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Gunn Wållgren (born Gunnel Margaret Haraldsdotter Wållgren; [vɔlɡreːn];^{[stress/tone?]} 16 November 1913 – 4 June 1983) was a Swedish actress.[1]

This article's tone or style may not reflect the encyclopedic tone used on Wikipedia. (July 2009)

Gunn Wållgren
As Joan of Arc, Royal Dramatic Theatre, 1948.
Born	Gunnel Margaret Haraldsdotter Wållgren (1913-11-16)16 November 1913 Gothenburg, Sweden
Died	4 June 1983(1983-06-04) (aged 69) Stockholm, Sweden
Nationality	Swedish
Occupation	Actress
Years active	1934–1982
Spouse(s)	Hampe Faustman ​ ​ (m. 1941; div. 1949)​ Per-Axel Branner ​ ​ (m. 1954; died 1975)​
Children	2

Considered one of Sweden's better actresses, Wållgren was famous for her fragile and sensual way of acting and her inner soulfulness on stage. Her Chekhov and Ibsen character interpretations, in particular, are considered to be unsurpassed.

Biography

Born and raised in Gothenburg, Sweden's second largest town, Gunn Wållgren took part in many local amateur theatre productions in her teenage years. She knew very early that she wanted to become an actress although her father, the stern company manager Harald Wållgren, strongly disapproved. To dissuade her from a career in acting, her father sent Gunn overseas on a trip to Switzerland. This proved unhelpful, as her desire to act only increased. By the time she returned home, she was more determined than ever. Carrying a tremendous shyness and insecurity, which came to personally restrict her all her life. In 1934, age 21, she secretly applied for the Royal Dramatic Theatre's acting school in Stockholm and was admitted first try.

Gunn Wållgren's was awarded her first major role in 1936, at the Royal Dramatic Theatre as "premiere actress", portraying Mildred in Eugene O'Neill's Ah, Wilderness!, which went on to become a very successful and long-running production. Winning the critics' and the audience's heart in her part she received an immediate contract with the Royal Dramatic Theatre after her graduation from drama school in 1937. Despite working at different theatres throughout her life, Gunn always returned to the national stage. Some masterful stage performances by Wållgren include her portrayal of Sorel Bliss in Noël Coward's Hay Fever in 1937, Celia in Shakespeare's As You Like It 1938 (directed by Alf Sjöberg), the strong portrayal of Curley's wife in the original Swedish staging of John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men in 1940, Iphigenia in Goethe's Iphigenia in Tauris 1941, her Ophelia in the classic 1942 staging of Hamlet (opposite Lars Hanson in the title role), Mary Grey/Joan of Arc in Joan of Lorraine by Maxwell Anderson in 1948, Catherine Sloper in The Heiress by Ruth and Augustus Goetz in the 1950/51 season, Indra's daughter in the Olof Molander-staging of Strindberg's A Dream Play 1955, Nina in Chekhov's The Seagull 1955, Masha in Chekhov's Three Sisters 1958, Isabella in Shakespeare's Measure for Measure 1958, Nora in Ibsen's A Doll's House 1962, Gerda in Strindberg's Storm 1964, Mrs. Alving in Ibsen's Ghosts 196?, the grand portrayal of Madame Liubov Andreievna Ranevskaya in The Cherry Orchard by Chekhov in 1967, Martha Brewster in Arsenic and Old Lace in 1970, the title role of Agnes in Kent Andersson's 1972 play, Lena in Fugard's Boesman and Lena 1977; and the role of Ethel Thayer in Sista sommaren (play based on the Oscar-winning film On Golden Pond, starring Katharine Hepburn in the same part) in 1981.

Her film debut was in Sonja in 1943, but her break-through came with Kvinnor i fångenskap the same year, where Wållgren portrayed a young prisoner on the run. Being "of the theatre", Gunn Wållgren filmed sporadically during her life. But whenever she turned to the big screen she was "The Actress". Ranked absolutely equivalent to Ingrid Bergman back in Sweden at the time, both in beauty and in talent (in Sweden even considered some notches higher than Bergman as an actress) she delivered electrifying performances in films such as Flickan och djävulen (The Girl And The Devil) (opposite Stig Järrel) 1944, Var sin väg (Each To His Own Way) 1946, Medan porten var stängd (While The Door Was Locked) 1946 (written & directed by Hasse Ekman), Kvinna utan ansikte (Woman Without A Face) 1947 (with an early script by Ingmar Bergman), Glasberget (Mountain Of Glass) 1953 (directed by Hasse Ekman) and Klänningen (The Dress) 1964 (directed by Olof Molander with script by Vilgot Sjöman), among others.

Her supporting part in Gunnel Lindblom's debating drama Sally och friheten (1981) (Sally and Freedom), about a woman dealing with the painful memories and reality of an abortion, later in life rendered her Sweden's most prestigious film award, the Guldbagge Award (the Golden Beetle), for Best Actress.

She was highly praised for her warm and sober portrayal of the grandmother – the immediate centre of the Ekdahl family - in Ingmar Bergman's colourful film Fanny och Alexander (1982). The role was to be her very last, as shortly after the shooting finished she was diagnosed with terminal cancer. Her condition deteriorated quickly and she died on 4 June 1983; ten months later Bergman's film was awarded with 4 Oscars, one for Best Foreign Language Film at the Academy Awards.

Gunn Wållgren was married firstly to Hampe Faustman (born Erik Stellan Chatham), an actor and film director, from 1941 until their divorce in 1949. She married secondly to Per-Axel Branner, a stage director, from 1954 until his death in 1975. She had two daughters from her marriage with Faustman: Susanne and Elaine.

Filmography

Awards

• The Eugene O'Neill Award (1959)
• The Swedish Theatre Critics' Award (1962)
• The Guldbagge Award for Best Actress (1981)[2]

See also

• The Gunn Wållgren Award

References

Further reading

• Gunn Wållgren at Svenskt kvinnobiografiskt lexikon

External links

• Gunn Wållgren at IMDb
• Gunn Wållgren at Find a Grave
• Complete list of Gunn Wållgren's stage work at the Royal Dramatic Theatre^{[permanent dead link]} (in Swedish)

На других языках

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- [en] Gunn Wållgren

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[ru] Вольгрен, Гунн

Гуннель Маргарет Харальдсдоттер Вольгрен (швед. Gunnel Margaret Haraldsdotter Wållgren; 16 ноября 1913, Гётеборг, Швеция — 4 июня 1983, Стокгольм) — шведская актриса[3].

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