Can these CELEBRITIES speak English?

Vanessa: Hi, I'm Vanessa  

from SpeakEnglishWithVanessa.com. Can  these six celebrities speak English?  

Some are amazing, but some are  not so great. Let's talk about it. 

Let's take a look at six celebrities from around  the world and test their English. Obviously these  

celebrities are already successful and don't  need me to give them tips about their English,  

but we can pretend for a moment that they are my  students. What would I say to help them along with  

their English? I'm going to give them some tips  and a score, zero for not understandable at all,  

and five, native English level. To help you remember everything that you  

learned in today's lesson, I have created a free  PDF worksheet with all of the pronunciation tips,  

vocabulary tips, grammar tips that I am going to  give celebrities so that you can speak even better  

than them. Amazing. You can click on the link in  the description to download the free PDF and never  

forget what you've learned today. Let's start  with famous football or soccer player Cristiano  

Ronaldo. We're going to watch a quick clip and  then we will analyze it together. Let's watch. 

Cristiano Ronaldo: I miss to play in Spain. We have  

that battle the last 15 years, which is good.  He push me, and I push him as well. It's good  

to be part of history of football. I'm  there and, of course, he's there as well. 

Vanessa: Thank you, Mr. Ronaldo.  

He is understandable, but he does make a few  pretty basic grammatical mistakes that we can talk  

about. The first one is he says, "I miss to play  in Spain." And what he should have said is I miss  

playing in Spain. With the verb miss, we always  have an ING verb. I miss playing. I miss sleeping.  

I miss seeing my family. That's great. Next he  says, "We have that battle the last 15 years." 

And instead, to take it up to the best level here,  he should have said, we have had that battle for  

the last 15 years. This is a common mistake by  English learners around the world. The present  

perfect verb tense is pretty tricky to know when  to use it, when not to use it. Adding the word for  

compared to since or maybe not adding it at all  can be tricky as well. But in this sentence,  

he's talking about something that was in  the past and it is continuing to today.  

We have had that battle for 15 years. It is still continuing. And finally,  

he said, "He push me and I push him as  well." He meant to use the past tense here,  

but he just cut off the ED. Instead, he should  have said, he pushed me and I pushed him.  

Now, this is an advanced way to use the verb  to push. He's not talking about physically  

pushing. He's talking about making someone  better and better. A good teacher should  

push you outside your comfort zone to do something  difficult because they know that you'll improve. 

He's talking here about improving his skills  as a soccer player, but he should have said it  

in the past tense. He pushed me and I pushed  him. So aside from some rough, basic grammar,  

he is still understandable. We are going to give  Cristiano a two. Next, we're going to watch famous  

Brazilian supermodel Gisele Bundchen. Let's  listen to her speak English, and then we'll  

analyze it. Let's watch. Gisele Bundchen: 

Yeah, and you know what I found? I come from a  family of five. I have five sisters and we usually  

play... We used to play volleyballs. It was like  a team sport. We all play in the same team, but  

Tom's family's a little different. He's the baby.  He's got three older sisters and they're pretty  

hardcore. I mean, when they play, it's like... Jimmy Fallon: 

Really? They go for it. Gisele Bundchen: 

You know that game that you... Dodgeball, is it?  Where you go and you like throw really hard in the  

person and they die. They're out of the... Vanessa: 

I have to say, Gisele has great vocabulary  and grammar here. She even uses some really  

American English expressions like, they're  hardcore. Hardcore means they're really serious.  

She's married to a famous American football  player. And as you can imagine, he's very  

competitive. His family is competitive. She uses  that expression to talk about how they're very  

serious when they play games. They are hardcore.  Also, her pronunciation is quite American. 

She says the word pretty with a D sound. She  doesn't say pretty, even though there's a T. In  

American English, that will change to a D sound.  This happens all the time in American English. We  

say water, sweater. Great. This is the same with  the word. Pretty. Pretty. And that's how she says  

it. Excellent. Overall, Gisele speaks quickly and  understandably and her English is awesome, so I'm  

going to give her a four. Next, we are going to  watch the Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi. 

He's giving a speech to the people of  the world, the people of India as well.  

We're going to watch a clip from that  speech and then analyze it. Let's watch. 

Narendra Modi: We are witnessing history in the making.  

Mr. President, you had introduced me to your  family in 2017. And today, I have the honor  

to introduce you to my family. Vanessa: 

Because this is a political speech and  maybe it was written by someone else,  

maybe it was written by him, but it's  something he can practice in advance.  

The grammar and vocabulary are awesome. He also  speaks slowly enough that even though he had some  

difficult pronunciation points that  we'll about in a moment, he's still  

understandable. And that is really the goal here.  The things that I'm mentioning that he can improve  

are just to take it to the next level. The most  important thing is that he is understandable. 

Let's talk about some pronunciation points.  At the beginning of this clip, he says,  

"We are witnessing," but he doesn't say it with  a clear W like that. Instead, he uses a V sound.  

He says, "Ve are Vitnessing." Now, this isn't  completely un-understandable, but it's important  

that each word is as clear as possible so that  the vast majority of people can understand. 

Mixing up the W and the V sound is a  common mistake with people around the  

world and what you need to do to have a  clear W is to make a little kissy face.  

We. We are witnessing. And with the V sound,  your top teeth are on your bottom lip. V. V.  

Vanessa. In this situation, making a little  kissy face will help the w to be very clear.  

We are witnessing. Next, I want to talk about  a point that is very typical in Indian English,  

and maybe for people in India,  it's extremely understandable. 

But for people outside of India, it might make  it a little bit more tricky to understand,  

and that is the R sound. I heard this in  two different words. The first word is  

honor, and the next one is introduce. In  American English, the R is very hard, honor,  

introduce. But in Indian English, it's often  rolled. What I heard the prime minister say is  

honor, honor, where it's not very strong.  It's rolled inside the mouth. Or for  

the word introduce, he said in introduce. It's inside the mouth, instead of a strong R  

sound. In India, this will be very understandable  to other people from the country. But I just want  

to give you a little tip if you are from India  or if this is something that is tricky for you  

in your native language to try to have a hard  R sound. And that will really help your speech  

to just take it up to the next level as far  as being understandable. Honor. Introduce. 

So overall, Prime Minister Modi, you speak slowly  enough, clearly enough that you are absolutely  

understandable, so I'm going to give you a three.  Next, we are going to take a look at the most  

famous South Koreans at the moment, the singing  group BTS. There are seven people in this group,  

so it's a little bit tricky to give them an  overall score, but I want you to listen and  

I will help to pull out a couple points to help  them become better English speakers. Let's watch. 

BTS: Who is BTS leader? Namjoon Kim. RM. Kim Namjoon.  

Our leader is very smart.  He is very kind. Oh yeah,  

very kind. Very strong. Very healthy. Big body.  

Very handsome. Vanessa: 

First of all, I have to give them some credit  because they are native Korean speakers,  

but they're doing presentations and speeches and  interviews in English. This is unbelievably scary,  

tricky. I'm sure they feel really nervous, and  they want to say the right thing. They want to be  

themselves. They're already in a tricky situation,  because they are suddenly overnight international  

superstars. I want to give them a little credit  before I give them some pronunciation advice. 

Let's start with the first word. I heard them  say the word leader. The question is, who is the  

leader of BTS? But a common mistake that I often  hear my East Asian students make is exchanging the  

R for the L sound. Now, I lived in South Korea for  three years, and I struggled to make the Korean R  

sound. So I absolutely understand that in  reverse for Koreans, the English L and R  

sound are also tricky. I was there. I understand.  Instead of saying leader, I heard him say reader. 

Instead of leader, reader. If you want to make  a clear L sound, your tongue can go between your  

teeth. Leader. Leader. He could have said, "Who  is the leader of BTS?" Who is the leader? Leader.  

Next, I heard many of them using the word  very. This is a common thing that I hear kind  

of beginner English learners overuse. There's  no problem in saying the word very. Oftentimes,  

American English speakers will say really  instead of very, so it's more common to hear  

really. Oh, he's really amazing. He's really handsome. He's really great,  

instead of very. But I want to talk about a  pronunciation point that I heard. Instead of  

saying very, I heard berry. He exchanged the V for  the B sound. This is common for Korean speakers.  

It's common for Spanish speakers. It's common  for a lot of other languages around the world.  

I want to help you, remind you, we talked about  the V moment ago, that if you want to say very,  

your top teeth are on your bottom lip. Very. He's very handsome. He's very smart. Very.  

You don't want to say that he's berry, because  that is talking about a fruit. Instead, very.  

There's one little word... Another word that I  wanted to mention. I hope I'm not being too harsh.  

BTS, please forgive me. I'm sure you'll never  watch this, but it is the word healthy. Healthy.  

This combines two tricky points together. We have  the L and the TH together, and a common mistake I  

see with the TH is changing it into an S. In this clip, he said healsy, healsy,  

but really it should be healthy. Can you practice  that word with me? Make sure that there's an L,  

healthy. And maybe it's a little bit helpful  because your tongue is already out of your mouth  

for the L sound. Healthy. Make sure there's  a stream of air. Healthy. He's very healthy.  

He's very healthy. Now, I do know that  the leader, the guy they're talking about,  

the guy in the middle here, that he is  fluent in English. His English is incredible. 

And whenever they do interviews in English, he's  the one who speaks for the group. Usually he  

translates. That's not an easy skill. Overall,  BTS, I'm going to have to give you a score of  

one. Your music is catchy, but you  can work on English a little bit more.  

Next, we're going to take a look at famous actress  Salma Hayek from Mexico. Let's take a look and  

then we'll analyze it together. Ellen DeGeneres: 

I also learned today that you  and your husband like to scare  

each other. Salma Hayek: 

Oh yeah, and all my children. Ellen DeGeneres: 

And your children? Salma Hayek: 

Oh yeah. Oh yeah. I have some masters in the  family. But I have to admit, and it's good to  

admit one's flaw, I like to scare them. I love the  anticipation. I don't like it when they scare me. 

Vanessa: Overall, Salma's grammar and vocabulary  

are great. She is understandable. There's a couple  pronunciation points that I would like to mention  

to her if she ever watches just this video. The  first one is at the very beginning of the clip,  

we hear her say family. Family. Now, usually in  American English, we break this word into just  

two syllables, fam lee, fam lee. She used  three syllables, and that middle syllable  

is very typical of Spanish speakers. She  didn't say family, with a short I, family. 

She says fameely, ee. Oftentimes I hear Spanish  speakers substitute a short I full are a long E.  

Now, this is usually not a big deal, like the word  family or family is understandable either way.  

But when it comes to some bad words, words like  beach and sheet, very clearly and not the bad word  

instead. I also noticed some emphasis that could  be changed slightly. She said the tricky word  

anticipation. Now, usually we say anticipation.  But instead, she said "anteeceepation." 

Here, again, she's using that long E sound,  "anteeceepation." Now, we can still understand it,  

but overall, Salma, if you would like to level up  your English, practicing the short eye would help  

a lot. For me as a native English speaker,  I can understand her with no problem. And  

that's excellent. But I'm curious for you all as  English learners, can you understand her clearly? 

Sometimes when there is tricky pronunciation or  emphasis that's a little bit different than we  

expect, it can be hard to understand when  you're learning that language. So let me  

know in the comments what you think about her  pronunciation and can you understand her. Well,  

I'd like to give her a score of three. Excellent  work. Let's go to our next celebrity, who is  

Maria Sharapova, the famous Russian  tennis player. Let's watch this clip. 

Maria Sharapova: How does Maria Sharapova spend  

her time off court? I have a few businesses  that I'm a part of and that I invest in.  

The main one happens to be Sugarpova, a candy  company that I launched in 2012. It's been that  

many years. Everything from gummies to chocolate  to truffles. You name it, we make it. I love  

candy. I feel like it's that little indulgence and  a little kid that comes out in me when I have a  

really great day or I win a tough match. And I come home and there's a mini bar and  

you're just like, I owe this to myself. So I do  it. I open up that mini bar. I get the chocolate.  

And there it is, straight to the hips. Vanessa: 

Okay. Wow. She's amazing. Not only is she  an amazing tennis player, but her English  

is flawless. If I just listened to her, I would  have no clue that she's not a native English  

speaker. For real. It's amazing. Let's look at a  couple phrases she uses so that you can use them  

as well. She's talking about a candy company that  she owns. I guess she's quite a multi-talented  

person. She uses the phrase, you name it, we  make it. This is kind of a shorthand way of  

saying whatever you can imagine, we can do it. If you can imagine any kind of candy, well,  

they can make it. So that means they can do  a lot of really cool things. You name it,  

we make it. Cool. At the end of this clip, she  says, And there it is, straight to the hips."  

The way that she uses this also is so  comfortable and so casual that we know  

she has an excellent handle on English. When she  says, "And there it is, straight to the hips,"  

she's talking about eating candy, eating  chocolate and gaining weight in her hips. 

Now, this is something that makes her as an elite  athlete very relatable to us as normal people.  

Because usually when we think about  elite athletes, we don't think about  

candy and chocolate. But she is saying, "I'm  just like you. I eat candy, and I eat chocolate,  

and it goes straight to my hips." It's a very  funny thing to say, and it really shows that she  

is completely comfortable speaking English.  So congratulations, Maria, you get a five. 

Our final celebrity is famous supermodel  and businesswoman Heidi Klum from Germany.  

Let's watch a clip where she's talking about  when she was a host on a famous singing show.  

Let's watch. Heidi Klum: 

I think I am the same. I would probably say  that I'm the most honest. I thought he was  

much harsher, to be honest with you, but he's not  really as harsh. We have a lot of fun together. 

Jimmy Fallon: He's harsh. 

Heidi Klum: And when he gets naughty, then he gets the drink  

spilled all over him, because I'm not taking it. Vanessa: 

First of all, Heidi, excellent work on your  English. You are extremely understandable  

and easy to listen to. There is one  little pronunciation point that I  

wanted to mention that will help you sound  even more like an American English speaker,  

and that is when she says the word naughty.  Naughty. We mentioned before that often a  

T will change to a D sound. We heard that  earlier with the word pretty. Pretty. It's  

not pretty, it's pretty in American English. And in this conversation, Heidi Klum says naughty,  

naughty, with a clear T sound. But in American  English, we would say naughty. Naughty. Ugh,  

my dog is so naughty. He's always taking my socks  and chewing on them. He's so naughty. This is  

an excellent way to level up your pronunciation  to sound more like an American. Overall, Heidi,  

you're doing an excellent job. I would like to  give you a score of four. There you have it,  

my ranking of six celebrities speaking English. I want to know, do you agree with my ratings?  

What do you think? Could you understand  their English? Who was the trickiest for  

you to understand? And is there a celebrity  from your country that you would like me to  

review or maybe give a couple tips to? Let me  know in the comments, who is a famous celebrity  

from your country that I should look at next?  Well, don't forget to download the free PDF for  

today's lesson so that you can review all of the  tips and ideas that I gave these six celebrities. 

You can download the free PDF with the link in  the description, so that you never forget what  

you've learned and you might even be able  to speak better than the celebrities. Well,  

thank you so much for learning English with me  and I'll see you again next Friday for a new  

lesson here on my YouTube channel. Bye. The next step is to download the free  

PDF worksheet for this lesson. With this  free PDF, you will master today's lesson  

and never forget what you have learned.  You can be a confident English speaker.  

Don't forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel  for a free English lesson every Friday. Bye.