#radio interviews

Roger has never slept with Mick Jagger and/or David Bowie.

Sorry for putting Howard Stern clips out into the wild but I thought this exchange was pretty goofy.

Apologies if there are minor errors, I am Norwegian, not Swedish, but it is very similar. I am also trying to practice my English/Journalism degree. :)

Please let me know if you would like other audios translated!

Link to the radio audio.

Alexander Skarsgård: I'm Now Retiring

Interviewer: He has taken Hollywood by storm and received a standing ovation at this year's Cannes Film Festival. P4 Extra guest Alexander Skarsgård talks about playing a cynical robot on TV, why he stays away from social media and about crashing an after-party. My name is Svetlana Pastuhovic. Hey Alexander.

Skarsgård: Hey Svetlana.

Interviewer: It feels like you are just everywhere now. How was Cannes. We will start there.

Skarsgård: It was absolutely incredible. An incomparable experience. I was there with a little British independent movie called Pillion by a young guy called Harry Lighton. His first movie and it's a kinky gay biker story submissive dominance relationship story and it was the premiere screening. [And there was the] biker gang members of GBM CC, which is the Biker Motorcycle Club. They weren't actors but they were at least playing versions of themselves and they came down from London, so they were there at the premiere screening and it was an incomparable experience, because I like that whole bunch so much and it was such an amazing experience to film and to make the movie and work with Harry [Lighton] and Harry Melling, who plays the lead role also in my partner in the movie. Great guy and it was a day I will never forget down there.

Interviewer: I understand that you also received praise and this movie is a real talking point. Or was it? And your red carpet boots also became a talking point. Have you paid attention to it or what?

Skarsgård: No, I try to avoid it. I stay away from social media and the media in general. Especially when I'm after press events and stuff like that. And I'm keen not to make the mistake of Googling myself or anything like that because I think it would be a disaster for my ego.

Interviewer: Is that the truth?

Skarsgård: Yes, I think so. I don't think it's good for me. I think so either way. If I read anything positive, my ego explodes. And if I read something negative, I'm afraid it's going to settle somewhere, it would just create even more uncertainty. I don't see how anything good can come out of that, so it's better to keep that door closed I feel.

Interviewer: Yes you, we need to talk, of course, of the quick turnarounds for you, to say the least. Different themes you mentioned from Pillion to sci fi and then Murderbot. What made you agree to play a cynical robot?

Skarsgård: When it landed on my doorstep, I had just finished [the Pillion] script and a couple of roles that were slightly darker in tone, both the roles and the tone of the movies. I had just done The Northman and Infinity pool, which were two amazing experiences and adventures, but I needed something a little more comical I felt. Something that was tonally different. So when this came up, and I didn't know that it's based on a book series by Matthew Welsh called The Murderbot Diaries, I hadn't read them. I [assumed] Murderbot was sci fi, action adventure and I was skeptical. I thought yes, but I think I was expecting something a bit more, a character who was perhaps a little more archetypal superhero. Kick ass. And so I started reading it instead. It's a very socially awkward character who wants to avoid contact with people in general and avoid adventures, and would rather be left alone to watch a space soap opera. There was just something so delicate and lovely about it. And unexpectedly, it felt like it was exactly what I needed at the time.

Interviewer: Yes, it's not very keen on going out on things and also wonders a bit how it sees the human race, correct?

Skarsgård: Yes, it is extremely skeptical and gets pulled in against its will. It's an android, so it's a sci fi story where an android that's made to be a security robot or security unit, but has hacked its system so it has free will and gives itself in an inner monologue called Murderbot, and it's going to go out into the galaxy on an adventure. But it cannot show the people around it that it has hacked their system. Then it's worried that they're going to call the company that owns everything and they're going to scrap it so it has to keep it secret. And in the meantime, while it waits for the right moment to go on an adventure, it has started watching soap operas. It has managed to hack into the satellite system and the Entertainment Channel and started watching a show called The Rise and Fall of Sanctuary Moon in particular. So it spends its days procrastinating, standing around watching soap operas, but then slowly, against its will, starts to build a relationship with these people it's on the planet with. Because they are different from the people it has worked for in the past, it has been treated as equipment, but these are space hippies. This group is very different and they invite more debate. I think it's quite uncomfortable, at least to begin with, because it's uncomfortable with social interactions that are not giving or receiving orders, but this standing and talking about how you feel and stuff like that is very uncomfortable. But slowly, in the first 4-5 episodes of the series, it reluctantly starts building these relationships with these space hippies. And they are quite naive and you have to step in and defend them against their will because they are about to kill themselves on crazy adventures.

Interviewer: Hey, we see you now in one major international film after another. So what are your thoughts? There is a lot of water under the bridge since the Dog Trick?

Skarsgård: Yes, it was a few years ago that we had a reunion for Christian Eklöv. One of the two directors turned 50 so we, me and Linus and Jossan and Christian and Christoffer and the other director, had a little reunion a few months ago back in Sweden and it was great to see everyone. I've met them all separately over these 20 years on and off, but this was the first time, I think, that we were all together. And it was a real nostalgia trip.

Interviewer: But do you have time to enjoy it all or is it just work, work, work for you?

Skarsgård: No, but I also enjoy work, work, work. I had a great time at Murderbot and it can be exhausting with long press junket. But, as I said, I don't have to pretend to be excited because I really am. I love the whole team that I did the series with. And as I said, flying down to Cannes for a premiere of a movie I loved to work on, doing what I love was definitely work, but it was also a great couple of days. Fares and Tarik are down there with a movie and they are old friends of mine. And to be there to celebrate with them yesterday, or what was it the day before yesterday, was also incredible. And I got to see my dad and Meghan, my dad's wife. He's down there with Joachim Trier, so that was definitely fun too. It's a lot of work but it's fun.

Interviewer: Is it true that you have actually only been to Cannes once before?

Skarsgård: Yes, I was in Melancholia and it was going to Cannes. They tried to get me out, but it didn't work with our schedule so I couldn't go then. And that's the only time I've had a movie there, so this was the first time I was there with a movie.

Interviewer: Do you go to parties?

Skarsgård: I need it. I was down there with some friends about 20 years ago. I had no business being there at all. But we were down in the south of France and of course I went there, because it was during the festival and somehow managed to. I had no contacts at all so it was no thanks to me. But a friend had a friend who had a friend who could get us into a Lord of the Rings party in a castle that they had turned into Middle Earth.

Interviewer: And it sounds lavish.

Skarsgård: Yes, I don't think they do that anymore, spend money on a party. But it was like two Swedish feature film budgets just for one party. It was swell and very fun to get in there.

Interviewer: We see you in quite a lot of American talk shows these days. I think you get quite a lot of questions about surströmming and midsummer and things like that. Is it that Sweden is exotic?

Skarsgård: Yes, they are very keen to talk about, as you say, one should. Ideally, you want to take something with you so you can try it out. You can't eat surströmming, you can't open it in a studio. Or maybe you can, maybe I should do it next time. Because they want you to bring something with you, so they are happy to try to include it. And it was caviar or Swedish candy, they think it's exotic so we talk about it. But now I have planted a seed. Maybe I'll bring a can of surströmming next time.

Interviewer: I think it's a great idea, really. I would like to see that.

Skarsgård: The reaction when I do... I'll invite Stephen Colbert to a can of surströmming next time I'm there.

Interviewer: Yes, we all want to see that. Now we are counting on it.

Skarsgård: And the audience will appreciate it.

Interviewer: Yes, and you can say hello from P4 Extra. What happens next for you? What is the next project?

Skarsgård: No, so now I'm retiring.

Interviewer: Yes. That's good.

Skarsgård: I am in London and will finish this in a few days. And we did the American part last week and then I'm going to LA in a week for some more press there. But then I'm done. So, by the beginning of June, I'll be ready. And then I think I am going home. So I will be at home and be in Stockholm and the archipelago and maybe Öland this summer.

Interviewer: And have some time off?

Skarsgård: Yes, absolutely. I will be on leave. I need to be free.

Interviewer: It was great talking to you. I think our time here is just about up. Alexander Skarsgård - thank you so much for joining P4 Extra!

Skarsgård: Thank you very much! This was nice.

Interviewer: Welcome home to Sweden!

Skarsgård: Yes, I look forward to it. Thank you very much! We will be doing some surströmming in August.

Grian and Curley dropped by BBC Radio 1 to talk to Jack Saunders about the first single off their upcoming fourth album Romance, which comes out August 2024. I'll grab the audio clip once the broadcast of Jack's show is done. Sorry if this sounds like a blurb off the BBC site, I don't work for them but they should bloody consider that.

[On the lyrics to Fontaines D.C.'s first new single, 'Starburster']

Grian: "I felt a sense of immobility when I was writing these lyrics. I actually had the lyrics written, and was unsatisfied was them. I was on the way to record them and had a bit of a freak-out. I sat down and texted the producer James Ford and said, "I can't do this right now," I had to have it postponed. I sat down and just redid them because it wasn't what it was meant to be. And then it kind of came out in one go. It was sort of the experience of listening to yourself as opposed to expressing yourself."

[On the gasping breaths on Starburster, which Jack described as 'coming up for air']

Curley: I think working on this project breathed new life into us, we were excited to work on new sounds and go for it instead of being safe, which I don't think we've ever done, but on this one, we tried for it even harder.

Grian: You've got to take steps forward. Previously when we were releasing new music, we though that we might alienate some people with what we were going to release, but where in the past we may have thought that we didn't necessarily completely commit to the step, this time we did really jump.

[On the hip hop influence]

Grian: I was really into hip hop as a kid, and as you [Jack Saunders] mentioned, there's definitely a bit of a Gorillaz element to the production [the strings]. The focus came from a place of aggression and frustration, all the vowel sounds came out first and I had to figure out what the vowel sounds were.

[On the band's new aesthetic and bright coloured look, and 'finding light in a dark place']

Grian: The idea of the title is about embracing the necessary delusion in terms of how to function [in everyday life]. I imagine it as a world within a snowglobe, that you can slip into like a warm bath, but within that world is all the madness and the hysteria. It's about embracing that.

[On the album 'Romance']

Grian: We're releasing a new album, it's name is 'Romance'. That track [the snippet posted yesterday] is the opening track and it's also called Romance.

'Starburster' is BBC Radio 1's Hottest Record of the Week.

Update: Full interview

David Mitchell and Lee Mack interviewed on Steve Wright in the Afternoon, September 2nd, 2016, in advance of series 10 of Would I Lie to You?

(Transcript under the cut)