The first interview I found of Mads was Mads Mikkelsen om Mads Mikkelsen, here. As part of one of my Danish lessons, we began translating it. Here is as far as we got.

Read an English interview "To Perfection" here. It is on the Danish Film Institute website.

Listen to a radio interview with Mads.

Interviews

    - ADAM’S APPLES

by Adam’s Apples - Making Of - M&M Productions

interview with:   

 Mads Mikkelsen  - Actor

May 20, 2006
"Affectedness or stardom has no place in Danish films"

The next villain in James Bond’s upcoming Casino Royal owes much of his stardom to Anders Thomas Jensen who directed him in his three films: Flickering Lights, The Green Butchers and Adam’s Apples and wrote sexy and charismatic roles for him in Susanne Bier’s Open Hearts, Brothers and After The Wedding.

Could you describe your character?
Mads Mikkelsen: My character is one of the kindest persons on the planet but he suffers from the tiniest bit of denial. He’s in such a state of denial that people won’t believe it. But that’s his way of surviving the evil that surrounds him.

What is it like to work with Anders Thomas Jensen?
Anders Thomas’ universe includes something akin to theatre auditions. You can’t just stand there and look cool and get a nice shot. There’s a layer of theatre that must be included and you can’t be too theatrical. You discuss your character and pick a consistent manner of speech so your lines won’t be neutral but always character related.

What research did you do to ‘become’ a priest?
I couldn’t be inspired by a priest because no priest is like the one in the film. My starting point was the person described by Anders Thomas, not his profession. I started from the denials the character has and from there it wasn’t any different than the other characters I had played previously. I try to recognize some strength in myself that a given character has. We’re all familiar with denials; I just had to enlarge them from my level to an extreme level. I actually just peel away my own characteristics and focus on the aspect that is Ivan.

Your screen partners Ole Thestrup, Nicolas Bro and Nikolaj Lie Kaas also starred in Anders Thomas Jensen’s Flickering Lights and The Green Butchers, and Ulrich Thomsen in Flickering Lights. Is it easier to play with ‘the usual suspects’?
I think we’re in a period of time where we make films together. There’s no room for affectedness or stardom. It has no place in Danish films. It’s been rooted out. We’ve been working close together since the very start. We move things and lend a hand with the gear. So we really are a whole. I can only be good in a scene if my co-actor is comfortable.

How do you think the audience will react to the film?
You always hope that people will see your film. I hope that besides being entertained –which I’m sure they will be – people will also get the great moral tale it contains. It would be great for Anders Thomas to take off with this one. The way he writes would be a godsend to the Americans. They could use it if they dared.

 Courtesy of Cineurope.org - links out to this site

Exclusive Interview with Mads Mikkelsen - Pusher II (2004)

Cast:  Mads Mikkelsen, Jesper Salomonsen, Leif Sylvester, Anne Sørensen, Øyvind Hagen-Traberg & Kurt Nielsen

Writer:  Nicholas Winding Refn                       

Director:  Nicholas Winding Refn

Release date: 16 September 2005.      Certificate: 18.       100 Minutes

Forgive us for consistently coming back to the point about how lovely actors who play bad guys turn out to be - perhaps they're just average and we think they're being lovely 'cos really they're meanies - but as Bond's newest arch nemesis and the scarily violent, if somewhat lovable, Tonny from Nicholas Winding Refn's first two Pusher movies walks into the room our slight trepidation is soon replaced by jovial relief as Mads Mikkelsen turns out to be a million miles from his characters. Mads has no plans for world domination, he's quite content with the fact it's sunny in London for a change.

FF: So as Pusher 3 rolls out and Nicholas tells us he's closing the book on the Pusher saga...

Mads Mikkelsen: Don't believe him!

FF: As Nicholas tells us he's putting a bookmark in the Pusher saga for the time being, let's go back to the very beginning. How did you become involved in the first movie?

MM: I did an audition for the first Pusher film. I was at drama school and Nicholas was definitely not looking for anyone who was educated. He wanted something real. But I went there and did the audition and I got the job.

FF: What was it like getting the call, after nearly ten years, to say he wanted to make a sequel - two in fact - and he wanted your character to lead the second?

MM: It was a big surprise. He talked about it a couple of times because Tonny was one of the characters in the first one who was interesting to follow. When he called me I was very into the idea but when I hung up I started having second thoughts; who wants to go back and play something they've already done? I'm ten years older and he's definitely not developing this character! *laughs*

I looked at the script and we talked about it. I shook my head, put the doubts out of my mind, and we agreed to do it.

FF: Is it not quite interesting to get another bite of the apple on a character you thought you'd never see again?

MM: Well it's a beautiful opportunity that you rarely get. In that sense it was perfect but it was a balance between... Did I have that energy as me, as the actor I am and as the person I am, to go back and re-play him? That was my conflict.

FF: Ultimately it seems to make sense to trust Nicholas - he gave you your first feature role and you've worked with him on a number of occasions since.

MM: He's one of a kind, there's no-one like him. I started out with him and everything I'm working on today, since that first film, is based on the way we worked in the first time. Even if it's a Bond film, a commercial film, I'm trying to focus on the acting and trying to get my space and come up with my ideas. Nicholas allows that to a really big degree.

FF: Does that help prepare you for the big Hollywood experience where you don't have that intimacy?

MM: There's nothing that can prepare you for that! It's just such a different world. I've been around for ten years so I know the business quite well and wasn't that surprised, but it's still so much different than working with Nicholas.

FF: I should imagine Le Chiffre, in Casino Royale, isn't quite as reluctant, perhaps, as Tonny is.

MM: Oh he's not even close to being him! He's a baddie, basically. We always tried to put a little dualism into the character but, of course, he doesn't have that camera time, that screen time to really go with that, but it's definitely there.

But it's Bond! I don't know the films that well, I saw some of them when I was a kid, but it's so much fun. I'm part of a legend. I mean, Orson Welles played Le Chiffre before me; that's huge! There's a great atmosphere on set and everybody's happy. Daniel is a fantastic Bond. I think he's going to be the Bond for this generation. People are really underestimating him but they're going to be surprised. It's going to be a great film.

FF: We've been told they're planning to reinvigorate the whole franchise with this one.

MM: The script is a little different. It's the first time you meet Bond so he's earning his license to kill in this film. He's also falling in love so we come to discover why he doesn't do that in the other films. It's a different script than we're used to.

Le Chiffre, who I play, is a greedy bastard who wants a lot of money. He's not trying to take over the world; he's just a greedy bastard like the rest of us! I think people can relate to him.

FF: How does it feel to be travelling around with Pusher again?

MM: It's wonderful. It's been something like two years since we released the second film in Denmark but I'd quite happily go over to Australia if someone asked me and keep talking about it because I'm hugely proud of it. It's a pleasure to travel around with something you're proud of. It's easy.

FF: And the first film has become a classic.

MM: Oh it's definitely a classic. Really, if any film I've done changed cinema, it was that one. It was such a different way of shooting; you were never sure if it was a documentary or a feature film. I think that changed a lot in Denmark particularly. Dogme was invented two years later in part because of Pusher, I think. It feels really good.

FF: Have you been surprised by the reactions of fans now that you're touring with sequels to a classic?

MM: They've been really positive. The thing is that all three films are so different. We never tried to make a second Pusher; we've always tried to make Pusher II. It takes place in the same environment with the same energy, but it's such a different film. The main character is so different. You don't have to look at it as a trilogy, they're three different films that happen to be in the same world. People are responding to that.