When Andrei Tarkovsky, having recently left Russia, wanted an actor to convey his poignant longing for his homeland, his "nostalgia," he chose Erland Josephson. It is Josephson's face which makes him so effective on film, that bearlike aspect, his ability to look lost and forlorn, to convey a sense of suffering and bewilderment, in spite of his bluff exterior. Were one to repeat Kuleshov's famous experiment of the 1920s and to intercut the same shot of Josephson with images of joy, of sadness, of anger, of hunger, the audience would find the Swedish actor, even though he had not moved a muscle, wondrously expressive, capable of embodying every emotion just through "being there," in front of the cameras. Nevertheless, he has the rare ability to combine a capacity for rage—for the grand gesture on the blasted heath—with a more subtle skill for understatement and comedy.

Unlike his contemporaries in Bergman Rep, most notably Max Von Sydow and Liv Ullmann, Josephson has not been lured to America to caricature his gloomy Scandinavian persona in Woody Allen comedies or to take parts as assassins in political thrillers. He has been too busy in Sweden. He has published poetry, novels, short stories, stage plays, plays for radio and plays for television, and he has written several film scripts. He is active in Swedish Equity. He finds time to teach drama. Still, outside his native country, he remains in Bergman's shadow.

FURTHER READING