Colin Farrell not only underwent a major physical transformation for his role in HBO’s series The Penguin, but also learned a distinctive New York accent with some assistance. The actor, who stunned audiences with his performance as main villain Oz Cobb in The Batman, is now set to reprise the now-iconic role in this spin-off series.
Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, Farrell revealed that playing the role of a New York gangster was full of challenges for him. However, there was a trick that worked when speaking dialogues in an American accent. First, he explained the elaborate process of selecting a peculiar accent for his character that would be true to the region he comes from.
He recalled, “My dialect coach, Jessica Drake, has a collection of thousands of accents from around the world, going back to the ’30s and ’40s.” After listening to several different recordings from that area, he chose the accent that was both “energetic” and sounded good—a middle-aged man in his 80s and an apartment manager.
“He used to talk a lot about gefilte fish,” the actor said. “And so whenever my accent started to get bad, she would call me back and I would say ‘gefilte fish’ and it was a little trick,” Farrell said. Now that’s a unique and effective trick!
The spin-off series follows the events of Gotham City after the events in The Batman, released in 2022 and starring Robert Pattinson and Zoe Kravitz. In The Penguin, Farrell’s Oswald Cobblepot will shake heaven and earth, attempting to take over the reins of the crime world in Gotham.
The show’s creator Lauren LeFranc claims it is less of a supervillain story and more of a “grounded character drama” about a very complex person who is problematic at times, overly pretentious, and has a bad sense of humor. She said, “It’s really grounded, so there are no heroes or villains in our show; there are just flawed, complex people.”
As for Pattinson’s cameo as Batman, he ruled it out, saying it would take the spotlight away from Oz and distract from the plot. “Oz definitely wouldn’t appreciate it,” he joked. Penguins, which also stars Cristin Milioti, Michael Kelly and Rhenzy Feliz, premieres on Max on September 20.
