10 Actors Who Completely Changed Their Voices for a Role

Find out what these stars had to say about changing their voices…

1. Austin Butler

Austin Butler spent nearly three years of his life preparing to portray Elvis, and by the time filming wrapped, the deep, sensual tone had stuck in his mind. Even months after the film premiered, Austin continued to sound a lot like Elvis. When his voice change made headlines, Austin admitted he didn’t notice his voice change later called He suspected that all the singing had damaged his vocal cords, as a song sometimes required 40 takes.

“I often compare it to when someone lives in another country for a long time. I had three years there [Elvis] was my sole focus in life, so I’m sure there’s only parts of my DNA that will always be connected that way,” Austin said called.

2. Hugh Jackman

Not only did Hugh Jackman completely ditch his Australian accent to play Wolverine on the big screen, but he also said that all the “snarls and roars” ended up damaging his voice as well. Looking back, Hugh admits he used his voice in a way he probably shouldn’t have used.

“With ‘Wolverine,’ I damaged my voice.” My falsetto isn’t as strong as it used to be, and I attribute that directly to the growling and screaming. My drama school singing teacher would have been appalled by some of the things I did [in ‘Wolverine’]’ Hugh said during an appearance at BBC Radio 4’s “Front Row”.

3. Lupita Nyong’o

While working on Us, Lupita Nyong’o stayed with her character both on and off set — using her haunting voice at all times. Lupita says she developed her character’s voice after studying a real-life language disorder called spasmodic dysphonia that results from trauma.

“Sometimes it’s emotional, sometimes physical, sometimes it’s inexplicable that the vocal cords involuntarily spasm and create this erratic flow of air. I’ve built on that and I’ve had experiences with someone who has this condition and I’ve done more research and met with people with this condition to talk about their personal experiences with it,” Lupita said People.

4. Idris Elba

In Mandela: Long Walk To Freedom, Idris Elba worked to recreate Nelson Mandela’s South African accent. He says moving away from his British accent wasn’t as difficult as it could have been considering he was raised by West African parents.

“[Director] justin [Chadwick] and I wanted to make sure everything else was absolutely the way it was, especially the voice,” Idris said NPR. “And my parents are West African. This is very different from southern Africa in terms of the way they speak English. I’m pretty used to that kind of rhythm though. So I had a basis to understand where to start.”

5. Michelle Williams

When Michelle Williams landed the role of Marilyn Monroe on My Week With Marilyn, she spent a lot of time mastering Marilyn’s voice. During her research, she discovered that the voice Marilyn was known to use in public was different from the voice she used in her private life – so she perfected Marilyn’s real voice as well.

“I knew it was going to take me as long as possible to make that transformation… The voice associated with Marilyn, her voice in the movies, that’s not her voice,” Michelle shared in an interview Making Of Interview. “From all the reading and all the research I did, that was a character she developed an understanding of, her real voice was quite normal.

6. Nicole Kidman

As an Australian, Nicole Kidman had to put in a lot of work to master the voice of Lucille Ball for her role in Being the Ricardos. Nicole says she spent two months changing her voice and even smoked herbal cigarettes that Lucille smoked in real life.

“I worked on the dialect with a fantastic dialect trainer. Finding her voice was probably one of the key issues as there are actually two characters: There is Lucille Ball who was a heavy smoker and had a much deeper voice and who speaks very directly and directly “Always look into your eyes and then there’s Lucy Ricardo, who is actually placed much higher, an octave higher,” Nicole said on “The Jess Cagle Show.”

7. MeRyl Streep

When Meryl Streep was cast in Sophie’s Choice, she knew she had to speak with a Polish accent. Instead of just mastering the Polish sound, she decided to learn the entire language. She later found out that some scenes would be in German – so she worked on learning that language too.

“I thought it would be child’s play to learn something like Italian or French or something – but that’s not the case,” says Meryl called to learn Polish. “It’s very similar to Latin because there are seven cases I think — my teacher will kill me if I don’t get that right — grammar wasn’t my forte, I understand the accent… For that reason I do.” Really hard too learn. You have to analyze each sentence as you speak it, each word changes its ending depending on whether it is the object of a sentence or the subject or the indirect object. It’s really wild.”

8th. Johnny Depp

For his role as Willy Wonka in “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory“Johnny Depp got creative with his voice. As he morphed into the character, Johnny said he had an unusual inspiration in mind that was definitely very different from his usual speaking voice.

“The character Willy Wonka for me, I started thinking about kid show hosts, you know, these guys that talk, [like], ‘Hello. Good evening everyone. Is everyone happy?’ This guy… but then I thought well that’s an interesting start, what’s the next layer of ingredients you know? And then I thought, “What would George W. Bush sound like if he wasn’t stoned but was incredibly stoned?” Johnny called during an event.

9. Joaquin Phoenix

When Joaquin Phoenix played Johnny Cash in Walk the Line, he had to master his deep baritone voice. Joaquin worked extensively with a singing teacher and admitted it took a lot of practice. In addition, the voice exercises made it difficult to get used to the role, he says.

“It’s the most humbling process I’ve ever gone through because you’re doing these exercises, [with] “All these vowels… and it’s so uncomfortable, I can’t tell you… It was very, very difficult,” Joaquin said during an appearance on “Late Night with Conan O’Brien.”

10 Kristen Stewart

Kristen Stewart devoted six months to perfecting her British accent for her role as Princess Diana on Spencer. During this time, she worked with a dialect coach to ensure she was truly “fair” to Diana.

“They make it a very physical thing and they describe what your tongue is doing, how open your mouth has to be. When I speak, I hardly open my mouth. It’s all in my throat…when.” [Diana] speaks, it is open. “Trying to make that sound makes me look like a completely different person,” Kristen said on “The Howard Stern Show.”

11. Forest Whitaker

For Forest Whitaker’s Oscar-winning role as African dictator Idi Amin in The Last King of Scotland, he had to learn to speak with a Ugandan accent. Looking back, Forest says the role required more research than any character he had ever played before.

“I’ve done a tremendous amount to prepare for this,” Forest said called during the Toronto Film Festival. “First I started learning Swahili, learned the accent, then I had to study all the recordings, as well as all the books, tapes, documentaries… When I went to Uganda, I met his brother, his sister, his ministers, his generals.” and even for the Ugandan king. I did more research for this role than any other character I’ve likely played.”