Ever wondered about all the voice and diction transformations that our stars have to undergo to play a character. Here are 10 well done accents.
Saif Ali Khan in Omkara: To play the goon Langda Tyagi from Meerut, he had to get rid of his British twang. It wasn’t easy. Director Vishal Bhardwaj’s recorded all the dialogues in his own voice. Saif played the tapes until the diction was embedded in his head.
Naseeruddin Shah in Pestonji: We’ve seen Parsis like Boman Irani sport Parsi accents. But when Naseeruddin Shah played Pestonjee in Vijaya Mehta’s film he didn’t speak like a Parsi. He spoke the way we would imagine any Pestonji speak. There was no come-see-me-talk showoff quality.
Shabana Azmi in Mandi: Her Hyderabadi colloquialisms in Shyam Benegal’s film about a brothel of happy prostitutes was so dead-on, you didn’t for a second feel she had rehearsed those lines before saying it. Shabana took to the Hyderabadi lingo so naturally that she had a tough time snapping out of it after the shooting was over.
Shah Rukh Khan in Chaahat: In this little-known Mahesh Bhatt film SRK and Anupam Kher played Rajasthani son and father. And both did quite well.
Amitabh Bachchan in Ganga Ki Saugandh: Normally the Bachchan baritone remained untampered. That’s the way the audience liked it. But to play the Ganga kinare ka chhora, the Big B embraced a Bhojpuri accent and diction.
Raj Kapoor in Teesri Kasam: To play Hiraman the Bihari bullock-cart rider, Raj Kapoor had to unlearn his Punjabi Hindi and convince producer (lyricist) Shailendra that he could carry off the character’s speech. RK worked hard on getting it right. There was a voice coach to ensure the actor got it perfect.
Dilip Kumar in Ganga Jumna: The thespian got himself an Awadhi tutor who helped the actor mould his fluent Urdu into a freewheeling Awadhi-Bhojpuri accent.
Ranbir Kapoor in Besharam: Sources from the sets say Ranbir sounds so much like his character that Honey Singh wants to write a song based on Ranbir’s character Babli and sing in the same accent!
Ranveer Singh in Ram Leela: Ranveer insisted on speaking in his character’s accent on the sets and location even off-camera. He apparently drove Deepika up the wall with his bhasha obsession.
Deepika Padukone in Chennai Express: Okay. Her thick Lola Kutty accent gets on our nerves initially. But it grows on us until we begin to enjoy Deepika’s dishy Tamilian diction.
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