Felix Herngren has many professional titles: actor, director, producer, comedian, creative director and co-owner of a production company. He is restless and loves to work. For our reporter Monika Agorelius, he tells us about when he was scolded by his theater teacher and got a feeling and about what he thinks is incredibly difficult. PHOTO: TV4

When INRI When Felix meets up with him via Zoom, he looks happy and cheerful, with a curious look in his eyes. He is wearing a gray T-shirt and his hair is a little messy. He gestures as he talks, and occasionally a large wristwatch can be seen on his left wrist. Behind him is a white wall adorned with a large framed picture of a lioness resting in the sand. Felix is in Mallorca, where he currently lives with his wife and the youngest of his children.

– We moved here a year and a half ago, but I travel back and forth to Sweden quite a bit for work, he says. I write from here and I can also handle phone calls and meetings when I'm here. We've always liked Mallorca. A couple of years ago we were here on holiday and then we felt like we wanted to try living here. It's easy to travel back to Sweden and there's a Swedish school here, so it works well for the children. I love the sea and the mountains. I run a lot and my wife plays a lot of tennis. It's a very international island and Palma is a nice city. There's not much crime here and the people are nice. When Felix is asked if he speaks good Spanish, he laughs, ruffles his hair a little and answers: – I started a beginner's course, but after a few weeks I had a film project that was hanging over me like a wet blanket and I felt like I couldn't sit and study Spanish vocabulary when I was about to finish writing a script. So I dropped out. I'm the worst in my family at Spanish, but I understand some. I hope to learn Spanish properly eventually.

I get by with the help of mime and Italian and French support words. Felix is incredibly creative, which he says is because he is so restless and finds it fun to work. He made his acting debut in 1990 in the comedy series S*M*A*S*H, directed by his brother Måns Herngren and Hannes Holm. That same year he began directing commercials and over the years he has created hundreds of successful and award-winning commercials. As a filmmaker, screenwriter and actor, he is well known for TV series and feature film successes such as Solsidan, Folk med angst, Hundraåringen and Bonusfamiljen. Felix is now on TV with the documentary series UFO-mysteriet, which is shown on TV4 and TV4 Play.

The series is interesting and entertaining at the same time, and I guess it must have been a huge project. – Oh my god, says Felix and laughs. I haven't worked much on this type of program before. I mostly work on writing scripts and characters and such. It was a huge amount of work with the UFO mystery. It was lucky that I didn't realize how big a project it would be when we started, because then I might not have jumped on it. But it's been fantastic fun.

Why do you think we humans are so interested in the possibility of life in outer space?

– We know a lot about our Earth and how it works, but we know very little about the microcosm and macrocosm. It's a mystery and I understand that people are looking for answers in different ways. It's interesting that religion is a bit close to UFOs in various UFO movements, because it becomes like a mystery in our entire consciousness and we ask ourselves the question 'why do we exist?' and we wonder and fantasize about what the universe looks like.

What was the most exciting thing you filmed?

– I thought before that the most exciting thing would be to interview the scientists and those with special knowledge. We interviewed, among others, a man named Chris Mellon, a former high-ranking military officer who has worked for a long time at the Pentagon. But the most exciting meetings were with the people who have seen things. That was the most interesting and a little bit upsetting for me. People who are obviously normal but who have seen things, and who have often seen it together with other witnesses – those meetings have made a big impression on me.

It must have been more difficult for those who saw the UFO alone, without other witnesses.

– In the series we have a man named Tommy. He lives in Greve in Skåne. One evening for
Just over ten years ago, when he went out to fill the wood basket, he turned around and saw a type of craft behind him. It flew by completely without light and he felt like it was looking at him for a few seconds. He couldn't tell if it was ten meters or several kilometers. It was enormous, and he ran in and screamed at his wife who had just seen it as it disappeared into the sky. He was basically alone and has struggled with the mental aspect of having experienced something like this himself and being questioned. Those you meet who have seen things together with others have a much easier time relating to it, even though it will probably be difficult for them to understand what they have seen.

Do you hope the UFO mystery will create debate?

– I hope it can remove some of the stigma surrounding the UFO issue. Because it is a watershed. I notice it when I talk about it with friends. Some people think it is super exciting and interesting and others you can tell by the look in their eyes that they think this is completely crazy. That means that those who have seen things don't dare to talk about it. And the scientific community also needs to become a little more open to these kinds of questions. When we called around to universities and tried to get hold of astronomers to interview, many of them turned us down. We weren't even allowed to record at Stockholm University because they thought it was frivolous. That's a bit sad, when science isn't even interested in discussing it. It is much more open in other countries, like the USA, the UK, Spain and France. It will be interesting to see how things develop with the American whistleblowers in the future.

Your career is incredibly impressive. You're not only incredibly funny as a comedian and actor, you do so much more; you write scripts, direct and produce. Doesn't it get tricky to do so much at the same time?

– It's a bit tricky to do a lot of things sometimes, but I think it's fun. Even though I have a hand in a few different jam jars, it's still the case that I work with a lot of incredibly talented employees. I've been good at sniffing out people who are a little better than I am, and then we work together. And that's one of my strengths, that I've been unafraid to call people who I think are really talented. When I do good things together with others, I have even more fun at work. I'm not a control freak. I'm very keen that what comes out is good and interesting, but it definitely doesn't have to be exactly how I planned it. The most important thing is that it's fun. I think that when you direct things, the end result is better when you give people freedom and inspire them by pushing them a little in the right direction so that you feel that it follows the vision that was there from the beginning. But I'm definitely not a control freak. On the contrary, I think it's very boring if one person decides everything on a recording.

For example, in Solsidan you work with actors who are naturally very funny and you know each other well after working together so much, does that mean there will be a lot of improvisation in the dialogues?

– There are scripts for everything, but when I direct, I can say 'now we'll drop the script here' and then it's improvised. Most of us are comedians at heart who often write our own material and enjoy improvisation. So there are always a couple of takes that are improvised. And quite often there are several lines from those takes, because there's something special when you start improvising. The actors who are going to listen to you don't know exactly what you're going to say so the listening is good. A big part of the humor engine is about who listens to things and receives what you're saying. And if you then just run the written lines, which can be great, then you know what to say but it's a different counterplay.

When did you discover you were funny?

– It was when I was in a children's theater group when I was little. It was called Vår teater and was located in Fältöversten in Stockholm. I went there when I was only 6-7 years old and when I was 14 years old we did a play The Imaginary Sick Man by the French playwright Molière. I played the lead role. We had rehearsed for about six months and no one had laughed. I probably didn't even know it was a comedy. At the premiere, many in the audience started laughing when I acted and I felt 'okay, this is apparently funny'. That was the first time I felt that I had some funny bones, as they say. At the first performance I was so happy that the audience laughed that I started improvising on stage. It wasn't popular with the other actors who had their lines, and they didn't know what was happening when I went off script and started acting. Afterwards I got a scolding from the theater lady. 'Felix, you don't do that!' I didn't understand, 'why then?' She told me that I was so good that I could be an actor but that I had to learn to adapt to the group. Everyone else got praise but I got a scolding. She was harsh, but she was right. It was that experience that gave me the feeling to pursue becoming a comedian.

As a funny guy, you probably became popular with the girls too.

– No, says Felix and laughs. He takes a sip of water and continues: – Both I and many other male comedians know that you become very good friends with the girls if you are funny, but you are not allowed to make out or sleep with them. That is for the tough, dangerous guys. Unfortunately.

You and your whole family are incredibly creative. Do you talk about work at home or is it too much to talk about work around the dinner table?

– My wife Clara and I work together and we talk a lot about scripts and different projects and stuff. She worked on the UFO program, among other things, and it was great fun. Iris, my daughter who is 13, has played my daughter in Solsidan for all these years. There is a lot of work talk.

In a family of fanatically creative people, with your wife Clara, your children and of course little sister Moa and big brother Måns; will there be competition between you?

– No. When I was younger, maybe. My brother Måns started with film and TV and stuff like that back in the mid-80s. I'm two years younger and grew up next to him and saw how well he did. I can't say it was competition, but I maybe felt a certain pressure to 'how am I going to succeed with this?' considering that he succeeded so well. But Måns has always been very sweet and invited me along, showed me and explained. Everyone in the family is happy about each other's successes in different ways. It's actually just fun. Somehow it's also the case that if my brother makes a good series, it rubs off on me a little too. My sister writes really good books and is a good screenwriter. We always get joy from what the others in the family do.

You're good at making others laugh, but what makes you laugh?

– My wife. She's really funny. She jokes around a lot with me and the kids. When it comes to comedians, Sacha Baron Cohen is a favorite. He's incredibly funny, I love the kind of humor that Borat does very much. He's amazing.

When you work as a comedian, you can't be afraid to make a fool of yourself, right?

– No, on the contrary. You have to get naked. It's really important. That's why the set has to be safe and you have to feel like it's okay to get naked and pull your pants down in the middle of the night during filming. It's really important. Otherwise it won't be fun.

You have to be tough to dare to do it.

– I'm a pretty sensitive person who finds it incredibly difficult to let myself go in private. Once some time has passed and you've gained perspective on different events in life, you can laugh about it. But you don't become immune to embarrassing feelings just because you work with humor.

What inspires you when you write comedies?

– I am inspired by real situations that I, my family and people close to me find themselves in. I rarely write anything down, but once I start writing scripts or creating characters, I scroll back through my head to people I have met and things I have experienced.

What drives you? You work incredibly hard.

– You have to have something to do, too. Keep your mind occupied. I'm very restless.

What does the future look like, what are you working on right now?

– I am working on new episodes of Solsidan that we will film next year. This fall I will be working on a new project that is not official yet. I have made a crime series called Jana – marked for life that starts on Prime Video in April, together with Henrik Björn who has made, among other things, Jordskott. The series is based on Emelie Schepp's novel.

Do you have a professional dream that you want to fulfill?

– I really enjoy working in Sweden and in Swedish, but I would like to try working in English, in the UK or the US at some point. Being able to do comedy with Sacha Baron Cohen would be a dream.

3 QUICK Watching TV: Documentaries and news. Like the Apple series Constellation with Noomi Rapace and the series about Truman Capote on HBO. Favorite podcast: I like Alex & Sigge's podcast. Best music right now: When it comes to music, I'm in an Amy Winehouse phase. Her music is insanely good.

FELIX HERNGREN
Age: 57.
Occupation Actor, director, producer and comedian. Creative director and co-owner of the production company FLX.
Family Wife Clara, screenwriter and producer, six children, one bonus child and two grandchildren.
Bor Mallorca, Spain and Stockholm.
Career in brief: Debuted as an actor in 1990 in the comedy series SMASH, under the direction of his brother Måns Herngren and Hannes Holm. In the same year, Felix began directing commercials and has created hundreds of successful and award-winning commercials over the years. He is well known for TV series and feature film successes such as Solsidan, Folk med angst, Hundraåringen and Bonusfamiljen.
Currently The documentary series UFO Mystery on TV4 and TV4 Play and Jana – marked for life on Prime Video.