The Stockholm Syndrome Alexander's A Victim Of His Good Looks!

Single and bohemian, he’s not your typical A-lister

- Helena De Bertodana

In the first episode of the drama series The Little Drummer Girl, Gadi Becker, played by Alexander Skarsgård, is described as “an international man of mystery”. The same might be said of the Swedish star himself.

Few actors have played a wider range of characters than Alexander. He kicked off his career in Zoolander as an airhead model. “Did you ever think there’s maybe more to life than being really, really, really ridiculously good looking?” he is asked by Ben Stiller’s character.

It was Alexander’s first Hollywood movie and it seems he’s been attempting to formulate an answer ever since, often trying to make himself as unattractive as possible – not easy for an absurdly handsome, 1.95 metre, blue-eyed Viking.

In Big Little Lies, his expression is often one of twisted rage as he beats up his wife. In The Diary of a Teenage Girl, he plays a paedophile. In Netflix movie Hold the Dark, he wears a sinister wolf mask as he wreaks murderous mayhem on a small Alaskan town.

Part of a Swedish acting dynasty, Alexander is the eldest of eight siblings fathered by Mamma Mia! star Stellan. Though he’s been an established actor for a decade, Alexander does not live a movie-star lifestyle. Until recently, he did not even have a place to live. “For the past three years, I haven’t had a home – just a suitcase with the bare essentials.”