Alicia Vikander is looking back at The Danish Girl, ten years after its release, and says the film “already feels extremely outdated.”
The Tom Hooper-directed film, based on the 2000 novel of the same name by David Ebershoff, revolved around the lives of Danish painters Lili Elbe and Gerda Wegener.
Eddie Redmayne was cast as a transgender woman who was one of the first to undergo gender reassignment surgery. Redmayne earned an Oscar nomination for his portrayal of Lili Elbe, while Vikander won as Best Supporting Actress.
“I’m the first one to say it already feels extremely dated, which I think is a good thing,” Vikander said in an interview with British Vogue. “At that time, it was a pivot in something that it made [the subject of transgender lives] at least discussed. I hope that in a way it was a bit of an eye-opener and opened the way for art to cover those themes.”
In 2021, Redmayne opened up about his regret for taking on the role, telling The Times of London, “No, I wouldn’t take it on now.”
“I made that film with the best intentions, but I think it was a mistake,” he added. “The bigger discussion about the frustrations around casting is because many people don’t have a chair at the table. There must be a leveling, otherwise we are going to carry on having these debates.”
Ahead of the film’s release in 2015, Redmayne addressed the controversy over his casting as a trans woman, telling IndieWire, “I hope there’s a day when there are more trans actors and trans actresses playing trans parts, but also cisgender parts. And I hope — as an actor one hopes — that one should be able to play any sort of part if one plays it with a sense of integrity and responsibility.”
