Dialect Coach - Joel Goldes

The Total Tutor Neil Haley will interview Dialect Coach - Joel Goldes.

Joel Goldes has always enjoyed accents and has worked as a dialect coach for more than 25 years.  He holds a Master of Fine Arts degree from the University of California, Irvine, where part of his graduate training involved three years of daily Voice and Speech classes. It was here he learned how to break accents down systematically and that Joel first started to teach. His work as an actor took him to New York City, where he directed and produced theater, while dialect coaching productions in which he appeared. He realized he was happiest being responsible for this one aspect of a production and that led to his current career.

Joel coached most of the cast of The Birth of a Nation, the acclaimed independent feature film, including Nate Parker and Armie Hammer, in historically  accurate 1830s Virginia accents. Since the production wasn’t able to afford having a dialect coach on-set for filming, Joel prepped the cast via skype sessions, resulting in accurate accents at a fraction of the cost.

Joel coached the pilot episode of FOX TV’s 24: Legacy, the reboot of the hit series 24, premiering following the Super Bowl. Joel coached foreign-born cast members in American accents, as well as coaching one actor into an accent from the Caucasus region. He continues to coach cast members via skype while they shoot in Atlanta.