Actor Eijaz Khan, who is known for his work in ‘Tanu Weds Manu’, ‘Kkavyanjali’, ‘Kyaa Hoga Nimmo Kaa’, ‘Kasautii Zindagii Kay’, among numerous others, has now given the Hindi voiceover for South superstar Arjun Sarja in the film ‘Leo’, and shared about his experiences of the dubbing.
‘Leo’ is a Tamil action thriller film, directed by Lokesh Kanagaraj. It stars Vijay in the titular role, alongside Sanjay Dutt, Arjun, Trisha, Madonna Sebastian, among others. It is the third instalment in the Lokesh Cinematic Universe (LCU).
Sharing his experience of dubbing for the film, Eijaz said: "I have done the Hindi voice over for Arjun Sarja in ‘Leo’. I think the most important thing about dubbing is choosing the right actor to do the voice over. The casting director generally looks for similarities in the face, in the physicality and the age group.”
“So I find the process very fascinating. During the recording, you can usually just use your natural tone. When I saw how Arjun Sarja looks in the film, I thought it was very similar to how I look. We are in the same age bracket as well so I thought I could do justice to it and was very excited to give my voice for him,” he said.
The ‘City of Dreams’ fame actor went on: "While I was dubbing for Arjun, I kept in mind the fact that when you do voiceovers for any scene, you have to understand the intensity of the scene and what the director is trying to convey. The choice of inflection has to be right.”
“A lot of credit also goes to my amazing dubbing director Abul. He is my friend, philosopher and guiding light for dubbing. He is the only person I have dubbed with and it's a lot of fun doing voice overs with him. Arjun’s character in the film is from a Catholic background, so we tried to keep the Mumbai dialect a bit, but we also remembered that people across the country should understand,” he added.
The actor called the overall experience satisfactory.
“I really had fun doing this. Another thing I had to keep in mind is that when you try to use Mumbaiya language, it is very easy to shift into a Munna Bhai zone. ‘Aree apun tereko aisa bola na’ and be like Sanjay Dutt. So I had to make sure that I did not end up sounding like him. That was one fun challenge in this assignment,” he said.
Speaking of the precautions one has to take before dubbing, he said: "All the challenges while dubbing are very different. You really have to take care of your voice. You can't have cold drinks, you can't have ice creams if you are dubbing the next day. I can't have anything sour, I can't have something very late at night and go to bed late. I make sure I gargle with a little bit of warm water. Your voice box is also like a muscle that needs to be exercised regularly.”
“I cannot even eat very spicy food a couple of days before dubbing. I have to make sure that I stay away from people who are sick. I stay away from congested places that could lead to some kind of infection because the dubbing studio is booked, the dubbing director is booked, and if you go with a bad voice, very little can be done so you have to force yourself to say the right words in the right tone and it shows in your work,” he explained.
The ‘Saas Bina Sasural’ actor also shared that there are different ways when you are dubbing for various languages.
“There are more challenges while dubbing for non-Hindi films. I think Tamil for me is easiest to dub because the language, the way the language is spoken can be equalised with a little bit of Hindi. In Telugu, it's a little less, in Malayalam, it's a little more,” he added.
