$80M Rich Emily Blunt Pursued Acting to Get Rid of “a disability that people bully and make fun of”
Emily Blunt has been in show business for over two decades now. Having started as a professional actor in 2001, she did not make her screen debut until 2003 when she starred in the British TV drama Boudica. Fast forward to 2023, she has starred in numerous blockbusters such as Sicario, The Girl on the Train, Edge of Tomorrow, and the most recent one is Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer.
A huge part of an actor’s career depends on their speaking skills. From different accents to the different emotions that can be conveyed, dialogues play a very important role in what cinema has become today. Emily Blunt once revealed that she was always not this fluent at speaking as she had a stutter that would make it difficult for her to say her own name.
Emily Blunt Had a Speaking Impediment
From singing as the nanny Mary Poppins in Mary Poppins Returns to whispering as Evelyn in the thriller A Quiet Place, Emily Blunt has been seen using her speaking abilities in the best way possible. However, the world would have never gotten the chance to witness any of these things if it was not for that one teacher who encouraged a 12-year-old Blunt to audition for the school play.
In 2020, The Adjustment Bureau actress addressed her speaking disability on the PEOPLE cover story Women Changing The World. She revealed that she finds it important to be able to help other kids with a stutter through her work with the American Institute for Stuttering because stuttering is “a very misunderstood, misrepresented disability, and … it’s one that is very often bullied and laughed at because people look funny and sound funny when they stutter.”
Disabilities are something that people usually avoid talking about or neglect until they are put on the spot. So, it was very brave of Emily Blunt to come forward and address her disability and extend her support to those who need it. A lot of people would find Blunt’s confidence and candidness about it inspiring.
Acting Helped Improve Emily Blunt’s Stutter
Emily Blunt once revealed that her grandfather, her uncle, and her cousin had a stutter. She noticed the impediment in herself when she was six to seven years old. Thankfully, a teacher had noticed that her stutter was not as noticeable when she would do impersonations and suggested she take part in the school play.
Years later, while speaking to PEOPLE at the American Institute for Stuttering’s 2022 Freeing Voices, Changing Lives Gala, Blunt revealed that it was not the sole reason that she chose to pursue acting. She said:
“I wouldn’t say that’s why I’ve ventured into acting, but it was just a bit shocking the first time I was able to speak, you know, doing a silly voice or an accent pretending to be someone else.”
The Jungle Cruise actress even went on to say that the impediment is often biological or hereditary so people who have it need not feel ashamed or embarrassed by it even though it frequently becomes a disability that others make fun of.
