20 Things You Didn't Know About 2021's Oscar Nominees

15. Riz Ahmed Spent 7 Months Learning American Sign Language - Sound Of Metal

Carey Mulligan Promising Young Woman
Amazon Studios

Riz Ahmed gave a career-best performance in Sound of Metal as Ruben Stone, a metal drummer who begins to lose his hearing and is forced to consider a possible future of deafness.

Ahmed rightly received a Best Actor nomination for his performance, and in order to fully convince audiences of his ability to sign, Ahmed spent seven months learning American Sign Language (ASL) five days per week with coach Jeremy Lee Stone.

This was in addition to also learning to convincingly play the drums for the part. To say that Ahmed studied hard and earned the hell out of his nomination is quite the understatement indeed.

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Stay at home dad who spends as much time teaching his kids the merits of Martin Scorsese as possible (against the missus' wishes). General video game, TV and film nut. Occasional sports fan. Full time loon.