The Killing: meet Sofie Gråbøl, star of the hit Danish crime thriller | Television & radio | The Guardian The Observer The Killing: meet Sofie Gråbøl, star of the hit Danish crime thriller The intricate plot and gritty naturalism of The Killing have had BBC4 and iPlayer viewers enthralled for weeks – and at its heart is detective Sarah Lund, played by Sofie Gråbøl. 'How did I come up with the character?' she asks. 'By acting like a man' Sofie Gråbøl, centre, plays detective Sarah Lund in The Killing. Photograph: BBC/DR/DR Share on Messenger Close Sitting in a small Copenhagen cafe, next to her apartment, the actress Sofie Gråbøl is trying to make sense of the cult status she has achieved in Britain thanks to BBC4's Danish thriller, The Killing. "It's amazing," she says. "I can't believe it." She plays the lead character, Sarah Lund, in the show that has become the subject of feverish dinner party debates and whodunit Twitter speculation. Although The Killing's TV audience is relatively small, at around half a million, it is devoted and vocal.

Previous long-running series, such as The Sopranos and The Wire, which laid claim to a cognoscenti audience, benefited from a DVD box-set boost after broadcast. The Killing, which screens in two-episode blocks on Saturday night (episodes 15 and 16 of 20 played last night), has been able to access another kind of viewer, those who catch up by watching online on the BBC's iPlayer. The action takes place in November in a Copenhagen that seems full of abandoned locations and is relentlessly dark. According to Gråbøl, the Danes were initially nonplussed by the crepuscular light, as many viewers struggled with their TV brightness settings. Lund is a tenacious and enigmatic homicide detective investigating the sadistic rape and murder of a schoolgirl. As each line of inquiry has doubled back on itself, the audience has been drawn into an intricate web of political and social intrigue. The series also explores the corrupting nature of power and unflinchingly examines the hidden fallout from murder – the pain and bereavement – in a way that is unprecedented in television. But the series does not come out of a vacuum.

Danish television has benefited from the revolution in film-making that was popularised by the Dogma manifesto. Hierarchies have been broken down and the emphasis on the scriptwriting has increased, says Gråbøl. "It's strange because I get these emails from London saying you are such a success but I'm so busy working on a stage version of Ingmar Bergman's Fanny and Alexander, and my ex-husband is working in the Ukraine, so I'm alone with my two kids and I spend all my spare time fixing their lunchboxes and rushing to the supermarket." At one time, Gråbøl could not visit a supermarket in Copenhagen without being drawn into elaborate discussions about Lund's love life and the identity of the killer. The Killing (Forbrydelsen in Danish) was first broadcast in Denmark in 2007. A second series has been screened and a third, and apparently final, series is being prepared. "I loved it," she says of the public response. "It was so nice to have real conversations with people instead of 'You were great'; 'Oh thank you'.

People would say 'I think it's him' but, as they began broadcasting before we finished filming the series, I didn't know the answer, so I could join in." The creator and screenwriter, Søren Sveistrup, refused to let the actors know where the plot was going or who the murderer was. They would receive each script just before shooting an episode and right until the last they were left guessing, along with everyone else. Gråbøl knew only that her character, Lund, was not the killer. One of the most appealing aspects of the series is its absorbing naturalism. There are no car chases, no high glamour and no unrealistic sexual dalliances. There are also three strong women who form the cornerstones of the story. While each is attractive, it's in a credible manner. Botox can claim no credit in this drama. Lund is particularly downbeat in her style. She wears her hair tied back, dispenses with makeup and is almost always in jeans and flat shoes – and a woolly jumper. A lot of thought went into Lund's wardrobe, says Gråbøl.

She and the film-makers knew that they wanted to avoid the cliche of the woman in a suit in a man's world, but they didn't know what to avoid it with. "Then I saw the sweater and I knew," says Gråbøl. "Because to me it is so on the spot. It tells so many things to me about the character, which meant I didn't have to act them. It tells of a woman who has so much confidence in herself that she doesn't have to use her sex to get what she wants. She's herself. "Also I was brought up in the 70s in a very left-wing politically active scene and I wore those sweaters. To me, a sweater like that tells of a person who deep down believes in soft values, togetherness. She works in a cynical world and she is cynical herself, but the sweater says that maybe deep down there's a longing to, I don't know, sit around a fire with a guitar!" Gråbøl says that she has a history of playing emotionally demonstrative characters, quite unlike the cool and distant Lund.

In person, the actress who began her career as a 17-year-old playing alongside Max von Sydow in Pelle the Conqueror couldn't be more different to the detective. Now 42, she looks like a warmer version of Jenny Agutter and she's animated, forthcoming and playful. All the things that Lund is not. She says it was her choice to take Lund in an unsociable direction. She had worked with Sveistrup in a previous Danish TV series and he came to her early with the idea for The Killing. Originally it was going to take place in a small village. "He said: 'We have a woman detective, a murder and the whole town should be involved. What do you think?' "I said I wanted to play an isolated person, unable to communicate and I'd like her to be at peace with that, so she's not even reaching out." Lund is so focused on finding the killer that everyone else – her son, her mother, the boyfriend with whom she is supposed to build a new life in Sweden – is pushed away. There's a stillness to Gråbøl's acting that is compelling, but which gives little away about her inner life.

Yet when filming began, Gråbøl found it hard to act up, or down, to her ideal. Her instinct was to infuse every line with more emotional meaning. "I can't even say 'Pass me the sugar' in a neutral way," she jokes. "It's as if the underlying question is 'Do you love me?'" Such was her frustration that she couldn't sleep – she knew what she wanted but didn't know how to get it. Finally she realised that the only people she knew like Lund were men. "I hate to generalise about men and women, but now I will," she says, and goes on to outline her theory that when a woman gives a party she busies herself making sure that everyone else is all right – "Do you have enough salad?" – while men are good at giving themselves. She says she's been guilty of the same feminine impulse in her acting. "I've been running around the theatre making sure everyone has enough salad." So she began acting like a man for a few days. Her character snapped into place. After that she forgot about being a man and allowed Lund to take shape. But she's had to defend her creation from possible deviations.

At one stage, she says, the scriptwriters hinted that she might have an affair with Troels Hartmann, the charismatic local politician caught up in the murder inquiry. "I rushed into the writers' office and said: 'You are not doing that. It's a sell-out.' I remember saying: 'I am Clint Eastwood! He doesn't have a girlfriend!'" The affair never happened. Can it be assumed that Lund does not make it to Sweden in the coming series? "We don't want her to go to Sweden, do we?" she taunts. "What's she going to do there?" The second series is apparently more complex and far-ranging than the first, taking in the war in Afghanistan and big-time politics. And it features none of the characters from the first, except for Lund and her boss. When I go to pay the bill, the tape recorder is still running at the table. Later, when transcribing the tape, I come to the end and hear this: "Shall I now whisper who the killer is?" There's a pause, a teasing giggle, then silence. If nothing else, Lund would appreciate the suspense.

Vicky Frost's series blog: The Killing picks up the pace as the political plot thickens and a cliffhanger will have viewers biting their nails Published: 5 Mar 2011 The Killing, BBC Four, review - Telegraph The Killing, BBC Four, review Sweaters and subtitles: Danish drama The Killing signs off in style, says Neil Midgley. The Killing: Sofie Grabol stars as Sarah Lund in the Danish drama. Photo: BBC Follow Gudrun & Gudrun is a small knitwear company, based in the Faroe Islands, which makes traditional Scandinavian sweaters. Over the years, one design in particular – the one “with the star pattern” – has, according to the firm’s website, “become our classic number one”. This iconic design has, apparently, long enjoyed cult status in Japan. And, over the last 10 weeks, these discerning Japanese jersey-coveters have been joined by an even more obsessive crowd: BBC viewers of Danish detective drama The Killing. Those viewers gather together, often in dark corners of the internet, and ask each other questions about the sweater.

How has Sarah Lund, the Copenhagen police detective who is the show’s heroine, managed to wear it almost every day throughout a gruelling murder investigation? Does it magically clean itself? Did it, indeed, magically repair itself when it was slashed – along with Lund’s arm – by a baddie? Even though The Killing managed to notch up half-a-dozen deaths during its 20 episodes, the sweater mysteries were still some of its most impenetrable by the time it finished its triumphant run on Saturday – to understandably Auden-esque wails of grief from its fans. But even the jumper, spellbinding as it is, does not entirely explain why so many people – a remarkable 500,000 a week on BBC Four, most of whom seem also to be discussing the show on Twitter – have been so devoted. The Killing is much more than just Midwinter Murders: it comes from an honourable and growing tradition of complex continental cop drama, including the French detective show Spiral and Sweden’s original Wallander. But by some magical Nordic alchemy, it has transcended both of them.

Some of the charm, of course, has come just from being transported to Copenhagen every week, and then feeling clever because you were reading subtitles, and then squealing character names at the TV: “Troels!” “Theis!” “Nanna Birk Larsen!” Even stripping away those cultural and linguistic differences, though, The Killing remains a remarkable piece of television. Its sheer narrative ambition – to present one convoluted murder mystery, lasting no fewer than 20 episodes and spanning a police investigation, a grieving family and a political campaign – is unparalleled in British TV drama. Related Articles BBC Four buys second series of The Killing 05 Mar 2011 The police officers – Lund, played by Sofie Grabol, and her partner Jan Meyer (Soren Malling) – did credible detective work (including painstaking forensic investigations, dead ends, red herrings and bureaucracy), rather than just predictably divining that the most famous guest star was the villain. But The Killing’s crowning achievement was Lund herself. Lead writer Soren Sveistrup drew Lund’s character, episode after episode, principally by stripping things away from her. She lost her boyfriend, her son, her mother, her police partner and, possibly, even her sanity.

As Lund managed simply to remain standing – but barely smiling or frowning, let alone hysterical – she became an almost impossibly courageous heroine. In Saturday’s climactic double-bill, of course, Lund finally solved the murder of 19-year-old Nanna Birk Larsen (“Nanna Birk Larsen!”). With Lund’s police partner, Meyer, having been killed off last week, Lund was freed to team up – almost Cagney & Lacey style – with Nanna’s grieving but stoic mother, Pernille. This was a woman whose kitchen windows were adorned with pretty glass shelves, but whose husband, Theis Birk Larsen (“Theis!”), thought nothing of bashing the occasional Muslim with a steel bar. As the light dawned on Pernille that Theis’s best friend, Vagn Skaerbaek, was the killer, she turned to her sister and said: “Check on the scalloped potatoes.” Sveistrup’s mastery of domestic detail also created the most chilling moment of that final episode – when a puppy yelped playfully out of a cardboard box.

Vagn had gone off with Theis, but not, we realised, to get a puppy for Pernille’s young son. The puppy was already in the garage, and Theis in mortal danger in a van. But after a chase through the spooky woods, Vagn barely had time to confess before Theis, true to form, efficiently shot him dead. In the end, only the long and embroiled story of the Copenhagen election campaign was unsatisfactorily resolved. Mayoral candidate Troels Hartmann (“Troels!”) escaped scot-free, with no final twist linking him to the murder – and therefore no real reason why he had seen so much screen time throughout the series. For The Killing’s obsessive fans, though, that was only a minor disappointment. They will face a much bigger challenge when Sarah Lund returns to BBC Four in the second series this autumn: she will, I hate to have to tell you, have bought a new sweater.

The Killing star Sofie Grabol's cancer battle encouraged her to swap TV for the stage as Queen of Scotland - Daily Record Entertainment The Killing star Sofie Grabol's cancer battle encouraged her to swap TV for the stage as Queen of Scotland SHE shot to fame as the Danish detective with a passion for knitted Faroe Island jumpers, but soon Sofie will be donning royal robes despite her recent diagnosis with cancer. Share Sofie Grabol in character as Queen Margaret of Scotland Share Get daily updates directly to your inbox + Subscribe Thank you for subscribing! Could not subscribe, try again laterInvalid Email THE star of TV series The Killing has revealed how a shock cancer diagnosis motivated her to take a leading role in a new Scottish theatre production. Sofie Grabol, who played detective Sarah Lund in the award-winning Danish crime drama, is heading to Scotland to perform in the much-anticipated James Plays, a historical trilogy from the National Theatre of Scotland. Two years ago, she wouldn’t have given the project a second thought but a diagnosis of breast cancer at the age of 44 brought with it not only a gruelling round of treatment but also catalysed a dramatic change in the actor’s perspective.

A sense of carpe diem – the determination to make the most of every day – accompanied the brutal side-effects of surgery and chemotherapy. Sofie said: “It has made me more aware, more grateful. “Coming to Britain to do the James Plays was a huge decision for me – to come away from my children. “But after dealing with something like that, you become more aware that you’re not going to live forever. “And when I read The James Plays, I decided to do it. My children, aged 10 and 13, are old enough now for me to head off for a while and for them to be with their father. After my illness, I became aware that some things you don’t get offered twice. And this was one of the things I thought was too good, too impressive, to let it get away.” Sofie became an unlikely star in the UK after BBC4 screened The Killing in 2007. The hit, known in Denmark as Forbrydelsen, quickly emerged as a word of mouth and social media phenomenon.

Her character Lund was a poker-faced detective who made the Faroe Isle woolly jumper a high street fashion trend over three gripping series, landing a crop of international TV gongs. The Copenhagen-based actress said: “I like to think people were interested in more than just the knitwear. “It was only the third time in the history of the BBC that they showed a subtitled TV series. “When it was on in Britain I would be at home, minding my work and my children, and journalists would call to ask if I was aware this was so huge in Britain. “But that’s all fictional to me because I wasn’t here. I’m still amazed by it. And I’m really proud of it too.” One of her co-stars in the James Plays is former Taggart actor Blythe Duff, a fellow alumni of TV’s cop shops. Sofie said: “Blythe has been great fun to work with and has been very generous. “My impression of the Scottish people so far is that you seem to be geared towards generosity and team playing. “In fact, I’ve never known such generosity. And there’s such a spirit of community and sharing.

Even when eating with Scottish people, everyone’s tasting stuff from each other’s plates.” The James Plays, written by Rona Munro and directed by NTS chief Laurie Sansom, are described by Sofie as being written “in a playful way”. She said: “People have a fixed idea of what life was like in the times the plays are set. But they’re not dusty or heavy or like a lesson in school. “Rona has really done her research and the writing is brilliant and the story surprisingly modern.” Sofie plays Queen Margaret, James III’s Queen of Denmark, in the story of three generations of Stewart kings who ruled Scotland in the 15th century. She stars in the third of the trilogy, which runs from August 5 to 22 at Edinburgh’s Festival Theatre. Having spent weeks rehearsing in London and Birmingham – the play is a co-production between the National Theatre of Scotland, the Edinburgh International Festival and the National Theatre in London – Sofie has yet to set foot north of the Border. In real life, anyway. “I haven’t really been to Scotland yet, so I’m looking forward to seeing it. I feel like I’ve been there for weeks anyway.

“I will definitely visit Stirling Castle, where Margaret was. I suppose that will be a bit like coming to meet her. “But I’m really looking forward to coming to the country and seeing modern Scotland after learning so much about its history.” The James Plays are part of the Edinburgh International Festival, Festival Theatre, August 5-22. Like us on Facebook The Q&A: Sofie Grabol: Drama queen | The Economist Tweet FEW Danish actors are known outside Scandinavia but, thanks to “The Killing”, Sofie Grabol is one of them. Ms Grabol played the stereotype-busting, jumper-wearing detective, Sarah Lund, in all three seasons of the Danish crime drama, and attracted something of a cult following in the process. The show has been broadcast in dozens of countries, but resonated particularly strongly with audiences in Britain, where it was broadcast in 2011 and 2012. Ms Grabol will be back in British living rooms later this year in “Fortitude”, a crime drama in which she plays the governor of a remote Arctic community whose peace is shattered by a murder.

She recently made her British stage debut playing Queen Margaret of Denmark in “James III: The True Mirror”, the final part of a trilogy about the medieval kings of Scotland. “The James Plays” premiered at the Edinburgh International Festival in August and will transfer to London in September. The Economist spoke to Ms Grabol about working in the UK and being rid of Sarah Lund. This is the first year where you’ve taken on major roles outside Denmark. Why now? Ever since “The Killing” became so successful in England I’ve been asked to do things [there] and I haven’t been able to. First because I was so busy doing “The Killing” for a whole year when we did the last season, and then I did some other projects in Denmark that I was committed to. And then I was ill all of last year with breast cancer, so I wasn’t really able to do anything. Also, I think I’ve always been quite happy in Denmark. I’m quite homebound and of course I also have my children here, so I never really wanted to go outside of Denmark. I have always felt very challenged in a good way workwise in Denmark.

I’ve always been really lucky with the roles I’ve been offered, so I hadn’t really had any ambitions about going away. But then obviously all of that buzz around “The Killing” made me go to the UK a lot and make some friends and I felt at home somehow—I felt connected in a way. And how have you found working in the UK? I’m 45 now and I’ve been working as an actor in Denmark since I was 17 and it’s just so amazing to me to have this meeting with something completely new. I’m sure it’s the same in Scotland and England, that even though it’s a big country, you have these small professional communities, and Denmark of course is a much smaller country. You can’t do a project at my age [in Denmark] without working with several people that you’ve worked with before. You have a big following in the UK. How heavy is the pressure of audience expectations? I don’t think I’m a major star of any kind in England. I think that “The Killing” was [the star], but I don’t feel that people will expect me to do Sarah Lund in “James III”, for example.

I don’t feel any pressure in that sense, but of course when you say something like that I suddenly do get a bit of a shiver. I remember I had it when I started when I was young and I entered this whole new world of acting and I’m just amazed that I can have this feeling again, at the age of 45. It’s like a whole new world opening, new experiences, and I try to focus on that. You went straight into the profession at the age of 17, without any training. Is every project a learning experience? Definitely, but it is for all actors, also the ones who got a diploma. That’s the greatest thing about this work: that you can never say, “Now I’m finished, I know how to play all roles and now I’m an expert.” You never get to be an expert because there’s always new nuances to find and new layers to discover and so I think it’s a line of work that you’re never done with. But yes, I guess that I’ve just been learning by doing and for the first many years of my career I had this feeling that I wasn’t really an actor because I wasn’t trained.

I remember the first time I did theatre and the first time I did Shakespeare and the first time I did Strindberg I had this feeling like, this is really sophisticated stuff that I’m not really allowed to touch because I didn’t get the tools. But then I’ve just thrown myself into things and learned by doing it and also discovered that everyone’s learning. You work regularly in TV, film and on stage. Do you have a preference for one medium over another? I would hate to choose because I love to do them all and that’s one of the things that I love about acting in Denmark. It’s such a small community that normally we all do everything and I’ve been extremely privileged to move freely within all media. Theatre is extremely demanding and obviously when you have children like I do, you’re just never home because it’s six nights a week. But I try to do a play once a year because it’s the essential work of the actor. You have the period of rehearsals, which is the luxury of going deeper into a text and into a character. It’s group work in a different sense and I would definitely miss that if I only did films or TV series.

You’ve spoken in the past about your involvement in creating the character of Sarah Lund in “The Killing”. Is that something you like to do generally and something you were tempted to do with Queen Margaret? No, definitely not. It was a big luxury on “The Killing” to be invited by the writer to be part of the process of developing that whole character, but this is just as luxurious to me, when you get a play of this substance when everything is just there and it’s just, “How do you want to play it?” Do you miss Sarah Lund? No, that would be too big a word. I worked with the same group of people for so many years that I miss the feeling of the part, but it’s not like I miss her as person. It was also a big relief to get rid of her, honestly. It was sad because I really enjoyed playing that character a lot, but it was also a feeling of having taken that character as far as we could and in that sense it was finished. So it was a bit like when a marriage ends. It’s over so you can miss it, but you’re also quite relieved that you can move on.

"The James Plays" are running at the National Theatre, in London, from September 10th-October 29th 2014 The Killing star to make UK drama debut in 'Broadchurch in the Arctic' | Media | The Guardian Sky Atlantic The Killing star to make UK drama debut in 'Broadchurch in the Arctic' Sofie Gråbøl will leave her police badge behind for her role as the governor of a remote town in Sky Atlantic drama Fortitude Sofie Grabol, who played Sarah Lund in The Killing. Photograph: Murdo Macleod Thursday 23 January 2014 19.19 EST First published on Thursday 23 January 2014 19.19 EST Close This article is 2 years old The Killing star Sofie Gråbøl will make her British drama debut in the Arctic circle thriller Fortitude, part of a high-calibre cast featuring Michael Gambon, Stanley Tucci and Christopher Eccleston. Gråbøl built a cult following in the UK playing detective inspector Sarah Lund in three series of The Killing on BBC4.

She will leave her police badge behind for her role as the governor of a remote town in the Sky Atlantic drama, dubbed "Broadchurch in the Arctic", a 12-part series that began filming this week in Iceland and the UK. Gråbøl will also make her British theatre debut at this year's Edinburgh international festival in August, playing Queen Margaret in the third part of Rona Munro's new trilogy, The James Plays, which will later transfer to London's Olivier theatre. Fortitude will also feature Hollywood star Tucci, Oscar nominated for his role in The Lovely Bones, in his first British TV role. Tucci's character is a detective who flies into the Icelandic town of Fortitude to join a local sheriff, played by Game of Thrones' Richard Dormer, to investigate its first-ever murder. Gråbøl's governor wants to transform Fortitude from a mining town into a tourist destination, but her plan is derailed by the murder. Gambon stars as a dying wildlife photographer, with Eccleston as the English scientist who heads up the biology department at the town's Arctic research centre. Fortitude's cast also includes Call the Midwife's Jessica Raine.

With a murder that unravels the town's frosty idyll and unearths its darkest secret, Fortitude is likely to prompt comparisons not just to Nordic crime dramas such as The Killing but another show in which an unexplained death revealed a town's rotten core, David Lynch's Twin Peaks, and last year's New Zealand-set Jane Campion thriller Top of the Lake. Written by Simon Donald, whose credits include the Channel 4 drama Low Winter Sun, adapted for the US last year, Fortitude is being made by UK independent producer Tiger Aspect through its Fifty Fathoms arm. Sky, which pledged in 2011 to increase the amount of money it spends on homegrown comedy and drama by 50% to £600m by the end of this year, described it as its most ambitious production to date. Stuart Murphy, director, Sky entertainment channels, said the aim was for Fortitude to be "cinematic drama on a grand scale". Sky's head of drama Anne Mensah said: "It has the same pressure cooker feel of Twin Peaks, but that was much more extreme.

This is a very grounded world, about what happens to an ordinary group of people when something really unexpected and unfathomable arrives in their midst. "It's about love, anger, and the secrets that are buried underneath a very beautiful facade. There's a lot of humour as well. It's so much more than a crime show, it's an ensemble piece about a whole community with Fortitude a character in the drama. It was like no other show that has ever been pitched to me." The cast also includes Luke Treadaway, who appeared in the recent big screen remake of Clash of the Titans, Top Boy's Nicholas Pinnock, and Johnny Harris, who played the part of Mick in the cult This is England series. Other Sky dramas include The Tunnel, its acclaimed remake of another Scandinavian drama, The Bridge, which finished on Sky Atlantic last month, Dracula and Fleming, its biopic of the James Bond creator starring Dominic Cooper. Originally planned as a co-production with US cable channel Starz, Fortitude is now being fully funded by Sky. News UK title to refresh look for the first time since going full-colour in 2009, with new font and focus on images.

By Mark Sweney Published: 24 Jan 2014 Media Monkey: Newsnight presenter and guests caught unawares as show goes live from Swittzerland Published: 24 Jan 2014 'It isn't what Mumsnet users want for their daughters, or sons' Published: 24 Jan 2014 Media Monkey: The broadcaster has certainly got its priorities right when it comes to the important issues of the day Published: 24 Jan 2014 The Killing: meet Sofie Gråbøl, star of the hit Danish crime thriller The Killing: meet Sofie Gråbøl, star of the hit Danish crime thriller Link to the original article in The Observer Sitting in a small Copenhagen cafe, next to her apartment, the actress Sofie Gråbøl is trying to make sense of the cult status she has achieved in Britain thanks to BBC4's Danish thriller, The Killing. "It's amazing," she says. "I can't believe it." She plays the lead character, Sarah Lund, in the show that has become the subject of feverish dinner party debates and whodunit Twitter speculation.

Although The Killing's TV audience is relatively small, at around half a million, it is devoted and vocal. Previous long-running series, such as The Sopranos and The Wire, which laid claim to a cognoscenti audience, benefited from a DVD box-set boost after broadcast. The Killing, which screens in two-episode blocks on Saturday night (episodes 15 and 16 of 20 played last night), has been able to access another kind of viewer, those who catch up by watching online on the BBC's iPlayer. The action takes place in November in a Copenhagen that seems full of abandoned locations and is relentlessly dark. According to Gråbøl, the Danes were initially nonplussed by the crepuscular light, as many viewers struggled with their TV brightness settings. Lund is a tenacious and enigmatic homicide detective investigating the sadistic rape and murder of a schoolgirl. As each line of inquiry has doubled back on itself, the audience has been drawn into an intricate web of political and social intrigue. The series also explores the corrupting nature of power and unflinchingly examines the hidden fallout from murder – the pain and bereavement – in a way that is unprecedented in television.

But the series does not come out of a vacuum. Danish television has benefited from the revolution in film-making that was popularised by the Dogma manifesto. Hierarchies have been broken down and the emphasis on the scriptwriting has increased, says Gråbøl. "It's strange because I get these emails from London saying you are such a success but I'm so busy working on a stage version of Ingmar Bergman's Fanny and Alexander, and my ex-husband is working in the Ukraine, so I'm alone with my two kids and I spend all my spare time fixing their lunchboxes and rushing to the supermarket." At one time, Gråbøl could not visit a supermarket in Copenhagen without being drawn into elaborate discussions about Lund's love life and the identity of the killer. The Killing (Forbrydelsen in Danish) was first broadcast in Denmark in 2007. A second series has been screened and a third, and apparently final, series is being prepared. "I loved it," she says of the public response. "It was so nice to have real conversations with people instead of 'You were great'; 'Oh thank you'.

People would say 'I think it's him' but, as they began broadcasting before we finished filming the series, I didn't know the answer, so I could join in." The creator and screenwriter, Søren Sveistrup, refused to let the actors know where the plot was going or who the murderer was. They would receive each script just before shooting an episode and right until the last they were left guessing, along with everyone else. Gråbøl knew only that her character, Lund, was not the killer. One of the most appealing aspects of the series is its absorbing naturalism. There are no car chases, no high glamour and no unrealistic sexual dalliances. There are also three strong women who form the cornerstones of the story. While each is attractive, it's in a credible manner. Botox can claim no credit in this drama. Lund is particularly downbeat in her style. She wears her hair tied back, dispenses with makeup and is almost always in jeans and flat shoes – and a woolly jumper. A lot of thought went into Lund's wardrobe, says Gråbøl.

She and the film-makers knew that they wanted to avoid the cliche of the woman in a suit in a man's world, but they didn't know what to avoid it with. "Then I saw the sweater and I knew," says Gråbøl. "Because to me it is so on the spot. It tells so many things to me about the character, which meant I didn't have to act them. It tells of a woman who has so much confidence in herself that she doesn't have to use her sex to get what she wants. She's herself. "Also I was brought up in the 70s in a very left-wing politically active scene and I wore those sweaters. To me, a sweater like that tells of a person who deep down believes in soft values, togetherness. She works in a cynical world and she is cynical herself, but the sweater says that maybe deep down there's a longing to, I don't know, sit around a fire with a guitar!" Gråbøl says that she has a history of playing emotionally demonstrative characters, quite unlike the cool and distant Lund.

In person, the actress who began her career as a 17-year-old playing alongside Max von Sydow in Pelle the Conqueror couldn't be more different to the detective. Now 42, she looks like a warmer version of Jenny Agutter and she's animated, forthcoming and playful. All the things that Lund is not. She says it was her choice to take Lund in an unsociable direction. She had worked with Sveistrup in a previous Danish TV series and he came to her early with the idea for The Killing. Originally it was going to take place in a small village. "He said: 'We have a woman detective, a murder and the whole town should be involved. What do you think?' "I said I wanted to play an isolated person, unable to communicate and I'd like her to be at peace with that, so she's not even reaching out." Lund is so focused on finding the killer that everyone else – her son, her mother, the boyfriend with whom she is supposed to build a new life in Sweden – is pushed away. There's a stillness to Gråbøl's acting that is compelling, but which gives little away about her inner life.

Yet when filming began, Gråbøl found it hard to act up, or down, to her ideal. Her instinct was to infuse every line with more emotional meaning. "I can't even say 'Pass me the sugar' in a neutral way," she jokes. "It's as if the underlying question is 'Do you love me?'" Such was her frustration that she couldn't sleep – she knew what she wanted but didn't know how to get it. Finally she realised that the only people she knew like Lund were men. "I hate to generalise about men and women, but now I will," she says, and goes on to outline her theory that when a woman gives a party she busies herself making sure that everyone else is all right – "Do you have enough salad?" – while men are good at giving themselves. She says she's been guilty of the same feminine impulse in her acting. "I've been running around the theatre making sure everyone has enough salad." So she began acting like a man for a few days. Her character snapped into place. After that she forgot about being a man and allowed Lund to take shape. But she's had to defend her creation from possible deviations.

At one stage, she says, the scriptwriters hinted that she might have an affair with Troels Hartmann, the charismatic local politician caught up in the murder inquiry. "I rushed into the writers' office and said: 'You are not doing that. It's a sell-out.' I remember saying: 'I am Clint Eastwood! He doesn't have a girlfriend!'" The affair never happened. Can it be assumed that Lund does not make it to Sweden in the coming series? "We don't want her to go to Sweden, do we?" she taunts. "What's she going to do there?" The second series is apparently more complex and far-ranging than the first, taking in the war in Afghanistan and big-time politics. And it features none of the characters from the first, except for Lund and her boss. When I go to pay the bill, the tape recorder is still running at the table. Later, when transcribing the tape, I come to the end and hear this: "Shall I now whisper who the killer is?" There's a pause, a teasing giggle, then silence. If nothing else, Lund would appreciate the suspense. Star of final series of The Killing reveals secrets of Britain's favourite cult TV detective...

and what 'obsessed' fans Charles and Camilla told her | Daily Mail Online Star of final series of The Killing reveals secrets of Britain's favourite cult TV detective... and what 'obsessed' fans Charles and Camilla told her comments Popular: Sarah Lund is back in the final series of The Killing Sarah Lund is back – but she seems to have lost her jumper and gained, albeit temporarily, a pair of heels. Like Sherlock Holmes without his deerstalker or Hercule Poirot minus the moustache, the obsessive detective is unimaginable without her snowflake-patterned sweater and her stout, manly boots. But when Lund makes her eagerly awaited return to our screens in November in the third and final series of the acclaimed Danish drama The Killing, she will be modelling some new knitwear – something striped, colourful and almost fluffy. Then there’s the rather worrying news that Lund is about to ditch gruelling murder investigations for a nine-to-five desk job and will be seen, for the first time, in high heels. ‘We put her in heels to show she’s not ready to go back out on the road. And then in the first scene, where I really had to run, I tripped and fell and hurt myself like hell.

So we got back to the boots she’s always had,’ says Lund actress Sophie Grabol, in an exclusive interview with The Mail on Sunday. Devotees of The Killing will, however, be relieved to learn that by episode four, Lund has dumped the fluffy number, abandoned her office job and headed back to the streets of Copenhagen. And the famous Nordic pullover and furrowed brow also return. The first series of the show, broadcast on BBC4 last year, proved a hit with viewers who were instantly hooked on the brooding story of the hunt for the killer of a teenage girl – a complex investigation led by the uncommunicative and downbeat Lund. While her attachment to her chunky sweater rapidly became major talking point, critics raved about the show’s intricate plotting and compelling performances. The success of the series paved the way for a number of other Scandinavian dramas, including The Bridge and Borgen. More... Share this article Share The second season of The Killing proved just as popular and the third series, in which Lund has a new partner (newcomer Sigurd Holmen le Dous) and a potential love interest (celebrated Danish actor Nikolaj Lie Kaas), promises to be the best yet.

Speaking on the set of The Killing III in Copenhagen, Sofie talks about her love of the show, her ever-expanding knitwear collection and her number one fans – the Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall, whom she met earlier this year. Big fan: The Duchess of Cornwall smiles after receiving a replica jumper from The Killing actress Sophie Grabol (left) who plays Sarah Lund in The Killing ‘Our writer, Soren Sveistrup, and I both felt the story of Sarah Lund wasn’t really finished in series two,’ says Sofie, 44. ‘Lund had put everything she had into the case she was working on. She lost her belief in people and everything else. ‘We had to ask, “Can a person just keep putting everything on the table? Is that possible?” And it really isn’t. ‘So in this series she applies for a new job where she sits behind a desk and tries not to get her hands dirty. We put her in heels to show she’s not ready to go out on to the streets again. ‘And then in the first scene where I really had to run, I tripped up some stairs, fell and hurt myself like hell.

So we soon went back to the boots – and we also go back to the jumper. It doesn’t take long. ‘We picked the first jumper to confound expectations. We had to put her in a jumper – Lund couldn’t be in anything else – but it had to express the change in her. This one is soft, fluffy, white and more feminine.’ Having won a Bafta last year, The Killing has, remarkably, secured not only the Prime Minister’s vote – David Cameron confessed to watching the show in bed with his wife Samantha – but also the Royal seal of approval. Big hits: Actress Sofie Graaboel, left,and actor Nicolai Lee Kaas during a press event in Copenhagen, Denmark The Duchess of Cornwall is such a big fan that she personally requested a visit to the set of The Killing III in Copenhagen during a state visit to Denmark in March. Sofie presented Camilla with her very own snowflake- patterned jumper. Presumably, the Duchess will soon be settling down on the sofa beside Charles, wearing her Gudrun & Gudrun sweater, determined to guess the identity of the killer. ‘Camilla was the sweetest,’ Sofie recalls.

‘She was just so easy to talk to that you forgot after two minutes that you were supposed to behave in a certain way. ‘We met three times in Copenhagen. She was genuinely obsessed with The Killing and knew every detail about it. But I think it was actually Prince Charles who told us that The Killing was the only television programme over which they didn’t fight about the remote control.’ Since the show started, Lund has separated from her fiance, become estranged from her son, and two of her detective partners have been shot dead. There is more trauma in store in series three. But these ten episodes will be the last we see of Lund. Sofie says that the end of the show has left her feeling bereft. ‘It’s like when you stop smoking,’ she says. ‘What I am going to find hard is the withdrawal symptoms. ‘Everyone involved feels an ownership of this project and I am going to miss that terribly. I have been working on The Killing for almost seven years and I haven’t stopped being fascinated by Lund.

And that’s more than you can say about most marriages – seven years and you are still thinking, “Who is this wonderful person?” ’ The first series of The Killing was renowned for the plot’s complex twists and turns. ‘The second series was an attempt to see how far you can take Sarah Lund into the darkness,’ says Sofie. ‘For the third season, our ambition has been to get to know her better. We all felt that she was still too much of a mystery. In Danish, we have an expression “To remove the dust from the butterfly’s wings.” The dust on a butterfly’s wings is what makes them able to fly. If you touch them and take the dust off, they can’t fly any more. ‘And that saying expresses how we feel about Sarah Lund, because you want to reveal more about her, but you don’t want to strip her of her secrets. Actors build characters by adding things. With Lund, it’s been the opposite – I’ve been stripping her. If I go back now and watch the very first episode of series one, I see that I didn’t have it at all when we started.

I started by taking away her smile, then more and more.’ It is testimony to Sofie’s skill as an actress that she is nothing like the character she is best known for playing. In person, Sofie is warm, charismatic, and sexy. She has been a household name in Denmark for more than 25 years. Cult hero: Sofie Graaboel as the Detective Sarah Lund is back into action when Danish National TV premiers the third season of the award winning crime series 'The Killing III' The daughter of two architects, she began acting aged 17, without any formal training – she appeared in Ovivir, a biopic of the artist Paul Gauguin, alongside Hollywood star Donald Sutherland. Since then, she has handled a wide range of roles, from Shakespeare to Ibsen to Strindberg, and won many awards. Had she been born in an English-speaking country, she would undoubtedly be one of Hollywood’s leading ladies by now, but America’s aversion to subtitles means that Forbrydelsen, as The Killing is called in Danish, never reached a US audience. Instead, the drama was remade in Hollywood with American actors.

Although Sofie made a cameo appearance in an episode of the second series, playing a district attorney in Seattle, she has not watched the American version of the show. In July, the series was axed. ‘I’m really relieved about that,’ Sofie admits. ‘I think it’s fine that they made it, but the idea that they would be able to make season 12 . . . I would find it really strange if they took Sarah Lund where I’ve never been.’ Having divorced the father of her two children, film editor Jacob Thuesen, several years ago, Sofie has not found a lasting relationship since. ‘I always fall in love with the project I’m involved in,’ she says. ‘In that sense, I’m a bit like Sarah Lund. ‘What I’m working on is always interesting. Romance is important when it’s there but no, it’s not there at the moment. I really do work a lot and I have my children, so it’s not like I have been actively seeking anything.

But when something happens, I’ll try to be ready – to pick up the phone when it rings.’ The enthusiasm with which she is received in the UK – and in Copenhagen, when she runs into British tourists – still surprises her Next week, Sofie begins shooting The Hour Of The Lynx, a psychological thriller based on a Swedish play, in which she will play a vicar. ‘Creatively, you need to be constantly moving,’ she says. ‘I want to stay on my toes.’ Although Sofie has had several offers to work in Britain, so far she has turned them all down because she does not want to leave her children – Bror, 11, and Gudrun, eight – who are at school in Copenhagen. Juggling The Killing with the school run and babysitters has been tricky enough, she says. ‘More than half of the Sarah Lund scenes are shot at night. It is hard to balance that when you are a single mother. ‘I would be thrilled if the right project came along and I could make it in the UK.

It would scare me to death but it would be wonderful.’ However, Piv Bernth, producer of The Killing, goes further, hinting that Sofie will now be looking ‘to explore what she has going on in the UK’. Writer Soren Sveistrup, who has worked closely with Sofie for many years, is currently in talks to create a series in Britain. The prospect of the pair teaming up again, this time on British soil, will thrill The Killing’s legions of fans. ‘I would go anywhere with Soren,’ says Sofie. ‘Anywhere.’ The enthusiasm with which she is received in the UK – and in Copenhagen, when she runs into British tourists – still surprises her. ‘The oddest thing I’ve experienced is when I pass women wearing that jumper,’ she says. ‘We look at each other, pause, and just move on, as they look embarrassed. It’s as if they are saying, “Sorry, I know, it’s your jumper.” ’ Sofie is certainly not short of knitwear. ‘In my wardrobe at home, I have between five and ten jumpers,’ she says.

‘We were looking to change the colours and the pattern of the jumper this series, so I got all the ones we didn’t use. ‘I also have jumpers that have been knitted for me by British people – often with mittens. The best thing I got recently, which I am considering hanging in my car, is a little doll, a knitted Sarah Lund, with jumper, jeans, ponytail and hands on her hips.’ Even as Sofie casts off The Killing, she knows she will never leave it behind altogether. ‘When I die and they write the obituary, it is going to say Sarah Lund somewhere – maybe in the headline. But it’s in the nature of any actor to move on. I can’t dwell on thoughts like that.’ lThe Killing III will be screened on BBC4 in November. Duchess of Cornwall reveals she and Prince Charles are 'addicted' to Danish crime drama The Killing - Telegraph The Royal Family Duchess of Cornwall reveals she and Prince Charles are 'addicted' to Danish crime drama The Killing We already knew the Duchess of Cornwall was a fan of Strictly Come Dancing, while the Prince of Wales loves a quiet night in watching Wallace and Gromit.

By Gordon Rayner , Chief Reporter 1:06PM BST 27 Mar 2012 Follow But when the royal couple want to settle down in front of the television together, their rather unexpected choice of viewing, it turns out, is the gritty, expletive-laden Danish crime drama The Killing. The Duchess admitted she and the Prince were “addicted” to the cult TV series when she met its star, Sofie Grabol, on a trip to the set in Copenhagen. The Prince missed out on the visit because he had another engagement to fulfil, but admitted that the show was “one of the only things we can agree on seeing together”. The Duchess, who specifically asked for the visit to be added to her itinerary during the couple’s official tour of Denmark, could not hide her excitement as she chatted with Miss Grabol, who plays the single-minded detective Sarah Lund.

After being told the cast were filming the climax to the eagerly-awaited third series, when Sarah Lund will finally unmask a murderer, the Duchess grabbed Miss Grabol’s pistol, pointed it at members of the press and declared: “It was me all along!” Related Articles 24 Mar 2012 “It is just a toy gun,” said Miss Grabol, who plays Lund. “It weighs nothing.” The Duchess also left with a unique souvenir as Miss Grabol, whose character always wears a Faroese jumper, presented the Duchess with her very own Sarah Lund sweater. The Duchess of Cornwall receives a replica jumper from The Killing actress Sophie Grabol (left) who plays Sarah Lund (Chris Radburn/PA) “It’s fantastic!” said the Duchess, who was clearly itching to put it on. “Do NOT lose it!” she said as she handed it to an aide. Miss Grabol even seemed a touch envious of the cardigan, saying: “It’s nice and soft. Why is it much softer than mine?

It’s a better one!” As the Duchess was shown around the location where part of the third series of the drama is being filmed – a scrapyard on the outskirts of Copenhagen – the Duchess said: “I’m an addict. I’m so excited by this.” As she was introduced to Sarah Lund’s new sidekick, played by Nikolaj Kaas, the Duchess said: “I hope we are going to see you again,” referring to the fact that Lund’s previous two partners were both killed off. “I hope you don’t go the same way as the others.” The edgy whodunit hit the headlines last year when the BBC agreed to tone down the number of four-letter expletives in the English translation following complaints from viewers. The series creator, Soren Sveistrup, who met the couple the previous day, admitted he was surprised the series was a hit in Clarence House. “Royalty is not the kind audience you would expect,” he said. “Prince Charles told me that it was Camilla who introduced him to The Killing.

He said it was one of the only things they could agree on seeing together.” Miss Grabol said she found it astonishing that the series was so popular that visiting royalty would beg for a visit to the set to be included in their itinerary. “I still cannot quite grasp it,” she said. “I think it is really surreal. But it’s lovely that she wanted to come here. I told her last night to wear flat shoes. This is not really an inviting place for a royal visit. “When I met the Duchess she was just so lovely to talk to.” Her only worry was that the day’s filming was so unexciting. “This is not really a dramatic scene. There is no action,” she said. During the visit the Duchess was shown the wardrobe department – in reality, a small, cramped trailer – where a rack of clothes included the iconic Sarah Lund jumper collection. The jumper may have been part of the show’s appeal, but it also meant the show had two stars. “It took all the attention,” Grabol told the Duchess. “It was wearing me.” She said: “When the series came out in Denmark everyone wanted the jumper. It is only made in the Faroe Islands, and they just could not keep up with demand.

“So the wool shops in Denmark thought they would knit some. The companies on the Faroe Islands went ballistic and said ‘We will sue you.” “Everyone said, ‘Take it easy, it’s just a jumper.’ “But the islands are a fishing society, consisting of clans and families. Each clan has their own pattern. The men go to sea, and when they come back the women stand on the shore and see whether their sons and fathers and husbands have survived.” Mr Sveistrup said the third series, which is set against the aftermath of the financial crisis, will be the last. “It will be the final chapter, the last 10 episodes,” he said. “We have to stop while we are still good. We don’t want to repeat ourselves. “We never wanted to make a never-ending story. We wanted to make something solid. Hopefully it will be just as good as the other series.” The Duchess, who visited the set with Denmark’s Crown Princess Mary, also got a sneak peak of the jumper Miss Grabol will wear in the third series – blue with a snowflake pattern.

Miss Grabol, who tried unsuccessfully to give up her jumper in the second series, said: “It is what we spent most of the time preparing for the new season – ‘What are we going to do with the jumper?’ “It is still in the same style – but yes, it’s blue.” The Killing' Sofia Grabol star on how she revealed murderer to fan dying of cancer | Daily Mail Online Murder mystery: Sofia Grabol sent a dying fan a note with the name of The Killing's killer during the first series because she was scared she wouldn't make it to the finale Danish murder mystery TV series The Killing was, against all the odds, the underground hit of 2011. Half a million viewers watched the slow-burning - and utterly addictive - 20-part series when it screened on the BBC at the end of the summer. That's more people than watched Mad Men (but still only five percent of Downton Abbey's mammoth audience). In Denmark, unsurprisingly, the cult following was even stronger. Three-quarters of the Danish viewing public tuned into the final episode to find out who actually killed teenager Nanna Birk Larsen in 2009.

But one very devoted viewer did not quite make it that far. Sofia Grabol, who plays ruthless detective Sarah Lund, tells the tale of a letter she received during the first run of the series. It was from the family of a woman dying of cancer who was worried she would not live to see the final episode. The mega-fan was desperate to know who the killer was, so Grabol sent her a note with the name of the murderer. Immediately after reading it, the woman tore the paper to shreds so that her nurses would not see it. 'She died the following day,' the actress said. Spending 20 hours infront of your TV to find out what happened in the final hours of just one 19-year-old, may seem like a bit of an investment - particularly as the whole series is in Danish with subtitles. But the twists and turns - and the strong political subplot - would have anyone hooked from the very first episode. RELATED ARTICLES Share And there's also the matter of THAT jumper.

Inspector Lund, the central character who is leading the murder investigation - much to the detriment of her personal life, wears the same white Gudrun & Gudrun woolly jumper with brown snowflake motif for pretty much the whole of the first series. It was Grabol who chose her character's clothes: 'We had a costume meeting and I saw that sweater and thought: "That's it!",' she said. Firm favourite: The Gudrun & Gudrun woolly jumper Grabol's character Sarah Lund wears throughout the first series of The Killing 'The reason it's so perfect is because it tells so many stories. It tells of a person who doesn't use her sexuality – that's a big point. Lund's so sure of herself she doesn't have to wear a suit. She's at peace with herself.' But the actress now seems on the verge of regretting her decision, the jumper has become more famous than she has. She told The Independent: 'Why don't people ask me about what happens to my character in the story? But every time that question. 'I love that sweater and I hate it...

it's so strong that it's almost wearing me.' In the second series, which will start showing on BBC4 on November 19, two years have past and the £327 jumper has been left behind - to be replaced with an almost identical £280 red version. Costume: In series two, Lund's trademark woolly jumper is swapped for a very similar red version Although only 10 episodes long this time, everything has been stepped up (apart from the wardrobe budget) with more murders, more political drama, more controversial decisions from Lund and even a trip to war-torn Afghanistan. A third and final series is being filmed in Denmark at the moment. And finally we will get more of an insight into Lund's personal life (details of which are even more lacking in the second season). You even get to see her at home. 'We had this enormous problem,' said executive producer Piv Bernth. 'How does she live? What does she have around her... apart from sweaters? We had to characterise her in some way.' Series three is not set to screen in Denmark until next autumn, so we'll have to wait considerably longer.

In the mean time, though, we're looking forward to seeing season two's lady in red.

Question: In the cult Danish TV series 'The Killing' Sofie Grabol plays which leading character?
Answer: SARAH LUND