kevin kline's french accent queen to play

Patrick Glaize/Studio Canal/Zeitgeist Films 'I can now predict four or five moves ahead I can see that I'm going to lose much sooner,' he jokes.

things that just don't translate,' Kline says.Ĭheckmate: In addition to achieving fluency in French, Kline also had to brush up on his chess skills. 'There were idiomatic expressions that I had not been aware of, and inflections and stresses that struck me as odd. In learning more French, the acting role exposed him to a whole new side of the language. 'It was terribly difficult actually, because although I didn't have to be a Frenchman speaking French - I was still an American - he had to be very fluent.' 'I could not do extensive ad-libbing,' he explains. Kline found that he felt limited acting in a nonnative language. 'I love that word because in French it means 'experiment' as well as 'experience,' and that's what it was for me.'īut it wasn't as simple as expanding his vocabulary and polishing his accent. When the opportunity to play a French-speaking American in Queen to Play came along, Kline embraced the challenge. That encouraged him to learn 'to speak it and to understand it when French people - especially Parisians - speak it rapidly.' So Kline went to the Alliance Francaise in New York, where a professor coached him. 'I actually had to speak a little French as a Frenchman in French Kiss,' he tells NPR's Robert Siegel.

Kevin kline's french accent queen to play