Gustaf Skarsgård

Playing Floki: performance & interviews

Watching the performance

Floki’s shifting posture, laughter and sudden changes of rhythm distinguish him from the more direct physical performances around him. Watch when that outward eccentricity falls away: the quieter moments can expose the seriousness of his faith and attachments.

The axe behind Floki’s posture

In Guy Lesser’s November 2017 MONROWE interview, Skarsgård explained Floki’s asymmetrical movement: he imagined a shipbuilder carrying an axe in his right hand throughout his life. That prompted the lowered right shoulder, raised left shoulder and crooked walk. He deliberately pushed Floki away from the other warriors’ stoicism, with early director Johan Renck encouraging greater eccentricity. The laughter and voice belonged to that exploration. This is his account of constructed physical performance, not evidence of a historical mannerism.

A wise fool with dramatic range

Skarsgård told MONROWE he saw Floki as a wise fool who could not be taken for granted, serving comic purposes without being confined to comic relief. He discussed finding a character’s inner child to make contradictory behaviour understandable. Understanding that approach does not require endorsing Floki’s actions. The interview also identifies his Westworld character as Karl Strand, a different role he described as a man of action.

From Floki to Merlin

In Jeandra Lebeauf’s July 2020 Black Girl Nerds interview, Skarsgård described his Cursed character Merlin as a cynical drunk who has lost his magic, with the story gradually exploring how he reached that state. He said he enjoyed embodying extreme characters and highlighted the layered feelings involved in Merlin’s scenes with King Uther. He also treated the Arthurian material as a setting for a new story rather than something that needed to compete with previous interpretations. The interview provides a direct route into his work beyond Floki, with the actor explaining the appeal of another contradictory figure in his own terms.