Klas Östergren wrote the best-selling novel Gentlemen in 1980. It is quite a coup that you made him go back to his own material and write the film adaptation …Was it hard to convince him?
Mikael Marcimain: Yes and no. He had actually written the sequel Gangsters -25 years after Gentlemen, where he had already decomposed his first novel. At the beginning he was a bit reluctant to write the screenplay because he felt the feature adaptation would be too costly and complicated to put together in Sweden. Then he was convinced by financiers. We then worked very well together, discussing what we both liked or not, what we wanted to push aside or keep from the novel etc. Klas liked my vision for the film and was very cool with his material.
I think you’ve read the novel several times, the first time when you were 15. What do you love the most about Gentlemen?
MM: Yes I have read the novel three times. I love the 60s-70s, the music scene of the time, Jazz in particular, as well as rock, Stockholm, Europe. The novel is so visually rich. I also love the stories of the different characters that intertwine, the mix of genres –noir movie, love story, cold war thriller, blood ties between Henry and Leo Morgan, the story of the writer Klas Östergren trying to write his novel etc.
It must have been quite a challenge though to cut through the depth of the literary work to keep the main elements…
MM: Yes for sure, we killed many darlings and kept the best ones. The key was to focus on the Morgan brothers, the writer, the love interest Maud and her elder lover William Sterner as that’s part of the core story. There were many locations as well that we did not put in the film.
Your feature film debut Call Girl was set in the same time period. In a way was it a kind of blue print for the more ambitious Gentlemen?
MM: Yes in a way, we had to recreate the 1970s with costumes, props, locations etc although Call Girl was also quite big, with many characters. It was a kind of little cousin to Gentlemen.
The darker theme in the film of weapon trafficking, Swedish elite with Nazi connections shows the other side of the perfect Swedish model of the 1960s-70s. You come back to that a lot in your films…
MM: Yes, and that’s also something that I have in common with Klas. He uses social and political themes as backdrop to the main storyline. For me it’s important to have a backdrop that is close to what I know -Stockholm and Sweden- and to comment on the society I live in.
You seem to be working with the same ‘family’ of actors (David Dencik, Sverrir Gudnason, Ruth Vega Fernandez) and behind the scene collaborators. Is it important for you to be surrounded by people you know well?
MM: Yes it makes the collaboration easier. I’ve worked years and years with some people behind the camera, such as my costume designer Cilla Rörby, editor Kristofer Nordin (with whom I’m grading the sequel now), casting agent Jeanette Klintberg. With actors, it’s the same; you can take a step back from what you did before and develop characters without having to start all over again. You have a kind of common ground to build on.
You’re now working on the sequel that will be included in the TV series. What can you tell about the TV version?
M.M.: I’m in the final stage of post-production on the six hour television version. It will be ready most probably in January 2015 and is scheduled to air on SVT at Christmas 2015.
What exactly will be included in the TV version?
M.M.: The series will be a mix of the feature film and new material, with new perspectives on stuff that happened in the feature and completely new story-lines and characters.
What’s next?
M.M.: I don’t know yet but I’m reading a lot. I think it will be very different, most probably a contemporary story for a change!