\u201cI said, I think I might be able to do it if I get somebody to read my lines,\u201d Skarsg\u00e5rd says over Zoom from his home in Stockholm. \u201cBecause I can\u2019t remember.\u201d<\/p>\n
At the time, he was between seasons of \u201cAndor\u201d and between the first and second \u201cDune\u201d films \u2014 still in demand but unsure whether he\u2019d ever work the same way again. He called Villeneuve and Tony Gilroy<\/a>, the \u201cAndor\u201d creator and showrunner, to explain what had happened and what might need to change. Since then he\u2019s used a small earpiece feeding him dialogue, a difficult adjustment, he admits, but one that\u2019s allowed him to keep working.<\/p>\n The effects of the stroke linger, subtle but real. He speaks with the same measured warmth as ever \u2014 that deep, lilting rumble that can shift from conspiratorial murmur to amused growl in a heartbeat \u2014 but he sometimes loses a name mid-thought. As he recounts the story, he blanks on both Villeneuve and Gilroy. \u201cThis is what happens,\u201d he says, almost apologetically. \u201cI cannot any longer have a political argument, which is sad,\u201d he says. \u201cI become a little more stupid and a little more brief, almost getting the point and missing it by an inch.\u201d<\/p>\n There\u2019s no self-pity in the observation, just a clear accounting of change. The stroke seems to have stripped away some of his old formality, leaving him more open, unguarded, even amused by his own lapses. That ease runs through his latest film, Joachim Trier\u2019s \u201cSentimental Value,\u201d a tender, sharply comic drama about a fractured family trying \u2014 and often failing \u2014 to heal.<\/p>\n Skarsg\u00e5rd with Renate Reinsve and Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas in \u201cSentimental Value.\u201d<\/p>\n (Kasper Tuxen Andersen \/ Neon)<\/p>\n Opening in theaters on Friday after an acclaimed festival run, \u201cSentimental Value\u201d stars Skarsg\u00e5rd as Gustav Borg, a renowned, narcissistic filmmaker who reappears in the lives of his estranged daughters after the death of his ex-wife, hoping to reconnect with them by turning their shared history into a movie. Nora (Renate Reinsve), a celebrated stage actor, wants nothing to do with the project \u2014 or with her father. Her sister, the more measured Agnes (Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas), tries to keep the peace as old grievances resurface and life and art begin to blur.<\/p>\n Trier\u2019s prior film, the Oscar-nominated 2021 romantic dramedy \u201cThe Worst Person in the World,\u201d<\/a> made him an international name<\/a>. \u201cSentimental Value,\u201d which won the Grand Prix at Cannes<\/a>, seems poised for a similarly warm reception and could bring Skarsg\u00e5rd his first Academy Award nomination.<\/p>\n A veteran of both Lars von Trier\u2019s provocations and the Marvel universe, Skarsg\u00e5rd plays Borg with a mix of charm, vanity and self-awareness. He seems genuinely surprised by the response. \u201cYou can never tell how a film will hit,\u201d he says, \u201cbut this one has reached everybody, every generation, every culture. It\u2019s obviously touched something. And it\u2019s remarkable, because in spite of its seriousness, it\u2019s light. It\u2019s like a souffl\u00e9 with dark specks in it.\u201d<\/p>\n Skarsg\u00e5rd as Baron Harkonnen in \u201cDune.\u201d<\/p>\n (Chia Bella James \/ Warner Bros.)<\/p>\n With \u201cSentimental Value,\u201d Trier hoped to bring Skarsg\u00e5rd back to the kind of intimate, emotionally exposed territory that first defined his work in films like his 1982 Swedish breakout \u201cThe Simple-Minded Murderer\u201d and Von Trier\u2019s searing 1996 drama \u201cBreaking the Waves,\u201d which brought him international acclaim. \u201cI wanted to offer him a chance at this age to go back to the roots of that dramatic, vulnerable openness that he does so well,\u201d the Danish-born Norwegian director says by phone from his home in Oslo. \u201cWe spoke a lot about what kind of man Gustav was \u2014 the paradox of someone who can see people so clearly in his art yet be so clumsy and inept in his real life.\u201d<\/p>\n That tension between sensitivity and limitation is one Skarsg\u00e5rd knows well. As a father of eight from two marriages, he has long seen parenthood as the most humbling role of all. \u201cI had to defend Gustav, in a way,\u201d he says. \u201cBeing a father, which I am, is a very difficult thing to be. To be a perfect father, as we all strive to be, is impossible. So I felt very much for his failure. I told Joachim that I wanted to stress the humanity of it.\u201d<\/p>\n He chuckles softly. \u201cSince 1989 when I left the Royal Dramatic Theatre, I\u2019ve spent maybe four months a year in front of the camera and eight months changing diapers and wiping asses, being with my kids. So I haven\u2019t lacked time. But is it enough? I don\u2019t know. I have eight kids and they all have different needs. Whatever you do, you\u2019ll fail. But you live with it.\u201d<\/p>\n The film, he says, captures a helplessness he recognizes. \u201cAll those scenes with the sisters, he\u2019s trying so hard, and he really f\u2014 up. He doesn\u2019t have the tools for that. But it\u2019s not that he lacks sensibility. He\u2019s a filmmaker, he\u2019s tactile and sensitive. I think a lot of filmmakers have that in common. It\u2019s easier to be vulnerable and soft in your profession than it is in private life.\u201d<\/p>\n For all of Gustav\u2019s bluster and ego, the film leaves room for grace. \u201cMaybe there\u2019s an opening, maybe there is forgiveness and maybe there\u2019s understanding \u2014 or the beginning of understanding,\u201d Skarsg\u00e5rd says. \u201cI look at my parents. They were very flawed, but I forgive them. They were human.\u201d<\/p>\n Learning to act with an earpiece \u2014 hearing his lines fed to him while still listening to his scene partners \u2014 became its own test of concentration and humility.<\/p>\n \u201cI thought it would be easy,\u201d Skarsg\u00e5rd says. \u201cBut you can\u2019t have the rhythm of the scene affected by it. The reader has to say my lines in a very neutral way while my co-player is saying their lines at the same time, so you get both lines at once. It\u2019s tough but it works most of the time, I think.\u201d<\/p>\n On \u201cSentimental Value,\u201d the long stretches of unspoken feeling in the script by Trier and the director\u2019s longtime co-writer Eskil Vogt<\/a> turned out to suit Skarsg\u00e5rd perfectly. <\/p>\n \u201cAs an actor, you really appreciate when a director is searching for the wordless expressions and the subtleties,\u201d he says. \u201cIn a less and less subtle world, it\u2019s necessary to find your way back to that.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve made 150 films. I have the tools,\u201d says Skarsg\u00e5rd. \u201cBut I don\u2019t want to show them. I want to surprise myself and lose my footing. That\u2019s when new things happen.\u201d<\/p>\n (Christina House \/ Los Angeles Times)<\/p>\n Skarsg\u00e5rd has long been one of cinema\u2019s quiet constants, moving easily between Hollywood spectacle and European intimacy. A longtime collaborator of Von Trier, with whom he has made six films, he\u2019s balanced roles in more commercial fare like \u201cPirates of the Caribbean\u201d and \u201cMamma Mia!\u201d with riskier, more searching work, including HBO\u2019s \u201cChernobyl,\u201d<\/a> which earned him a Golden Globe. \u201cI\u2019ve hedged my bets,\u201d he says with a dry smile. \u201cI have [fans] from small girls to old farts.\u201d<\/p>\n He spent decades resisting polish. Early in his career, working with Swedish director Bo Widerberg, a pioneer of realism, Skarsg\u00e5rd absorbed a lesson that never left him: <\/p>\n \u201c\u2018I know you know how to do this,\u2019\u201d he remembers Widerberg telling his cast. \u201c\u2018But I don\u2019t want to see your f\u2014 tools.\u2019\u201d Skarsg\u00e5rd smiles. \u201cI\u2019ve made 150 films. I have the tools. But I don\u2019t want to show them. I want to surprise myself and lose my footing. That\u2019s when new things happen.\u201d<\/p>\n Like Gustav, Skarsg\u00e5rd comes from a family steeped in performance: Six of his eight children, including Alexander, Gustaf, Bill and Valter, are actors. Call them a dynasty if you like \u2014 or, in today\u2019s less charitable parlance, a \u201cnepo family.\u201d Skarsg\u00e5rd himself treats the whole idea with a shrug.<\/p>\n \u201cHow could I steer them away from something I love myself?\u201d he says. \u201cI didn\u2019t push them, and I didn\u2019t help them either. I let them decide for themselves. They saw that I was having fun in my life and they were drawn to that.\u201d <\/p>\n Still, he insists, there\u2019s no mentoring across generations. \u201cYou can\u2019t,\u201d he says. \u201cWhen I was young, I was protesting the war in Vietnam and my parents\u2019 generation didn\u2019t understand why. I realized then: They knew more about some things, but they didn\u2019t understand the world we were living in. It\u2019s the same now. Young people have to build their own world out of the shambles we leave behind.\u201d<\/p>\n Skarsg\u00e5rd and Renate Reinsve in a scene from \u201cSentimental Value.\u201d<\/p>\n (Kasper Tuxen Andersen \/ Neon)<\/p>\n <\/p>\n
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