Any thoughts on Lena Olin?
The youngest of three children, was born in Stockholm, Sweden. She is the daughter of actress Britta Holmberg and director Stig Olin. She studied acting at Sweden's National Academy of Dramatic Art. She was crowned Miss Scandinavia 1974 in Helsinki, Finland in October 1974.
Olin worked both as a substitute teacher and as a hospital nurse before becoming an actress. Olin performed for over a decade with Sweden's Royal Dramatic Theatre-ensemble (1980–1994) in classic plays by William Shakespeare and August Strindberg, and appeared in smaller roles of several Swedish films directed by Bergman and in productions of Swedish Television's TV-Theatre Company.
Ingmar Bergman cast Olin in 'Face to Face'. Later she acted at the national stage in Stockholm in several productions directed by Bergman, and with Bergman's production of King Lear (in which Olin played Cordelia) she toured the world—Paris, Berlin, New York, Copenhagen, Moscow and Oslo, among others. Critically acclaimed stage performances by Olin at Sweden's Royal Dramatic Theatre included the leading part as The Daughter in A Dream Play by Strindberg, Margarita in the stage adaption of The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov, Carlo Goldoni's The Servant of Two Masters, Ann in Edward Bond's Summer, Titania in A Midsummer Night's Dream by Shakespeare, Ben Jonson's The Alchemist, the title role in Ingmar Bergman's rendition of Strindberg's Miss Julie and her neurotic Charlotte in the contemporary drama Nattvarden (The Last Supper) by Lars Norén.
In 1980 she was one of the earliest winners of the Ingmar Bergman Award, initiated in 1978 by the director himself, who was also one of the two judges.
Olin's international debut in a lead role on film was in Bergman's' After the Rehearsal' (1984). Two years earlier, she had appeared in a small role in the same director's 'Fanny and Alexander'. In 1988, Olin starred with Daniel Day-Lewis in her first major part in an English speaking and internationally produced film, The Unbearable Lightness of Being, followed by Sydney Pollack's 'Havana' (1990), Roman Polanski's 'The Ninth Gate' (1999) and many others.
In 1989, she earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress for her work in 'Enemies: A Love Story', in which she portrayed the survivor of a German Nazi camp. In 1994, she starred in 'Romeo Is Bleeding' and played what is perhaps her most extreme character to date; the outrageous hit woman Mona Demarkov—still one of the actress's most popular portrayals on film.
Olin was for many years (mid 1970s – end 80s) partner of Swedish actor and Royal Dramatic Theatre colleague Örjan Ramberg. They had a son, Auguste Rahmberg, in 1986. The relationship ended in the late 1980s.
She met film director Lasse Hallström in Sweden in 1992. Two years later they married in Hedvig Eleonora Church in Stockholm. In 1995 they had a daughter, Tora. They live in New York with their children. She and Hallström collaborated on the 2000 film 'Chocolat', which received five Academy Award nominations, and on 'Casanova' (2005).
In 2005, Lena returned to Sweden for a brief period of filming and starred in a supporting role in Danish director Simon Staho's film 'Bang Bang Orangutang' (with a punk music soundtrack by, among others, The Clash and Iggy Pop).
