By Anne Brodie
Lena Olin, the renowned Swedish American actor stars as Bruce Dern’s long-suffering but loving spouse in Tom Dolby’s The Artist’s Wife. Dern plays a renowned abstract artist about to launch an important exhibit. She has no career; she gave up painting to be his wife and helped his star rise. We find them in their Hamptons beach home, as he prepares for the show and begins to act erratically. Thus, begins a journey of memory, change and love, a beautifully realised and often painful love story. I spoke with Olin from New York and we covered a lot of territory.
Lena Olin, I remember interviewing you and Daniel Day-Lewis in Toronto in 1988 for The Unbearable Lightness of Being. You made such an impression. I think it was your first North American film.
Oh, wow, that’s a great memory! That was our first publicity tour, we were so green. And it was my first American picture, period. We shot it all in France in Paris and south of France so that was my first visit to America. I think we started that tour in Toronto. It all started there. Was Juliette Binoche there?
Yes, all three of you! You are selective about the roles you’ve taken, what was the appeal of playing Claire in The Artist’s Wife?
I was rehearsing at the time, I’d gone back to Stockholm to do a play at the National Theatre, I was Martha in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? You know, a big drinker. When I read The Artist’s Wife and she was so caring and loving and powerful, and she was empowered. I was so moved by it and drawn to Claire. I immediately emailed my agent said I wanted to do it. We were on a long boat ride, sitting on this boat and falling for Claire.
You and Bruce Dern give such great performances, there’s intensity between you. But I would never have imagined you and Bruce Dern together!
Neither would I put us together! When Tom Dolby said to me what about Bruce Dern, I said “…and I? As a married couple?” Tom said it might work. The thing was he was busy, and we couldn’t get together before the shoot. He came in for wardrobe, but there was no warming up or anything. I have to tell you we got so lucky, there was something about him and way of working that was right up my alley. I felt so inspired. It was refreshing. He just gets it. and he’s great and doesn’t stick to any rules. You just have to get there and dance with him. It was so wonderful. It creates tension. What we want to do is create tension and be in the moment. It’s real and with Bruce it was like where did he get that from? He was in the moment, in character. It’s a fun way to be surprised. I told my husband, he’s a filmmaker (Lasse Hallström) that I think we are a great match.
Claire’s husband is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease on the eve of his exhibit. She decides to hide his condition, why?
I think it happens a lot, any kind of mental disorder or disorder someone has of the mind, and kind of depression or mental problems we tend to be so ashamed and people will judge, us mind illness any kind of depression or mental problems, we tend to be so ashamed and people will judge us. You see my reaction when I’m with the doctor and he suggests I need someone to talk to. I tell him I could never be in a group; I couldn’t protect my husband. We see that in the film. We understand the need to share conditions, everything is more complicated. And he starts babbling at the award show. It was important to Tom that we see Claire there and her embarrassment. But I think it’s about Tom’s dad Ray, a mega guy in the movie industry and he watched his mum worry about telling or not telling, rather than going behind his father’s back. All that pain.
Claire gave up her own art career for him, and she secretly rents a studio to work. To express herself and manage her feelings. Would he see that as a betrayal?
I think its so relatable, one of the things I loved with the story, especially women, we want things to work, we want our relationships to work and we tend to slowly maybe lose parts of ourselves that were important. We always tend to prioritize people we care for and love and that’s what has happened. She stopped painting, he was successful, and it was a choice. I’m going to forget the wild and crazy person I can be and how wonderful I am and slowly… If you look at photos of yourself form ten years ago, you say,” Wow, I looked very different”. We wear down parts of ourselves. That’s what happened to her. It’s a tragedy, you wish she would have done that without going so far away from who she was.
How do you shake off a project like this?
It’s interesting you don’t get rid of it, that’s what’s so fun about being an actor. All the characters you do, all the rooms you have to visit in yourself stay with you. It makes your life richer because of all the characters you play. You lead a life exposed to so much. But an actor going through all these different characters gets in touch with all of them. No matter how horrible the character or how different she is from who you are. It’s a wonderful thing with this job. I feel I have all the characters.
Have you kept in touch with Bruce Dern?
No, we kind of lost touch because we’re working. Daniel his wife were nearby and they came to dinner with Lasse and me just before the pandemic. We had exactly the same love for each other that we had before. Just as close. I think you go through an experience making a movie, it stays. The connection stays.
The Artist’s Wife in theatres Sept 25