Our first guest tonight is an Academy Award-winning
actress you know from films such as "The Danish Girl,"
"Tomb Raider," and "Ex Machina." She stars next in "The Glorias,"
which will be released on September 30th
on Amazon Prime Video and Digital.
Let's take a look.
-This year, the press has finally discovered
a movement that has already been strong for several years now,
and reported it as a small, privileged,
rather lunatic event,
instead of a major evolution in consciousness.
-Everyone's consciousness, male and female, black and white.
This is the year of women's liberation!
-Please welcome back to the show Alicia Vikander.
How are you?
-I'm good. Thank you for having me.
-It's wonderful to see you again.
Very good Gloria Steinem voice.
I have to give you full credit there.
That was very impressive.
-[Deep voice] Yeah, I had to -- I mean, I do have a low voice.
[Normal voice, laughing] But I had to go even lower.
-Yeah. -This is a wonderful film
where different actors play Gloria Steinem
over the course of her life
based on a book she wrote about her life.
And you and Julianne Moore actually got to meet her.
I was lucky enough to have her on this show.
I mean, she is a titan, and it's very --
I was nervous talking to her.
Were you even more nervous knowing that you then
had to take on the task of playing her?
-Yeah, I was. It was almost like --
I had this question asked to me just earlier today --
"Oh, how was it meeting her the first time?"
And I suddenly remembered,
I did actually meet her for lunch first
before we met for rehearsals.
But I think I had almost had that as a blank
because I was probably so nervous.
I was just so kind of -- you know, felt so privileged
and honored to just be able to meet her.
And, of course, I managed to be a bit more calm
when she saw me, Julianne, and Julie, our director,
for rehearsals,
which she was so generous to tell me
that she could be part of.
I think it was, yeah, quite a few times
when Julianne and I just looked at one another,
couldn't really believe what was happening.
But Gloria, she was -- she's so incredibly generous,
and she kind of pushed us and said,
"You know, please, just ask me anything."
And in the end, we actually -- I was a bit embarrassed to ask,
but she actually read some of the scenes
from the script herself, as herself,
which was pretty mind-blowing.
I even -- I actually have some videos
still on my iPhone, which is a bit of a treasure.
-That's an incredible advantage you got.
When I used to have to do impressions on
"Saturday Night Live," I'd have to record it off the TV
to actually get the person to do it for you.
-Yeah, I mean, it was one of those things.
I was like, "Is it okay? Can I film you doing this?"
And she was like, "Yeah, of course."
And, you know, we ended up getting like,
I don't know, 20 videos.
And I think, in the end, I think she kind of enjoyed it,
but it was -- We each kind of started the scenes,
and then she was like -- stopped halfway.
And then she was like, "Well, actually
what happened at that event,"
or, "Actually what I did say or what that person said."
And then it would always turn out
to a much longer, exciting story.
-That is fantastic.
You know, I think the interesting thing
about Gloria's life is she's always been timely,
and yet it seems more timely than ever
to be making this movie now.
You guys must have been aware of that while you were making it.
-Of course. I mean, a lot of the discussions
that we had whilst filming was how excited we were,
you know, for the release of the film
and, of course, the topics that it brings up.
And the fact that Gloria, you know,
from the beginning has been so supportive
and wanted to be part of us releasing this film.
And we had big plans, so, you know,
hoping to be on tour now and be on a bus and involve,
you know, a lot of other women, do a lot of talking circles,
which is something that Gloria does a lot of.
Now, of course, the world looks very different,
but it was a very beautiful kind of communal feel
that we got a few weeks ago when we --
I think we were, like, 16 women on a Zoom call.
Gloria was one of them.
We kind of passed around, you know, the questions
of "What can you do?"
And everyone had their own ideas of how --
how we can kind of get the message out.
-It's -- You talk about how hard it is
to have those communal moments,
but I have heard that one solution
you have to the dinner party that we can no longer have
is to order the same take-out
as the people that you Zoom with.
This is a very, very novel idea.
-It started as something I did --
you know, like, a sneaky thing I can -- you know, to a friend,
I can kind of sent a text and like --
It happened once when my friend was stateside,
so it was, like, a Sunday.
So it ended up being a dinner for me
and a brunch for my friend.
And I was like, "Yeah, this is an address.
You need to be there in half an hour."
And then I had just called, like, another --
I think it was a Mexican restaurant.
And the good thing is, like, Mexican food, you know,
you can kind of decide to order the same thing wherever you are.
So then we ended up having the exact same, you know, order,
and I think we even had the same bottle of wine.
And then, you know, that's a great way
of really forgetting
about the fact that you are in front of a screen.
The tough thing is, though,
because if you've had a few glasses of wine,
suddenly you have this amazing social event --
Suddenly you just, like, go offline,
and then you feel really lonely.
-[Fingers snap] -Suddenly, everything's gone.
-Right, and then nobody believes you when you say,
"Look, I was at dinner with a friend."
They're like, "Were you?"
You -- I want to congratulate you,
as well, 'cause you got this in right under the wire.
You got your driver's license in the UK.
-I did!
I mean, literally a few days before lockdown.
I mean, it's been -- It's been way too -- too long.
I promised myself I was going to do it before 30,
but that didn't happen.
But now I have it, and, you know, I was born in Sweden,
which drive on the right side,
so for me to have passed the test in the UK,
in London, too, with all the black cabs,
and everything and on the left side,
I feel like I'm hopefully not a huge danger
when I go out there in the traffic.
-I think the good news is,
no matter how bad a driver you are,
there are so many other huge dangers
right now that you're so --
you're comfortably at the bottom of the list.
-People will forget if I just run over them.
-Yeah, if you sideswipe somebody right now,
that's the least of their problems.
And it's really good now I think, more than ever,
a good time to be able to get in a car
and drive as fast as possible.
So congratulations on your license.
Congratulations, as well, on the film.
It's always so nice to see you.
-So good to see you. Thank you so much.