She is a 43-year-old actress who is best known for her starring role in the internationally acclaimed television series ‘Borgen’.
Isn’t she the TV prime minister?
Indeed she is! Knudsen has been playing Birgitte Nyborg, Denmark’s first fictional female prime minister, on ‘Borgen’ since it premiered in 2010. As we all know, the real-life version wasn’t too far behind, as Helle Thorning-Schmidt became PM the following year.
What else has she done?
Among other things, she’s been in a couple of Susanne Bier films: ‘Den Eneste Ene’ (‘The Only One’) in 1996, in which she plays a pregnant woman with a philandering husband, and ‘Efter Bryllupet’ (‘After the Wedding’) with Mads Mikkelsen in 2007, as a woman who passes off her daughter as another man’s son. Bier has an affinity for unloading some serious Freudian issues on Knudsen!
Didn’t that win an Oscar?
It was nominated, but lost to a German film in the end. Speaking of losing, this year Knudsen was nominated for an international Emmy for her performance in ‘Borgen’, but was beaten by Argentine actress Cristina Banegas.
Bummer! How did she take it?
Pretty well. She admitted to being disappointed, but was happy for her peer, and although she didn’t win, she was so honoured to be nominated … blah, blah, blah. We would have hoped she would have shown some Viking rage and gone a little Red Sonja on the academy, but she handled it very gracefully.
That’s a shame.
A win (or a media meltdown if we’re lucky) in 2013 is still possible, with the third and final season of ‘Borgen’ scheduled to air next spring. Fingers crossed!
