Boston Strangler star Keira Knightley reveals she was not allowed to do a Boston accent for the film

Actress Keira Knightley was on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon last month to promote the Hulu true-crime movie, Boston Strangler. The episode aired on March 15, 2023.

In the episode, the English actress was seen talking about what her children think of Pirates of the Caribbean, her first acting gig at 6 years old, and exploring the story of the Boston Strangler from the female gaze in her recent Hulu movie.

The film is based on the life of Loretta McLaughlin, the first of two journalists to connect the murders and break the story about the serial killer behind the murders in Boston in the 1960s.

The IMDb description of the film reads,

"Loretta McLaughlin was the reporter who first connected the murders and broke the story of the Boston Strangler. She and Jean Cole challenged the sexism of the early 1960s to report on the city's most notorious serial killer."

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Boston Strangler's director banned Keira Knightley from doing a Boston accent for the film

While talking about her new film Boston Strangler and the role she played in it, actress Keira Knightley told host Jimmy Fallon “it felt cool to, kind of, see it through that female gaze, and to put these two journalists, sort of, in the center of it.” She also shared that she was unaware of the work done by them and called it the wrongful erasure of history.

She said:

“What I didn't realize, was that there are these two female journalists right at the center of the story and actually, when you Google it, you know, they were the two that really, kind of, went after it they first linked the killings they even named the killer, "The Boston strangler." And yet, when you Google it, their, kind of, part of that history has largely been erased.”

She was then asked by the host whether she would have a Boston accent for the role, to which she replied that she wasn't allowed to do so but she wanted to try it.

“The director was like, "Absolutely not" because he is from Boston too and he told us "No, you can't". I mean, if you weren't from the street that the character was from in Boston, you were not allowed to do the Boston accent.”

She further added:

“Yeah, yeah, no, we were not allowed. So it's a standard American accent.”

Jimmy Fallon commended the director's decision and went on to share his own experience of doing a Boston accent in a movie.

He said:

“I was in a Boston movie. I didn't do a Boston accent, but I did do it when my character got excited. If my character was drunk or excited, I threw the accent and it worked. It was perfect.”

The host then shared the trailer for the true-crime movie.

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Boston Strangler was released worldwide on Hulu on March 17, 2023, and features Keira Knightley, Carrie Coon, and Chris Cooper in the lead. It was directed by award-winning director Matt Ruskin.