Wondering how Salman Khan got his Haryanvi diction right in Sultan?
The credit goes to Rahul Bagga, his dialect coach.
Rahul, who is a trained theatre actor and played the lead in 2014 film Mastram, says it was an indomitable challenge to get the superstar to change the way he spoke in films.
He says, "I am an actor. To be given the job of being a diction coach was daunting. As he is a big star, everybody is very intimidated by him. But I guess I had this determination that I was chosen for a job that wasn’t my main vocation."
Sources from the film's unit reveal that initially Salman refused to take instructions from Rahul and that the latter had to work from scratch on the punctuations and diction in Salman’s voice.
The talented lad says, "If I was intimidated, he would have not been able to speak the Haryanvi so authentically. To his credit, Salman gave me space to correct his dialogues in-between takes. And I was fearless in going up to him to correct him."
But at the same time, the actor made sure that he did his job without hurting Salman's ego.
"Being an actor myself I know how much it hurts the ego when you are told to correct yourself. Though I am an actor, I was clear that my work as a voice coach should also be the talking-point in Sultan. So the relationship with Salman got established on the first day itself. He was also supportive to let me correct him between the takes, and during dubbing. So I guess his eagerness and my will worked well overall," adds Rahul.
Weirdly enough, Rahul himself is not from Haryana.
He confesses, "Not being a Haryanvi, I was aware I was digging hell if I goofed up. Luckily, it worked."
