In trailers for the new true crime-based period piece Boston Strangler, it’s surreal to hear an American accent emerge from Keira Knightley’s extremely English visage. But it was almost a lot weirder. Knightley and her co-star Carrie Coon, who play real-life Boston Record American reporters Loretta McLaughlin and Jean Cole, told People at the film’s NYC premiere that Bostonian writer-director Matt Ruskin forbade the cast from taking a stab at Boston accents. Knightley says that the cast all tried to talk Ruskin into letting them do the accent, “and he was like, ‘Absolutely not.’ So we failed, but I kind of hear him, because as I found out, people are very opinionated about that accent.”

Coon, who isn’t British but is from Ohio (which is in no way, shape, or form Boston), says that she “was really looking forward to the Boston accent.” Coon got an accidental read in at Ruskin when explaining his Boston Strangler gag order, saying he’s “from Boston and very insistent that anybody who is not from Boston was not going to be doing an accent, because he claims he’s from Boston and he doesn’t have an accent. But he does.” While Knightley and Coon are disappointed they didn’t get to throw around some “wicked pissahs” while tracking down the Boston Stranglah, it’s probably for the best. Sounds like Ruskin didn’t want a Nancy Donovan situation on his hands.

sources