By Moonah Ellison
Images by Karl Nordlund
“… ‘What’s that on your head?’ I go Strength & Honor [hat]. She goes, ‘Where’s that from?’ It’s from Gladiator. ‘Who made Gladiator?’ I go, Ridley Scott. She goes, ‘Yeah, funny that you should be wearing his hat when you’re going to be working with him.’ I zoned out, it was a moment of madness… ”
I wish actor Alexander Karim a Happy Friday. Not that it’s a holiday or anything, just because it’s, well, the weekend and it’s 9PM. I tell him his publicist should’ve made him have a glass of wine for our call. I first marveled over his photo shoot, images that were taken in his native Sweden, Stockholm to put a pin on the shoot locale. Alexander Karim, the Idris Elba of Sweden. “I mean being the Idris Elba of anywhere would be a great honor. He’s one of my true idols. He’s fantastic.”
Karim’s resume is strong on the acting side, but he’s also a producer, a director. He has his own company. (There’s so many layers.) His family were a family of movie lovers, and storytellers. Growing up in a family from anywhere in the African continent—Uganda to be exact—it’s the same in a lot of Asian countries and all over the world: these cultures have a rich tradition of storytelling. His family emigrated to Sweden, moving from a fairly rough neighborhood in Uganda to a very swank sort of neighborhood in Sweden. “The swankiest of them all. And, and this was in the 80s because she wanted us to go to the best schools and so on and so forth. The elevator went straight into the apartment. It has a beautiful view of Hamlet’s Castle in Denmark. It is absolutely beautiful. She still lives there, and it’s a stunning apartment.”
But for Karim, movies were instilled in him at a young age. His mother would come home from work and she would watch movies. That’s where they all bonded. Bonded around those movies, and it was everything for Karim. From the classics like Ben-Hur, The Ten Commandments, to greats like Zoltan and House of Dracula. Karim and his siblings would just talk about movies and always talk in movie quotes…Tell it to the judge again… Great, Scott!… “We talk in movie quotes to this day,” laughs Karim.
Karim’s journey began when he was first put in front of the camera at a very young age. His brother is a director but originally started doing special effects makeup and they needed a model so Karim became his model. He also modeled for his brother’s still photography and when he went to the States to study film, Karim followed them to the States to study acting right after high school.
“I would say the reason for my sort of spreading myself all over every part of the industry is, is partly out of necessity. It started off as a necessity, where you move, you go from drama school, where you’re playing Richard the Third and Hamlet, Marcello and all the greats, you know, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. And then all of a sudden, you’re out in the real world and, and you’re doing a Taco Bell commercial, and that’s sort of the Holy Grail as well. That’s when you’ve succeeded is when you get the Taco Bell commercial.” So he started writing and started studying literature and writing and screenwriting and he did that for years. Writing parts for himself and have his brothers direct.
The screenwriting has paid off and Karim’s passion for writing is evident. In 2019, Karim published his first book, novel Den extraordinära berättelsen om Jonas Paulssons plötsliga död, followed by a children’s book called Modigast i världen, which he co-wrote with his wife, Malin Karim. Karim and best-selling author Camilla Läckberg released an audiobook in 2021 based on their co-written script Glacier. The story has also been adapted into a film starring Karim and Lena Endre and directed by Baker Karim.
Karim has broken out in Swedish cinema and television, but not necessarily in the United States yet. He starred in a show Tyrant on FX for three seasons (2014-2016). His character grew into sort of the biggest antagonist in the storyline. But at the same time, he was pounding away at the keyboard, trying to learn more and more about screenwriting. Flashback seven years prior to Tyrant, Karim was at a screenwriting conference and the director, Paul Schrader (Taxi Driver, Raging Bull), had a workshop in Copenhagen and he was there just taking it all in and writing stuff. Somebody at the conference asked Schrader what he was working on and he saida story about a CIA agent who gets hit with dementia and starts forgetting his old cases, and who also has a nemesis out there he had a run in with 20 years ago who cut his ear off, and they had this big run in…”Cut to seven years later, I’m on hiatus from Tyrant and I get this script. Someone seeing me on Tyrant play Ihab Rashid—terrorist and freedom fighter—and my agent goes, we need to audition and they need it by tomorrow. This is Christmas day. And I was like, come on, it’s Christmas! It’s Paul Schrader. Nicolas Cage is playing the FBI agent, and they want me to audition for the terrorist. And I was like, what? And I start reading, and I realize it’s that script he talked about seven years earlier. So I did everything in my power to get it.” The film is Dying of the Light and was released in 2014.
Fast forward to present day and Karim will next appear as Ravi in the Ridley Scott-helmed Gladiator II, the epic sequel to the 2000 Best Picture Oscar-winner, Gladiator, starring Russell Crowe and Joaquin Phoenix. “I’ve seen several films with my agent that I’ve been in, and I’ve never seen her this excited. She was yelling with excitement. And she’s from Finland. They don’t yell with excitement. She was thrilled. It was absolutely amazing.”
Months and months prior to even hearing anything about it [Gladiator II]. Karim’s agent had him send her a self-tape which was submitted to Ridley Scott’s team. Three months later, his agent called for him to do a zoom and told him it is for Gladiator II. He prepared like never before.
“I’m on Zoom. They go cool. It’s Monday today. Ridley’s going to take a look at this on Wednesday, and we’ll get back to you. And I sat for days. There’s a few ways this could go. I put my “I Like Film Quotes” hat on. I knew that if I got an email, that would be bad, because, you know, if it’s a phone call, that could be good. That could be because he’s seen it. He likes it. He’ll get back to you. But if I get a FaceTime, they want to see my reaction to something. A “Strength & Honor” hat. So that’s a good one. So I’m waiting. And finally I get the FaceTime call and they’re like, ‘What’s that on your head?’ I go Strength & Honor [hat]. She goes, ‘Where’s that from?’ It’s from Gladiator. ‘Who made Gladiator?’ I go, Ridley Scott. She goes, ‘Yeah, funny that you should be wearing his hat when you’re going to be working with him.’ I zoned out, it was a moment of madness. And then I wore the hat the first time I met Ridley as well. Because I love that fucking nice hat. I love it, love it.”
With all the hoopla surrounding Gladiator II, Karim has his head down while grinding away at other opportunities. Right now he’s developing a thriller for Netflix; shot a film over this past summer, a Swedish film; and now he’s shooting another Swedish film. “Nothing really that’s super interesting for an international audience, I guess,” insists Karim.
Maybe not now but soon enough you’ll be internationally known. Now go get some wine. You definitely deserve it.
