Gerard Butler might be famed for his pulse-pounding mid-budget action thrillers, but he’s ventured into plenty of different genres during his career, dating right back to his very first big screen appearance in quaint period drama Mrs. Brown.
Before his breakout role as King Leonidas in Zack Snyder’s 300 rocketed him up the Hollywood ladder, Butler was a recognizable if hardly globally famous actor that bounced around from dismal blockbusters like Lara Croft: Tomb Raider – The Cradle of Life and Timeline to lavish musical The Phantom of the Opera via a few low budget independent dramas.
The first of his movies to be released after he and his chiseled abs led 300 to massive box office success was P.S. I Love You, the nonsensical story of Hilary Swank’s grieving widow, who begins receiving letters from beyond the grave from her late husband. Despite getting panned by critics, it was a major commercial success after hauling in over $150 million at the box office on a $30 million budget.
However, Butler’s attempt at an Irish accent is nothing short of horrendous, and is so bad that you can’t believe nobody thought to tell him on the first day of shooting that it wasn’t going to work. In a recent interview, the 51 year-old admitted that trying to adopt an Irish brogue was a mistake in hindsight having been roundly mocked for it, and is not something he’ll be in a rush to try again.
“After all those wonderful reviews and glorious feedback, I’ve ticked that box.”
Very few actors can convincingly mimic an Irish accent, so Gerard Butler is far from the first to try and fail miserably. If anything, though, there’s a hint of irony to it when his natural Scottish tones have been also butchered countless times on film and television over the years by American, Canadian or even Irish stars.
