Voice Trainers Sees Surge in Demand for Bad Russian Accents 

Voice trainers across the film and TV industry are seeing a surge in demand for bad Russian accents in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. 

Vladimir Putin’s war of aggression against Ukraine has sent studios and streamers worldwide scrambling to re-write scripts, replacing generic evil-doers with clearly Russian baddies. But a fear that accurate accents could lead to Russians being viewed humanely has led to a deluge of calls from actors to dialog coaches demanding lessons in generic, Cold War-era Ruskie voice-overs. 

“Most have to unlearn everything they’ve been taught, about proper grammar and accurate pronunciation,” says a teacher at the Rocky Bullwinkle school of sound design, which specializes in traditional Slavic vocalization. “It’s a huge challenge. We call it acting without a Nyet.” 

But a sharp decline in Russian cinematic baddies since the 1990s has decimated the industry —”we used to be able to run the school on Bond films alone,” she notes —leaving few voice coaches left with the proper training required to meet the new demand.

But she remains hopeful, noting that Hollywood used to lead the world in generic Russian accents performed by non-Russians and can draw on that tradition. “Sean Connery in The Hunt For Red October is obviously a high-water mark,” she says, nostalgically. “But Dolph Lundgren as Ivan Drago [in Rocky IV] is a personal favorite. Just hearing him say ‘I must break you’ gives me a warm erotic thrill.”