n e w        b i o        f i l m o g r a p h y        a r t i c l e s        s t u f f       l i n k s

"Everything in life has something to do with love."    
Interview by Nicholas Wennö, Dagens Nyheter

After overwhelming popularity. After one year of "Fucking Åmål"- cult Rebecca Liljeberg dreams of becoming a doctor.

As Agnes in "Fucking Åmål" she has become a teen-idol all over the country. Rebecca Liljeberg doesn't know yet if she will continue with films and theater. While she thinks about it, she will complete her role as a rebellious horse addict in a movie "Sherdil- ett tigerhjärta" (Sherdil - a tigerheart), directed by Gita Mallik (premier in September).

The biggest driving force behind Rebecca Liljeberg's life has been to "find her own identity" - before everybody else find it for her. Theater has been like a psychological laboratory, where she has been able to test different identities.

- "My biggest fear is that I will be swallowed by the grey mass. Theater helps me to better understand who I am."

She has just turned 18, but could still act as a 13-15 years old girl, without anyone asking her about...

In the half-idyllic Nynäshamn of her childhood, where most people were sport addicts, she started her acting career as Winnie the Pooh.

- "Back then the most important thing for me was to do something together with other peole. During the first years of my teenage, when I was more unsure of myself, it was nice to jump into another role. Only after that came the need to express myself, to do something I'm good at, and to get publicity" she says without sounding self-praising.

When she was a child her dad read stories by H C Andersen and Shakespeare to her. Ever since she has wanted to create her own stories. She debuted when she was just 3-years-old with "Kung Salomons död" (The dead of King Salomon), a Shakespeare-drama about jealousy, murder and love.

When the interview has been going on for two hours, she comes to a conclusion that after all love is the biggest driving force behind everything.

- "Well, everything in life has something to do with it. Theater has to do with it. I didn't realize how powerful force that is untill I seriously fell in love when I was 14. It's almost frightening that you can get so obsessed to another person" says Rebecca Liljeberg, who nowadays lives together with the film-maker David Flamholc.

Theater has been her own psychological laboratory, where she has been able to test different identities. She says that she has been able to find something common with her real life and all her roles. In real life Rebecca has been born with dad's Smiths-albums, and has allways been sitting at her Mac-computer, writing daybooks, poems, short-stories, and has started uncountable number of novels.

"Åmål-Agnes" sat alone in her room and wrote at her Mac, and her only friends were Smiths-vocalist Morrissey and Edith Södergran.

- "Yes, Agnes and I have many things in common, although I prefer Harry Martinson over Södergran, and I have never been so unpopular at school."

Liljebergs only role after Agnes-mania is the new role as Sanna in "Sherdil - ett tigerhjärta", where she saves a horse from being killed.

-"Sanna is a quite naive and not so "dark" as Agnes. It is a horse-movie that will get young girls to stop feeling sorry about themselves. It's worth of gold to find something one loves, let it be a horse or football or working with wood. I've found theater."

After one year of almost mindless "Fucking Åmål"- cult she has got an overdose of popularity. At the same time she wants to thank "Fucking Åmål" for the greatest adrenalin-kick of her life.

- "The strangest is that I made the role of Agnes for myself. I didn't realize how much the film meant to other people before the premier. When the movie was on I was at the lobby of the theater with Lukas Moodyssons son. When I went to the salong people were standing and screaming out of happiness - the feeling was unbelievable!"

- "It's moments like that when movies is like acting at a theater-company, it's moments like that when you want to do it all again. But without the support of the people who likes you just like you are you can have problems.
When you land on earth again, you have a certain feeling of emptiness."

At fall she's going to start gymnasium at an adult-program in Nynäshamn to be able to apply to a doctor-school later. She works at the moment as an assistant for disabled people and used to sell lottery tickets at Gröna Lund (an amusement park in Stockholm) during summer.

- I have been thinking about becoming a child-doctor, to be able to do something new and concrete, something unselfish.

She admits that it might sound like a parachute, just in case the acting career fails when she isn't a "child-star" anymore.

- "I know it sounds pretty when I say that I want to become a doctor, but that actually isn't just some "plan B" she laughs.

Even though the actor colleges in the always envious acting-community have labeled "Fucking Åmål" as a lucky once-in-lifetime occurance, it still has given her a star-aura and tons of mail from Agnes-fans. Herself she has always taken idols from her everyday-world; daycare-personnel, teachers, film-collegues. Other than that she has been inspired by books and weird things like sitting at a SL-buss and watching beautiful pieces of snow falling down.

- "Eve Ramaeus from "fem myror.." is my only real idol. She tought me to read when I was 3 years-old and I even fell in love with her little bit, I hoped that she would be my mom - and then again not" Rebecca Liljeberg laughs.

Her only superheroes are her mum and dad, who got divorced when she was 1,5 years old.

- "I can see much of them in myself, I just try to block the best parts. My mother and I are quite much like each other, both physically and mentally. If I would continue the family-tradition from my mothers side, I would be pregnant now. I love children, but I will still wait until I'm 23-24 at least."

Rebecca Liljeberg doesn't know yet if she will get some role in the new movie of Lukas Moodysson that will be shot during fall. She has become demanding, and doesn't feel that she desperately has to get a new role. In fact, she has only one dream for her career; to get a role in a Star Wars-movie.

- "It would be just too cool. I envy so much Natalie Portman (from "Leon") who got a chance to be in the latest. Even tough, the very coolest would have been to be in the first one."

- "For me, that is cooler than to play Ofelia in "Hamlet".

Translation by Puppe