A biography for Alexander Skarsgardhasn’t been written yet.
“I'm always going with my visceral reaction when I read a script. I am more drawn to characters who are conflicted, and in developing a character exploration. If it's a baddie, I'm rarely intrigued, and if it's a goody two-shoes - too much of a good guy - I'm not, either.”
“I was thirteen, and I did a movie that got attention, and I got attention, and I didn't like it - it made me uncomfortable - so I just quit. And then I was trying to figure out what to do and was worthless at everything, so I was like, 'All right, I'll try acting again.'”
“We are civilized human beings, but we're all animals deep down, and that creates a certain friction in all of us.”
“In general, we are lazy as consumers and just want to label people as good guy, bad guy.”
“I've always freelanced as an actor, and you always have to worry about the next paycheck. When I booked 'True Blood,' I promised myself I would take advantage of the fact that for the first time in my career, I could afford to turn down big money to go and do small, character-driven indies.”
“I'm really into 'Veep.' I think that the showrunner Armando Iannucci is a genius.”
“I was raised by this whole community of artists. It was pretty wild.”
“To me, when I watch movies, it's always fun to watch the bad cop or the bad guy.”
“We don't have paparazzi following you in Sweden.”
“A true artist, in my mind, is willing to fail sometimes, because if you're not brave enough to say yes and follow your gut, it's never going to be good.”
“I'm from Sweden. We don't wear clothes in Sweden.”
“When you're in the public eye, we all feel like we're constantly observed, so we don't let things out. Anger, sadness, happiness - when does that come out? Maybe when you're in traffic, because you're in the safety of your little metallic bubble.”
“I'm not interested in parts where they are looking for a good-looking guy. I want to be a weird little sidekick in a crazy comedy and then play like a dark drama or a thriller.”
“I spent a summer in Texas when I was eight, in Fredericksburg, which is, like, real Texas. It's, like, cowboys and stuff. That was my first time in the States, and I was eight years old. It was also the first time I tasted Dr. Pepper, which blew my mind.”
“When you meet someone, of course you want it to last forever. It'd be very depressing if you didn't feel that way. But things change, and you maybe grow apart. You have to accept that.”
“As an actor, what's interesting is what's hidden away beneath the surface. You want to be like a duck on a pond - very calm on the surface but paddling away like crazy underneath.”
“I like to dress up and put on a nice suit for a party or a special event; I do enjoy it, but on a daily basis, I wear stuff that I feel comfortable in, you know?”
“Sweden is a good country to raise a family in because there is an equality there I don't feel in the States.”
“There are a lot of Swedes in Hollywood in general. We have a tendency to know each other and help each other out.”
“All the characters I play are all inside of me in a way, and they're all different, the darkness, the lightness, whatever that is.”