It’s more pulse-quickening than a visit from Denmark’s actual prime minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt. This weekend Sidse Babett Knudsen, Borgen’s Statsminister Birgitte Nyborg, arrives in London to open Nordicana, an event dedicated to the ever-increasing amount of Scandinavian exports seen on our TVs. She will also be interviewed and take questions from the audience. Who needs real PMQs?
Over Saturday and Sunday, Knudsen will be joined by the cast of Borgen’s fellow DR production Arne Dahl and Jan Arnald – the author of the books it’s based on, who writes as Arne Dahl. Also stopping off are Marie Askehave (Rie Skovgaard from the first series of The Killing), Charlotta Jonsson (Linda Wallander) and Lars Knutzon (Borgen’s rumpled liberal Bent Sejrø). From behind the scenes, Nordicana is also hosting Borgen’s creator Adam Price, its writer Jeppe Gjervig Gram and DR’s former head of drama Ingolf Gabold, who was responsible for many of these progammes existing and bringing them to the non-Nordic world. It’s an unprecedented gathering.
The talks, interviews and Q&A sessions are complemented by screenings of selected progammes as well as the Scandinavian films King of Devil’s Island, A Hijacking, The Hunters (with Wallander’s Rolf Lasgaard), Above the Street Below the Water (with Sidse Babett Knudsen) and Accused (with Sofie Gråbøl aka Sara Lund). British crime writer David Hewson presents a guide to deconstructing The Killing, while Ann Cleeves discusses her Shetland novels (recently adapted by the BBC).
If all that weren’t enough, ScandiKitchen are catering, there’s Briska cider and Reyka vodka is on offer. Anyone not sated can buy DVDs and books. As invasions go, it’s more welcome than the first one by the Vikings in the Ninth Century. Velkommen og skol!
