Actor Austin Butler was so dedicated to the role of musician Elvis Presley in Baz Luhrmann’s 2022 biographical drama film Elvis that he’s having a hard time getting rid of the singer’s accent. After filming Elvis for three years, Butler had to work on Masters of the Air (2024), and the sudden switch didn’t give him enough time to get rid of the accent.
In a recent interview, the actor explained that he had to hire a dialogue coach who helped him sound less like Elvis Presley in Masters of the Air, which is set to premiere on January 26, 2024, on Apple TV+. The actor also revealed that Tom Hanks, who created the series alongside Steven Spielberg, offered Butler a role in the series when they were discussing that Butler would have a hard time adapting to something else after working on Elvis for three years.
Austin Butler struggled with losing Elvis Presley’s accent
During his latest appearance on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, actor Austin Butler explained that he struggled with losing Elvis Presley’s accent when he was required to work in the series Masters of the Air (2024). The actor explained that he focused on Baz Luhrmann’s 2022 biographical drama film Elvis for three years and just one week after wrapping up, he was on the sets of Masters of the Air, so he had to hire a dialect coach to help him get rid of it,
“It was a lot – I was just trying to remember who I was, I was trying to remember what I liked to do. All I thought about was Elvis for three years. And then I had that week off and then I flew to London and at that time it was Covid so I’m quarantined for 10 days, so I thought, ‘Alright just pour all this energy into learning about World War II now.’ I had a dialect coach just to help me not sound like Elvis in that film, that was the whole thing.”
Butler plays the role of Major Gale Cleven in the series, which serves as a companion to Band of Brothers (2001) and The Pacific (2010). Apart from Butler, the series also features Callum Turner, Anthony Boyle, Barry Keoghan, Nikolai Kinski, Stephen Campbell Moore, Sawyer Spielberg, and Isabel May.
Tom Hanks offered Austin Butler the role while having dinner in Australia
Further in the interview, Butler revealed that Tom Hanks, who starred with Butler in Elvis, joked that he would find it hard to adapt to other projects after Elvis while having dinner in Australia. After Pat McCormick asked Hanks to find something for Butler, Hanks offered him a role in Masters of the Air,
“I was having dinner with Tom Hanks in Australia and he was sort of joking saying, ‘You’re going to lose your mind when you finish this three years of your life focused on this one thing, you’re gonna have to find something else to jump right into right afterward,’ and the other producer Pat McCormick, who is a good friend of mine, he said, ‘Well Tom, find him something to do,’ and then Tom said, ‘Well I’ve got this World War II thing I’m working on.'”
The filming of the series began in 2021 but was delayed several times due to the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. The first two episodes are all set to drop on 26th January 2024, on Apple TV+ and a new episode will drop every Friday until March 15, 2024.
