Dolph Lundgren: The Action Man Who Fell to Earth

Dolph Lundgren was once a happy, pumped-up, fast-lane action dude. Now he's older, thinner, glummer, and out to prove he can act.

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Dolph Lundgren, the cruelly handsome movie star whose work you may have missed, is telling me about the research he did for his most recent film, which you've probably heard of because that Keanu person is in it, too, "I play a crazy futuristic street preacher," he says, "so I studied a lot of tapes of TV evangelists to learn the way they speak and gesture, the way they manipulate their audiences, I looked at biblical books to see how people dressed and wore their hair."

This might not seem like a lot of research for a Mel Gibson or Jodie Foster film, but for a Dolph Lundgren vehicle, it approaches the level of a master's thesis. We're talking a whole new Dolph here.

I'm with the Swedish-born star at one of New York's busiest spots, the public space at Sony Plaza, 55th Street and Madison Avenue. The huge atrium is teeming with lunchtime tourists. Dolph, dressed in a brown suede, fleece-lined jacket, black Levi's, dark-blue Paul Smith socks with an electric-blue cutlery pattern, black ankle boots and Calvin Klein underwear (don't ask), orders a double espresso from the City Bakery and we sit smack in the middle of the rabble to talk. Even here, with so much to distract, he's quite a riveting presence.

"How's your acting in Johnny Mnemonic?" I ask, cutting to the chase.

"Oh, I think it's pretty good," he says. "I'm happy with it. The part was larger when we started, but everything had to be slimmed down because the plot is so convoluted. But it shows me playing a very different character. The body language is different--I had to really practice."

"Are you still taking acting lessons?"

"Actually, when I moved back to New York last year, I started to work with EST, the Ensemble Studio Theatre, which is experimental and improvisational. We've done a few one-act plays, a couple of evenings of them. In between, I shot a picture in Prague, The Shooter, a post-cold war suspense thriller directed by Ted Kotcheff. It's more character-driven than what I've done before. There are long, two-minute shots without a cut. I play a regular guy."

"So you're determined to get respect as an actor if it kills you."

"Yes. And I think I will. I have to be positive. It's a radical turn, but I'm seeing results. If I keep working on it I will get respect; but more importantly, I'll get better roles and have more fun."

Fun doesn't seem to be the operative word today. This is a much glummer Dolph than the one I knew as Hans 10 years ago in New York. In those days, he was working at the door of the Limelight nightclub (with, ironically, the now Oscar-nominated Chazz Palminteri), dating legendary diva Grace Jones (making spectacular, shirtless public appearances with her aboard a Harley built for two), and about to debut as Rocky Balboa's fierce Russian opponent Ivan Drago in Rocky IV (a film that Leonard Maltin would forever damn as "unnecessary" in his Movie and Video Guide). No Swedish meatball, Dolph was armed not only with the body of a young god and a history of sports championships, but also a master's degree in chemical engineering from the University of Sydney, Australia, and a Fulbright scholarship to MIT. He was, at the brink of his career, a perfect union of brains and brawn.

Ten years later, he's still that perfect union and his career is still on the verge--despite more than a dozen feature films under his black belt.

"What made you decide to study chemical engineering? What were you thinking?"

"To become a terrorist!" he says, laughing. "My father was an electrical engineer and my older brother is in offshore oil technology, so it ran in the family. I'm the only one who's strayed. But I was always good at mathematics and physics, and it was a way for me to get scholarships and see the world. I kept doing it until I was about 25 and realized I didn't wanna do it for a living. I didn't wanna work in a big company and work my way up like my dad did. I really wanted to be in the arts. I didn't know what to do in the arts, either, but I took a shot. I guess it turned out to be the right thing."

An important question concerning genetic engineering: "Is your whole family great-looking or are there some ugly people in it?"

"Nobody's really ugly [in my family]," he says. "But everybody's really tall..."

Too bad. "Are you from Viking stock?"

"I guess so. Navigators, Swedes are navigators."

"So, do you have a good sense of direction?"

"Yeah, and I can swim."

"In case you get lost?"

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