Emily Blunt: 'I want to make a movie about a stutterer'

Emily Blunt starred in this year's Oppenheimer blockbuster

"I would absolutely love to make a movie about a stutterer," actress Emily Blunt has told the BBC.

The Oppenheimer actress, who struggled with stuttering as child, said she wanted to "destigmatise" and increase understanding about the condition.

"The emotional trauma of living with the inability to speak will limit you in ways, that are for someone who speaks fluently, pretty unimaginable," she said.

"There's so much shame about it."

The Mary Poppins Returns star has previously said the condition left her unable to speak as a child.

She credits the confidence she gained from acting in school plays, something she was encouraged to do by a teacher, with helping her overcome her stutter.

Speaking to BBC Radio Four's Woman's Hour presenter Clare McDonnell, she said: "There's so much shame about it because there's not enough information it's neurological. People really deem it psychological. So you're sort of deemed off-putting or unconvincing in order to get a job, or anything like that."

Neurological relates to conditions affecting the brain, spinal cord or nerves, while a psychological condition relates to an issue affecting someone's mental state.

"So as long as we can keep destigmatising it, then there won't be so much shame - it can just be more acceptable - because I think it is one trait that is easily bullied still."

Speaking on how if affects her now, she said: "I'll always be one, I'm probably unaware of how much I flip-flop words around to substitute ones that are easier to say...

"Certain environments will still create a struggle for me - if someone asks me to pitch them anything it's a nightmare.

"But I did sort of grow out of it."

More than 80 million people internationally stutter, according to the US-based Stuttering Foundation.

Stuttering is relatively common in childhood and can persist into adulthood, and it is not possible to say what causes the condition, according to the NHS.

This year Blunt portrayed the wife of J. Robert Oppenheimer in the biographical blockbuster about the physicist's role in developing the first nuclear weapons.