Warner Bros.
It’s the kind of tragedy you can absolutely see coming, but it hurts nonetheless. Austin Butler, who took up Method acting to play Elvis Presley in Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis, has announced that the voice he adopted to play the King of Rock and Roll is no longer with us.
Butler did not mince words on The Graham Norton Show, where he told his host, via Entertainment Weekly, “I am getting rid of the accent.” (“Getting rid of”…? How ominous! We hope the death was swift and painless.) “But I have probably damaged my vocal cords with all that singing,” Butler added. “One song took 40 takes.”
Although it’s lived only a short life, Austin Butler’s Elvis Voice—like many a big vocal performance before it—has garnered quite the reputation. Sources tell The Daily Beast that it had been spending time with Lady Gaga’s House of Gucci voice before Butler announced its demise. The accent’s downfall seemed to begin in January at the Golden Globes ceremony, where viewers seemed bewildered to notice Butler was still using it.