92 Minutes With... Claes Bang

The supernova of Cannes tries to figure out what to make of sudden stardom at 50.

- Jada Yuan

THE VERY FUNNY Swedish art world farce The Square may have been a divisive pick when it won the Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, but there was one thing the entire international film community could agree on: the swooning. Claes Bang, the movie’s dashing and virtually unknown Danish star, might as well carry a fainting couch with him, considering how often he inspires fawning reveries from anyone who sees him, onscreen and off. “The main actor, I felt in love, I must say, and I’m not the only one,” said French actress-director Agnès Jaoui when asked at a press conference why she and other Cannes jury members had given The Square the top prize. “Yes! Yes!” enthused Will Smith, sitting next to her.

Bang is six-foot-four with a great head of dark hair and an inescapable, seductive charm. He’s spent the past 30 years hidden away in theater and TV in Denmark and Germany; the closest crossover he’s had was a three-episode arc on a Scandinavian crime series called The Bridge that aired on the BBC. So watching Bang for the first time at age 50 can spark the same kind of “Where have you been all my life?” awe and wonder that many of us felt upon seeing Jon Hamm emerge as Don Draper at 36. Or perhaps the more apt comparison is Bang’s fellow Dane Mads Mikkelsen, who’s 51—though he’d had way more international success by the time he landed NBC’s Hannibal four years ago. (Surprise, surprise: Getting to emerge as a sex symbol at 50 is a very male privilege, though let’s not begrudge the unwitting beneficiary.) For American audiences, Bang has basically appeared out of nowhere. When I tell him I want to introduce him to readers who don’t yet know who he is, he laughs: “Obviously they won’t. I don’t think anyone would’ve seen me anywhere!”