Now it's my time to bad-mouth Americans.
All those who are in charge of programming for children's t.v. in the US are really STOOOPID.
For some reason no US channel wants to pick up What's the Story in Balamory?, which is a BBC Scotland production (and no worse than lots of other children's shows, probably better).
This touches on a subject that I've wondered about for a while now. Why do Americans feel that children won't understand accents? Thomas the Tank Engine is a great little program for kids. Yet, when it went to the US, the programmers felt that they needed an American voice to narrate. So, out went Ringo Starr (Ringo Starr for God's sake! Wasn't his voice on records that sold well in America at one time?) & Michael Angelis and in came George Carlin & Alec Baldwin.
Why? I don't know, but I do know that the shows seem to lose something in the non-translation.
Now it seems that American TV executives feel that children won't understand the Scottish accents in What's the Story. They're totally wrong. Kids will understand them much better than adults. Kids are much better listeners and will have little trouble getting used to the Scottish accents.
What puzzles me is that Sesamee Street and other programs have no trouble with people who have heavy Spanish accents, but somehow the Scottish accent is ruled out? This is ridiculous nonsense.
