Alicia Vikander co-stars in ‘The Danish Girl’ as Gerda Wegener, a 1920s artist who stands by her husband, Einar (Eddie Redmayne), after he confesses that he believes he was born in the wrong gender and begins to dress as a woman they call Lili.
Alicia Vikander is in an unusual position this awards season.
At the 2016 Golden Globes, she’ll arrive double-nominated, for best actress in The Danish Girl (in theaters nationwide Christmas Day) and again for her supporting role in spring’s sci-fi critical favorite Ex Machina, in which she plays a robot whose artificial intelligence allows her to break away from the man who created her.
Those are just two of the five films that Vikander has appeared in this year, which spanned Guy Ritchie’s The Man From U.N.C.L.E. and chef drama Burnt to the World War I coming-of-age story Testament of Youth. Which means the Jessica Chastain comparisons have been rolling in for a while.
“I’ve heard it a few times,” says Vikander, 27, who also has recently been nominated for Screen Actors Guild and Critics’ Choice awards. (Chastain’s big debut year was 2011, when she had five films out within 12 months.) But there’s a big difference at play, she cautions. “I’m a Swedish actress, and for me it’s just been such a huge thing that I got a chance to do English-speaking films.”
