Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas ‘Sentimental Value’ Interview

Inga Ibsdotter Lilleaas is not short on sentimentality. Boasting a great relationship with her parents and a fulfilling life offscreen that includes a husband and son to boot, Lilleaas had all she needed in her arsenal to step into her latest role as Agnes Borg Pettersen in this year’s Norwegian Oscars submission Sentimental Value. The dramedy, co-written and directed by Joachim Trier, follows sisters Nora (Renate Reinsve) and Agnes (Lilleaas) as they battle with a strained relationship with their nearly estranged father Gustav (Stellan Skarsgård). Gustav, a once-renowned director, offers Nora, a stage actress, a role in what he hopes will be his comeback film. When Nora turns it down, she discovers he has given her part to an eager young Hollywood star (Elle Fanning). Suddenly, the two sisters must navigate their complicated relationship with their father and deal with the starlet who dropped into the middle of their complex family dynamic.

Lilleaas’ Agnes is the more diplomatic of the two sisters, quiet and able to receive life’s woes more healthily than her more detached and abrasive sister Nora. “I see myself in [Agnes] in the way that I have a sister and a brother. I know what it means to love them and be scared for them if anything were to happen to them. I know what it’s like to be in a family and want the family to work,” Lilleaas says. “I think a lot of people can relate to that in a less conflict-based way. It’s just complicated to be in a relationship when there’s so much love involved. When there’s love, there’s also disappointment and grief.”  

Below, the actor opens up about her Oscar-contending debut, her journey to acting and the creative challenge of taking on a complex role in Sentimental Value.

DEADLINE: After watching this film, I have to ask you. How is your relationship with your parents? 

INGA IBSDOTTER LILLEAAS: They’re theater people, but they didn’t go to a performance every night. They didn’t leave us like the dad in the movie does [laugh]. Growing up with parents who shared my interests was really nice and made me feel close to them. And it still makes us close today because we have something in common and something we can always talk about. 

DEADLINE: If you look at your family history, are there any other artists and creative types in there, or are you the first? 

 LILLEAAS: My great aunt on my father’s side was an actress in some capacity, and my grandfather on my mother’s side was definitely artistic. He wrote poetry. He was also a teacher and a musician – he played the Norwegian fiddle. My uncle is also very artistic; he’s a musician and a theater teacher. He also writes plays and is active in the community theater. 

DEADLINE: It seems like acting was the only choice for you. Was there ever another career path you’ve considered? 

 LILLEAAS: Being a teacher is something that I think I wanted. I had the idea that I would be a teacher because my mother was one, so it was something I looked up to. And I knew my grandfather had been a high school principal, so the teaching profession was highly respected. I’ve taught as a guest teacher here and there just for a semester or a course. 

I wanted to be a psychologist when I was a kid. But somewhere along the way, I realized the acting part was more of what I was interested in. I studied a little psychology after high school before I started my theater degree, and I realized that I’m not into numbers or science in that way. I’m more interested in the personal aspect of it, the human analysis of the human being in a more artistic way, not so analytical.

I wanted to be a midwife. I still think about that as a secret dream. My sister’s a midwife, and I really admire her and her work, and I’m very interested. After having kids myself, I went into a wormhole of the giving birth process. But I think that’s what’s so great about being an actor. Actors want to be a lot of things, and being an actor means you can do a lot of stuff. 

DEADLINE: When did you start to take yourself more seriously as an actress in terms of sticking to it as a professional career? 

LILLEAAS: I’ve always taken myself very seriously in the acting department. In Norway, we have high schools where you can choose the path you want to take. You can select drama, science, or sports, for example, and that’s what you do. You also have all the other subjects, as well as theater and production. When I started to realize that acting was what I wanted to do, it was a little scary to admit it to my parents. I applied to a school I didn’t get into, but I made it to the final rounds of auditions, and that was when I realized I actually had something to do in that space. 

So, I studied a little, trying to get into schools and figure out how I fit into the acting business. I wasn’t really outgoing in my teens, and later I was more scared to do the full acting thing because it’s very uncomfortable to lose control [of myself the way an actor needs to].

DEADLINE: Do you have any advice from your learnings that have stayed with you about getting through that fear as an actor? 

LILLEAAS: I attended a physical theater school in Norway based on the work of Jacques Lecoq, the French theater pedagogue. This was very scary because I wasn’t very physical in that way yet. But I had two teachers who said two different things that stuck with me. And one said, “Talent is to thrive.” That’s the best way I can translate it. What he meant was that you have to find a way to be happy or comfortable and enjoy what you’re doing. That’s on you. You have to find, how can this be good? Because there’s always going to be people that you don’t get along with, or material that isn’t the best, or a director who is horrible, all of these things. And you have to be able to be as good as you can and be able to work through it and find the spark in it in a way, which I thought was, for me, very good advice. It’s become a life motto. I can find a way to be comfortable, content and happy in this situation that will inspire me to move on.

And the second one was, my other teacher, said, “Don’t worry, you can never be vulgar,” which was really, really good for her to say, because as a woman, you’re always afraid to be too much. It’s hard not to get influenced by people trying to make you less. So, her saying that to me felt freeing. 

DEADLINE: What place were you at in your life when Sentimental Value came to you? 

LILLEAAS: I was going away for a few months to do a theater production in the north of the country for a small theater. I went to the audition and didn’t feel that I did a really good job because I had my head so full of this other thing. So, I went away and did my shows, and then they called me after a few weeks to ask if I could come and do another round and I couldn’t. [The theater production] wouldn’t let me go, so the opportunity almost slipped away. Luckily, [the casting directors] waited until I was done with the theater production.  

When I came back, I had a few rounds of auditions, then a few conversations with Joachim Trier, which were really nice. I never had a director take that much time before to get to know someone, which is a very good way to make people feel safe and in ownership of the material at an early stage. And then he called me finally after about six months and told me he wanted to do it, and here I am. 

DEADLINE: In what ways did you understand Agnes? I know you are a mother yourself. 

LILLEAAS: I see myself in her in the way that I have a sister and a brother. So I’m both a little sister and an older sister, and I know what that is, and I know what it means to love them and be scared for them if anything were to happen to them. I know what it’s like to be in a family and want the family to work. I think a lot of people can relate to that in a less conflict-based way. It’s just complicated to be in a relationship when there’s so much love involved. When there’s love, there’s also disappointment and grief. 

My son was three years old when we shot this. I felt I could really understand Agnes’ need for everything to be safe for everyone involved. I see all of these characters as little children who just want to be loved and safe, and to be with their parents. They’re just looking for their parents to take care of them in a way. That really resonated with me. 

DEADLINE: Agnes is the only one who can get Nora to read the script. What do you think it is about her personality that allowed her sister to open up? 

LILLEAAS: It’s like Agnes says in the movie. She has an older sibling who was there for her, so she’s doing fine, more or less. I can recognize this in my own life. I have an older sister, so I’m definitely more carefree in a way compared to my sister. So, I think Agnes has Nora, who took care of her when she grew up, and that made her feel more safe and secure, who is then able to take care of Nora, who is not doing good. 

DEADLINE: What conversations did you and director Trier have about Agnes’ resilience? 

LILLEAAS: Well, I think she suppresses a lot of things, to be honest. I realized that throughout. And I’ve realized, more talking about it, that she pushes it away because she wants peace. She knows what she has to give up to have the whole family. She has to accept some things about her father that her sister isn’t able to accept. And I don’t know if that’s right or wrong. I just think that’s how she works, and that’s how she’s able to make life better for herself. She’s been able to, because she’s met her husband, and we talked about her in the beginning of that relationship, but that wasn’t necessarily so good, and it didn’t work so well. But then her husband is the kind of person who is a very safe, stable and secure human. So, through meeting him, she was able to work a little on herself, her fears, and her commitment issues. And she has been able to heal herself a little in the relationship.

Her father and sister make a little fun of that. It’s a very safe and secure and conventional lifestyle. But I think that’s a very conscious choice she’s made. She wants the family and the home that Nora reads about in the script, but can’t have. And Agnes has gone out and taken it because she wants it, and she’s able to do that. And I think throughout the movie, she sees how Nora reacts to her father being there and how it affects her. And in the beginning, she’s more in denial. Agnes can’t fully support Nora in the birthday scene. She has to protect her father in a way, and she betrays her sister slightly. And that creates a little rift between them, and these things build and build until her father wants her son in the movie. And that brings up the whole, OK, I was in your movie as a child too and you just took advantage of me, and you’ve told the story that this is the greatest memory of our lives together. And it probably was, but looking back at it when it was over, how he just left and had used her in a very, I don’t think he did that on purpose. I think that’s just the effect of a parent taking advantage of a child’s emotions that way, using them. And I think she realizes that at that moment.

DEADLINE: What was the most challenging part of taking on this role? 

LILLEAAS: Having the feeling that the whole thing was about finding the truth in every situation and finding the real reactions, which is always challenging because it’s a little scary, and you have to have the courage not to hide how your body wants to react to a scene naturally. 

So, it’s about finding that truth, sticking with it, and not hiding it or making it prettier. It’s about not preparing everything perfectly, but preparing in the sense that you have a very stable foundation of how you see the character and their relationships. 

DEADLINE: What is your favorite scene? 

LILLEAAS: When Agnes goes to Nora’s apartment with the script, it is a little intimidating. We knew it was an important scene. There was a lot that wasn’t evident, but we just worked with the text in the scene, trying to figure out what I was trying to say, and that made me very emotional. It also affected Renate [Reinsve] in a similar way. Listening to her monologue as she read the script snippet aloud in the scene was so overpowering that the emotions I felt in that scene felt truthful because I felt them. We were really immersed in the character, but also as ourselves in a way, so it was just a mind-blowing moment. 

Then later, the moment in the bed, it was the same sort of thing, just having that true feeling of love and just how afraid Agnes had been to lose her sister, and how afraid she is of that all the time, that’s always in the back of her mind. It must be. I don’t remember this, but Joachim said I was just sitting there talking to Renate and that I wanted to go up and hug her, but it wasn’t in the script. Again, I was a little scared about changing things up because I didn’t know where the camera would be, but Joachim encouraged it. 

Also, she and I were so in tune that I felt like saying, “I love you.” So, I said it, and it wasn’t in the script. In Norwegian, saying those words is a very big thing. It’s almost too much. It’s something reserved for husband and wife when you get married. But, I felt very much in that moment that it was important to say to a sister going through what she had to go through. It felt very cathartic. 

DEADLINE: What parts are you looking for next? 

LILLEAAS: I want all the parts. I want to do a lot of different things. I really like the challenge of a role. I really enjoyed the way we worked making this movie in having the time and intimacy. 

[This interview has been edited for length and clarity]