Sam Neill explains why he still ‘gets a lot of flak’ from Jurassic Park fans, 29 years on
‘It’s an actor’s nightmare,’ he said
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.Sam Neill has explained why he’ still getting criticised by a lot of Jurassic Park fans, 29 years after it was released.
The actor played paleontologist Alan Grant in the 1993 Steven Spielberg film, and will return in the forthcoming sequel Jurassic World: Dominion.
However, during the promotional trailer for the new film, the New Zealand-born actor told Vanity Fair that his accent in the film continues to anger fans of the original.
Neill explained that he had attempted to perfect the use of an American accent for the role until Spielberg told him to use his own.
“He came up to me halfway through the day and he said, ‘Hey, Sam, you know the accent we were talking about?’ I said, ‘Yeah, I’ve been working on it for four weeks...’ He said, ‘Don’t worry about it, just use your own voice’.”
Neill continued: ‘I said, ‘That’s great, Steven, thank you so much.’ And then four days later, he came up to me and said, ‘You know that voice you’re using now?’ I said, ‘Yeah, my voice?’ He said, ‘Somewhere in between.’”
The actor described the situation as “an actor’s nightmare”, telling co-stars Laura Dern and Jeff Goldblum: “So that’s why I get a lot of flak to this day: ‘Sam Neill’s American accent in Jurassic Park was a load of T-rex poo’.”
Dern defended Neill, telling him he was giving “the fans everything they wanted”.
Jurassic World: Dominion, which also stars Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard, will be released on 10 June.
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments