ALEXANDER KARIM TALKS THE EXTRAORDINARY STORY OF JONAS PAULSSON'S SUDDEN DEATH
"Wanted the book to feel like seeing a film"
Daniel John
Jonas Paulsson wakes up, eating breakfast, goes for a walk, and then he is brutally murdered. In 'The Extraordinary Story of the Sudden Death of Jonas Paulsson', this same day repeats on a loop, becoming a suspenseful, cinematic-page-turner. Your own film background is unmistakable. But when did you really find time to write a novel with everything else you’re doing?
There’s an old saying in the film industry, “They don’t pay us to act, they pay us to wait” and it’s true. Even when you’re playing leading roles, there’s an incredible amount of waiting. That’s just how filmmaking works. And in all that time, there’s plenty of room for writing.
You directed your own debut role in the short film 'Limelight' in the year 2000, was it also on your very own initiative to write your debut book?
'Limelight' was a film I made together with my brother Baker, the reason was that the things I was auditioning for when I moved back to Sweden from the US were so bad. We both felt that if you want to play good roles, you probably have to create them yourself. It was the same with Jonas. I’m offered very big roles now, but even so, there isn’t that much that’s truly great. I’m not claiming my book is better than anything else, but I wrote it because I really wanted to play that role. Sitting around waiting for someone else to write it wasn’t going to work. I had to write it myself.
What draws you to telling stories do you think?
I think we humans love telling stories, the feeling of sharing around a campfire. I love to tell stories, the form doesn’t always matter, any kind of storytelling fascinates me.
Writing it, did you see the book play out in front of you, like a film?
Yes, I absolutely saw a film in front of me as I was writing. I wanted the book to feel like seeing a film while reading it. That is why I spent so much time on the cinematic-expression, in the writing.
Are the literature-world and the film-world very different?
Oh yes! The literature world is much calmer, you take your time. I think the big difference is that an author has an entire lifetime to write a book. In film, everyone is always in a rush. As an actor I know the circumstances change radically after a certain age.
So how did it feel to release a book compared to say a theatre or film premiere?
For a theatre- or film-premiere, the producers put all their energy into that day. It’s a party, big! Ads in every newspaper and all over town, and so on. The premiere is incredibly important. When the book came out, nothing happened. It was released, and three weeks later we had a release party. Film is extremely dependent on opening-weekend numbers. Whereas a book is allowed to live and grow. It’s a beautiful process.
There's certain similarities between you and Jonas, I did imagine him as you a bit when reading, yet he’s introverted, he doesn’t like city-people, and he hates actors. So still, he’s not exactly you, but are parts of him still autobiographical?
Yes, parts are absolutely taken from my life. But that’s always the case. You draw from yourself. It’s the same in acting. You use what matters to you so that it feels true.
Having to keep reworking Jonas’s repeated day, making each restart feel different, how did you navigate that kind of repetition, that one wouldn’t necessarily expect to work well in written form?
I had an idea for the premise and how it would end. But it was an enormous puzzle. And in the middle of it I wasn’t sure I’d find my way out. But I have an absolutely incredible editor named Erika Degard. She’s a magician. She knows exactly how to push me to rewrite and to get it right. It’s thanks to her that it became a cohesive story in the end.
Time travel stories continues to fascinate despite H.G. Wells writing 'The Time Machine' back in the late 1800s. Do you also have this fondness for time-travel stories?
I love stories about time travel. I watched 'Back to the Future' every single day for a year when I was around fifteen. 'Back to the Future' is the ultimate. And an absolutely brilliantly told story.
We don’t need a time machine to at least look back a little. You and your brothers, with whom you started making films early, moved to LA quite young. How do you look back on those years now?
I loved my time in LA. I remember saying to my best friend Courtney when she was feeling down, “We are young, talented actors in Hollywood, we are the luckiest people on the entire planet!” And that’s exactly how I felt, it was magical. We thought we were Brando back then.
Could that version of you imagine himself as a future author?
No, because I never had any ambitions to write. I was never passionate about it. I just wanted to create roles to play. And I realized early that I have many ideas that work, and it’s so hard to convey them to others who are supposed to write. I’ve tried. A lot. All to avoid writing it myself. But then I realized that if I want it written, the way I want it, I have to do it myself.
What was it like filming 'Dying of the Light' with 'Taxi Driver' and 'Raging Bull'-screenwriter Paul Schrader and, not least, Nicolas Cage?
Nicolas Cage was absolutely fantastic to work with but the one I was really starstruck by was Schrader. He’s a screenwriting god!
Is it true that Lukas Moodysson and Lars Von Trier were both involved in helping elevate your career here in Sweden?
No, that’s not quite right. I did get a push from Moodysson, but the Lars I think you’re referring to is Lars Jönsson, he was Sweden’s biggest producer in the early 2000s, he discovered Moodysson, Fares, Maria Blom and many more.
This fall we’ll see you in cinemas in the comedy 'Call Mom!' by Lisa Aschan. Do you have anything else coming up on the on-screen side of storytelling?
I filmed a series in Iceland at the start of the year, 'Thin Ice', with Lena Endre and Bianca Kronlöf. Then I did the second season of 'The Lawyer', which is now finished. After that I started on Colin Nutley’s 'Weddings, Funerals and Baptisms', which I’m filming now and at the same time I’m filming 'We Got This' for SVT and Jarowski, and next week I start playing the lead in the feature film 'The Woman Under the Bed' by the fantastic Robin Holm.
Will you keep on writing alongside acting?
I've just turned in my second novel, and begun writing a third. I'm also writing two new children’s books with my wife Malin, with whom I also have a column in the evening paper with. We are writing two more children’s books in the same series as 'The World's Bravest', which is the title of our first children’s book. And then my own books which I am writing right now. Phew!
