Today, I want to introduce you to some famous Swedes. Some of them you might be familiar with, but I hope I will introduce you to some new names as well. This list will include both people from the present as well as from the past. When I started to plan for this episode, I had no idea that a small country like Sweden had so many famous people. So I have decided to make this a couple of episodes. The focus of today will be Hollywood.
Let’s start with some old-time Hollywood stars, like Greta Garbo, who was born Greta Gustafson in Stockholm in 1905. She had nicknames like the face or The Swedish Sphinx, and one of her most famous roles was in Ninotchka from 1939.
Another old Hollywood star was Ingrid Bergman. She was born in 1915 in Stockholm, and she was one of the greatest actresses of the golden era in Hollywood. She is one of the most Oscar awarded actresses, tied with Meryl Streep and Francis McDormand, all three, second only to Katherine Hepburn. And one of her most beloved movies was Casablanca.
We then have a couple of, let’s say femme fatal, starting with Anita Ekberg, born in 1931 in Malmö, and her most famous movie La Dolce Vita.
Then we have Ann-Margaret who was born in 1941 as Ann-Margaret Olsen in Valsjöbyn, Jämtland Sweden, her most famous movie is Made in Paris.
And then we have some Swedish Bond girls.
The first one is Maud Adams who was born in 1945 in Luleå Norrbotten. She has acted in three bond movies. She had a small role in The Man With the Golden Gun in 1974. She was the lead villain in Octopussy in 1986. And she was an extra in A View To Kill in 1985.
Our next Bond girl is Britt Ekland. She was born in 1942 in Stockholm and she was the Bond girl, Mary Goodnight in The Man With the Golden Gun from 1974.
The third Bond girl is more recent. It is Isabella Scuropco. She was born in 1970 in Poland but moved as a young child to Sweden. And she was the leading female Bond girl in GoldenEye in 1995.
Now to some other Swedish actors and directors that have reached fame outside of Sweden. And let’s start with Lena Ohlin, she was born in 1955 in Stockholm, and she had an established and successful career as an actress in Sweden before Hollywood. She acted at the Royal theater and Stockholm and made several movies before she got discovered in Hollywood, where she acted in movies like Sydney Pollack’s Out of Africa, 1985, In Havana in 1990, in Enemies, a Love Story in 1989, for which she had an Oscar nomination as best supporting actress, and the Chocolat in 2000.
Now let’s take a look at some male Swedish actors.
We start with Peter Stormare who was born in 1953 in Kumla Örebro. He was born Peter Storm. He also started his career back in Sweden at the Royal national theater. He can be seen in movies like Chocolat in 2000, The Big Lebowski in 1998 Armageddon also 1998, and Fargo in 1996.
Then we have Max von Sydow, who was born in Lund in 1929 and unfortunately passed away in 2020 at the age of 90. He had a long career in Sweden, often working with the director Ingemar Bergman, who I would talk a little bit more about later on. The number of movies he has made in Hollywood would be your really long list so let me just name a few. For example, in The Exorcist in 1973, where he played father Lankester, Flash Gordon in 1980, where he was seen as the emperor Ming, and Awakenings in 1990.
And we can’t forget the Skardsgård family starting with Stellan Skarsgård, the father who was born in Göteborg, or Gothenburg, in 1951, Stellan was a star from his teenage years in Sweden and went on to work at the Royal dramatic theater between 1972 to 1988. His first American role was in 1988 in The Unbearable Likeness of Being. And he has later on done movies like The Hunt For Red October in 1990, Goodwill Hunting in 1997, and Amistad in 1997.
Then we have his sons following in dad’s footsteps. Alexander was born in 1976 in Stockholm. Gustaf was born in 1918 in Stockholm, and Bill was born in 1990 in Vällingby.
Alexander can be seen in movies like Zoolander in 2001 and TV series like Generation Kill in 2008 and True Blood in the same year.
Gustaf can be seen in Vikings in 2013 and in Westworld in 2016.
And you will see Bill in It from 2017. It, Chapter Two From 2019 and Deadpool 2 from 2018.
Let’s end the Hollywood section with a couple of directors, let’s start with Ingmar Bergman born in 1918 in Uppsala and passed away in 2007.Ingemar Bergman has no relation with the actress. Ingrid Bergman. Bergman’s influence as a filmmaker has been of importance. He was chosen as the world’s greatest living filmmaker by Time magazine in 2005. He has made 13 movies with Max Von Sydow and he is the third best-represented director in the fifth edition of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die, where he has 10 of his movies listed. He has directed 49 feature-length films, four of them have been documentaries.
The second director from Sweden I want to talk about is Lasse Hallstrom. He was born in Stockholm, in 1946. He is currently married to Lena Ohlin, who I mentioned earlier, and he was the director of the movie Chocolat. He has also directed What Is Eating Gilbert Grape in 1993 with Johnny Depp and Leonardo DiCaprio, and one of my favorite movies, My Life As A Dog in 1985, which is a Swedish film and for which he was nominated for the best director Oscar
I hope you enjoyed this episode and that I introduced you to some new names. As I said, there were so many more famous Swedes than I had anticipated. And I have lists of people in music, the internet, sports, and authors, that I didn’t touch in this episode, but I have saved those for the future.
Let me remind you about my discord server, where we talk about anything and everything about the podcast and Sweden. This is where you can find new friends and have an impact on the future of the podcast. If there is an interest, I will have a movie night on there where we can watch and talk about one of my favorite movies, My Life As A Dog, this would be free for you, but I would have a limit on how many that can participate.
Until next time, as we say in Sweden,
Hej Då
