What makes every Desi extremely happy? When our culture, traditions and languages are celebrated around the world. Don¡¯t we trip when we see foreigners taking keen interest in our taur-tarike?
We live in a world now where we often witness inter-racial marriages with both the families exploring each other¡¯s cultures. The language barrier is slowly getting abridged from all ends. While many Indian actors have established themselves in the West, even actors on the other side of the ocean are taking keen interest in Hindi Cinema.
?Recently, Laxman Utekar directorial Mimi was released on OTT and it has been receiving rave reviews from audiences and critics alike. Revolving around the concept of surrogacy, it stars Kriti Sanon and Pankaj Tripathi in the lead roles. Apart from them, another actress that has won hearts is foreign artist Evelyn Edwards, who plays Summer in the film. Not only did she play the part that was given to her phenomenally well, she has also added a lot of desi folks?to her list of fans. Why you ask? Well, for those of you who are yet to watch the film, here¡¯s a little incentive.?
Instead of playing a firang in a Bollywood film, Summer went through the whole shebang of learning the local dialect to make her character look more authentic. She has managed to floor the audience with her amazing dialogue delivery in Hindi along with an impeccable diction. Something that many actresses still struggle with.
While Edwards is the newest entrant of this pool, there have been many firang actors in the past who have shown incredible potential when it comes to learning our matrubhasha. Unlike the people in the West, we have only appreciated their efforts without really making fun of their different accents.?
Long before Mimi, one movie that had an English actress at its centre was Rang De Basanti. British actress Alice Patten not only played a vital role in this Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra directorial but she tried to form a connection with the audience by delivering the dialogues in Hindi. Ronnie Screwvala in an interview back then had revealed that Patten learned to speak a decent amount of Hindi in just about two weeks.
Before them, it was Paul Blackthorne in the Oscar-nominated film Lagaan who played Captain Andrew Russell and delivered the iconic dialogue - teen guna Lagaan dena padega. This wasn¡¯t the only one, mind you. Blackthorne spent three months learning Hindi for this particular role and the result was quite satisfying to say the least. Most of the cinelovers still remember him.
?English actor Ben Kingsley decently pulled off playing Gandhi and then again starred in Teen Patti along with Amitabh Bachchan. Infact, we also saw Mark Ruffalo voice a dialogue or two in The Avengers when he is shown to be hiding in India.?
?While in no way are we endorsing that it¡¯s necessary to learn the language to be a part of a certain cinema, it should go both ways. Indians getting trolled for their English accent is no different than crossover actors expecting acceptance in the desi heartland. At the end of the day, it¡¯s all about putting in active efforts into learning a new language and mastering the dialect.