(Being a foreigner, I can't judge how good their accents are, but I haven't heard complaints down the fannish grapevine, so I conclude that like Damian Lewis and Hugh Laurie, they pass for American unless you know better?)
Both of these guys are very much in the 'no one knows they're British until they see them in a UK-made role" vein (I think West's accent does slip a bit sometimes, but possibly because the show uses particular regional accents that you don't hear much of anywhere else in the media, it doesn't stand out; and there's a great bit in a later season where he goes 'undercover' as a British man, which was apparently done just so Dominic could speak in his regular voice). Elba, particularly, before he was getting a lot of movie work, did some DJ'ing and such in US clubs, and the story goes that if anyone approached him who knew him as Stringer, he would talk in his Stringer accent to avoid confusing people.
Re: the cast, this is one of those shows where, once you've seen it, you will notice actors from it EVERYWHERE FOREVER, because it's such a large ensemble, and because it's so loved within the industry that the actors will always be in demand (also, more cynically, because it's one of the few shows that really cast a whole lot of African-American actors, so when a show or film NEEDS one to fill the much smaller number of roles that are typically available, they look to The Wire alums.
Re: Kima, she IS great (and unfortunately doesn't have a large body of work otherwise, but seems to have shown up in guest/recurring shots on a number of shows -- I see she played someone named Sonya Rucker in an episode of the The Good Wife so that may be where you recognize her from).
About women overall, I have some frustrations with the way The Wire approaches gender -- the perspective of women on the drug dealer side, particularly, doesn't get the same kind of attention that the lives of the corner boys do -- but it does avoid a lot of the failures that we think of vis-a-vis women-as-victims/love interests within this genre. I'm trying to be as vague and nonspoilery about this as I can.
no subject
Both of these guys are very much in the 'no one knows they're British until they see them in a UK-made role" vein (I think West's accent does slip a bit sometimes, but possibly because the show uses particular regional accents that you don't hear much of anywhere else in the media, it doesn't stand out; and there's a great bit in a later season where he goes 'undercover' as a British man, which was apparently done just so Dominic could speak in his regular voice). Elba, particularly, before he was getting a lot of movie work, did some DJ'ing and such in US clubs, and the story goes that if anyone approached him who knew him as Stringer, he would talk in his Stringer accent to avoid confusing people.
Re: the cast, this is one of those shows where, once you've seen it, you will notice actors from it EVERYWHERE FOREVER, because it's such a large ensemble, and because it's so loved within the industry that the actors will always be in demand (also, more cynically, because it's one of the few shows that really cast a whole lot of African-American actors, so when a show or film NEEDS one to fill the much smaller number of roles that are typically available, they look to The Wire alums.
Re: Kima, she IS great (and unfortunately doesn't have a large body of work otherwise, but seems to have shown up in guest/recurring shots on a number of shows -- I see she played someone named Sonya Rucker in an episode of the The Good Wife so that may be where you recognize her from).
About women overall, I have some frustrations with the way The Wire approaches gender -- the perspective of women on the drug dealer side, particularly, doesn't get the same kind of attention that the lives of the corner boys do -- but it does avoid a lot of the failures that we think of vis-a-vis women-as-victims/love interests within this genre. I'm trying to be as vague and nonspoilery about this as I can.