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Today’s episode features a conversation I had with Tyler Coates, looking back at the year in awards events — from what we learned from the less-than-successful Emmy Awards to how the blockbuster news about YouTube and the Oscars might affect the future.
But it also has my interview with the great Renate Reinsve.
Reinsve knew that she and director Joachim Trier had something special when they worked together on The Worst Person in the World, which made Reinsve more or less an overnight international star when it debuted at Cannes in 2021. They had previously collaborated on 2011’s Oslo August 31st, where Reinsve had a small role, but The Worst Person in the World was very different. “We both had the feeling that we had more stuff to explore,” Reinsve tells me on today’s episode of the Prestige Junkie podcast. “I think it’s very rare you get to work with someone who you connect to.”
Still, Reinsve, a native of Norway, had a busy dance card to consider. Immediately after The Worst Person in the World, Reinsve took roles in the Apple TV limited series Presumed Innocent — where, spoiler alert, her character is murdered by future One Battle After Another star Chase Infiniti — and in the acclaimed indie A Different Man, with Sebastian Stan. But it’s by reteaming with Trier for Sentimental Value that Reinsve is once again back in the international spotlight — and the awards conversation. She stars as the actress daughter of an acclaimed Norwegian filmmaker (played by Stellan Skarsgård) who kicks off the film by turning down a role in his latest film. Trier wrote the movie with Reinsve in mind, and she says he and co-writer Eskil Vogt were working on a story about two sisters before a father character even entered the picture.
“This father just came bursting into the sisters’ dynamic, and he just got bigger and bigger and meaner and meaner,” Reinsve tells me. “He had to bring Stellan in to balance out the dynamic in the character, because Stellan’s such a nice person.”
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Reinsve, Skarsgard and Inge Ibsdotter Lilleaas, as the younger sister, build an unbelievably complex family dynamic onscreen, with Elle Fanning — as the American actress who is cast to star in the father’s deeply autobiographical film — rounding out the film’s central quartet. Reinsve got a look at the script when it was just an outline, but even then, it was clear what they had on their hands. “They had an outline of what it was going to be, and he invited me for a coffee in his house,” Reinsve tells me. “I remember crying, not necessarily about the part, but about the whole structure and how he wanted to tell the story.”
In our podcast conversation, Reinsve tells me more about her exceptional partnership with Trier and how he specifically aimed to challenge her with Sentimental Value, which has gone from winning the Grand Prix at Cannes (the runner-up award to the Palme d’Or) to one of the year’s most significant award contenders, including in the international feature category where it’s the Norway submission.
The Prestige Junkie podcast will continue publishing over the holidays. Though Prestige Junkie After Party is taking a brief hiatus this week, we’ll be back in action next Friday, Jan. 2, with a true holiday season spectacular — subscribe and don’t miss it!
