARMEL.

"and she tried VERY VERY HARD to be a REALLY GOOD MOTHER."

'And she tried VERY VERY HARD'.

So, 'and she tried' is one unit.

'tried' is the keyword here.

'an she TRIED'.

So 'TRIED' is longer than 'and she' that are reduced.

'VERY VERY HARD' - look at all the emotion that she puts

in, into those stressed words.

- VERY VERY HARD.

'HARD' is more stressed than the 'VERY' and the 'VERY', right?

'VERY VERY HARD'.

But all of it is stressed, there's a lot of weight that goes into it.

'and she tried VERY VERY HARD'.

"to be a REALLY GOOD MOTHER".

'to be a REALLY GOOD MOTHER'.

'to be a' - that's reduced.

'to be a' - 'duh-be-uh'.

REALLY GOOD MOTHER.

Because 'to be a' is not that important as 'REALLY GOOD MOTHER'.

And these words are stressed, they're longer, they're pronounced clearly.

Now, why is it important?

Because every language has its own rhythm and stress and intonation patterns.

Now you have a unique rhythm for your language, your first

language, if it's not English.

And there it is perfectly fine, but sometimes if you bring that into English,

it might change the quality of the speech, and maybe the message is not gonna be

delivered as quickly if you don't use the rhythm of English or the intonation,

where you change the pitch and you make the word longer when it's important.

Let's look at another scene.

"Yeah.

He likes the first LAYER."

'Yeah, he likes the first LAYER'.

'Yeah'.

'Yeah'.

Notice this intonation, it's kinda like, 'Yeah, maybe', right?

That is, it's like up-down-up.

'He likes the first LAYER'.

So, ta-DA-ta-DA-TADA, LAYER is stressed, so it's going to be longer than the rest.

'Yeah, he likes the first LAYER'.

That type of intonation or tone of voice is somewhat doubting or uncertain.

"MAYBE, I don't know."

Right?

Same thing here.

'MAYBE, I don't know'.

"But what about the SECOND layer?"

'But what about the SECOND layer?' 'wadabout', right, that is reduced.

'What about the SECOND layer?' SECOND LAYER - these two words are stressed.

"And the THIRD LAYER."

'And the THIRD LAYER'.

Let's practice the word 'third'.

'thir', 'thir' - TH to an R.

"and then EVERY STEP ALONG the WAY"

'and then EVERY STEP ALONG the WAY'.

'an-then' - reduced.

EVERY STEP - stressed-stressed.

ALONG the WAY - stressed-stressed.

'and then EVERY STEP ALONG the WAY'.

Now try to really imitate the melody and the rhythm, don't just repeat the words.

This is how you start changing your rhythmic habits, right, that

you carry from your own language.

And give yourself this freedom to try out new things and play with your voice.

That's what makes it interesting, and that's how you start

discovering new things as well.

"I have to WORRY ABOUT".

'I have to WORRY ABOUT'.

'I have to WORRY ABOUT'.

"you know, is he gonna like the NEXT LAYER?"

'you know', 'you know', that's a common filler phrase, 'you know'.

'Is he gonna like the NEXT LAYER?' Let's try that with our voice,

right, like this exaggeration.

You know, you charge it with emotion and then that changes your voice.

'Is he gonna like the NEXT LAYER?' This is fun, isn't it?

Let's try another scene.

"You're on VACATION" Now here she's pissed off.

'You're on VACATION', right?

The tone goes up here.

'What do you want?

Why are you doing this?

You're on VACATION'.

Which word is stressed here?

VACATION.

'You're on VACATION'.

"Yeah.

You INSISTED that we come to SICILY and have this ROMANTIC WEEK".

INSISTED, SICILY, ROMANTIC WEEK – these are the stressed words.

'You INSISTED', right?

So she really raises her pitch here to stress the word INSISTED.

Right?

I dunno what you're saying.

Imagine that she just said it like this: 'you insisted that we come to

Sicily and have this romantic week'.

It wouldn't have the same impact, right?

So you use your voice to tell the other person what it is that you're feeling.

'You INSISTED that we come to SICILY', right?

And the words that are stressed are longer and higher in pitch.

'and have this ROMANTIC WEEK'.

Try it out.

All right.

Let's do one more line from the show.

"Listen, I'm in DESPERATE need of a MASSAGE."

Now, I think that's a sentence that we should all memorize.

'I'm in DESPERATE need of a MASSAGE'.

'I'm in DESPERATE need of a MASSAGE'.

'uh-vuh-muh', 'of a MASSAGE'.

"Is THAT POSSIBLE?"

'Is THAT POSSIBLE?' 'Is THAT POSSIBLE?' She's asking, but she's also demanding.

Can you hear it from her tone of voice?

It's not really a question.

'Is THAT POSSIBLE?' She's dropping her pitch down.

She doesn't say, 'Is that possible?' 'Is that possible?' 'Is THAT POSSIBLE?' Right?

There is something about this tone and intonation that shows that she knows

that her request is going to be answered.

Something that we should all practice, every now and then.

All right, that's it.

Now we have collected for you a bunch of different sentences from the

different scenes with links to the scenes, and a phonetic transcript,

which means that you will see in front of you the stressed words and the

reduced words, so that you can practice effectively with Jennifer Coolidge,

who is also Tanya from White Lotus.

I hope you enjoyed it.

If you did, please consider sharing it with others.

Don't forget to download the PDF that we have prepared for you.

And I cannot wait to hear what you think.

So let me know in the comments below.

If you enjoyed this episode, check out my website at hadarshemesh.com for many

more and many other resources for you.

You can also follow me on Instagram at @hadar.accentsway.

Have a beautiful, beautiful rest of the week, and I will see you

next week in the next video.

Bye.