Nikolaj Coster-Waldau

Nikolaj Coster-Waldau
Coster-Waldau at Game Of Thrones season 3 Seattle premiere, 21 March 2013
Born	(1970-07-27) 27 July 1970 Rudkøbing, Denmark
Occupation	Actor, producer, screenwriter
Years active	1993–present
Spouse(s)	Sascha Nukaka Motzfeldt (1998–present); 2 children

Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (Danish pronunciation: [ˈneɡolaɪ̯ kʌsdɐ ˈʋaldɑʊ̯]; born 27 July 1970) is a Danish actor, producer, and screenwriter. He attended Statens Teaterskole in Copenhagen in 1993. In the United States, he played Detective John Amsterdam on the short-lived Fox television series New Amsterdam, as well as appearing as Frank Pike in the 2009 Fox television film Virtuality, originally intended as a pilot. Since April 2011, he became known to a broad audience by playing the role of Jaime Lannister in the HBO series Game of Thrones.

Personal life

Coster-Waldau was born in Rudkøbing, Denmark, to Fritzer Waldau (of German descent;^{[citation needed]} died 1998) and Hanne Søborg Coster, a librarian, and grew up in Tybjerg.^[1] He has two older sisters, and was raised mainly by his mother.^[2] He lives near Copenhagen.^[2][3] with his wife, Nukaka, a Greenlandic actress and singer, and their two children.^[4][5] His father-in-law is Josef Motzfeldt, a member of the Parliament of Greenland and former leader of the Inuit Community party.

Career

Coster-Waldau was educated at the National Theater School in Denmark from 1989 to 1993.^[4] He made his stage debut as Laertes in Hamlet at the Betty Nansen Theater. His role in the movie Nightwatch (1994) brought him fame in his native country. He later transitioned to United States film and television.^[3]

In 2001, he began his U.S. career in Ridley Scott's Black Hawk Down as Medal of Honor recipient Gary Gordon. Coster-Waldau says "My first U.S. movie was Black Hawk Down and a friend helped me put myself on tape up on the attic over my apartment in Copenhagen. We shipped it out and I got lucky."^[6]

He next landed a lead role in Michael Apted's Enigma. Scott brought Coster-Waldau back for his 2005 film Kingdom of Heaven. Richard Loncraine, who cast the actor in Wimbledon in 2004, cast him in Firewall two years later, in 2006.^[3] He later played John Amsterdam, an immortal New York homicide detective who will become mortal after he finds his true love, in the short-lived Fox TV drama series New Amsterdam.^[7]

Since April 2011, Coster-Waldau has played Jaime Lannister on HBO's hit series Game of Thrones, based on George R. R. Martin's best-selling A Song of Ice and Fire fantasy novel series. He commented about the character: "What's not to like about Jaime? As an actor I couldn't ask for a better role".^[6] BuddyTV ranked him #85 on its list of "TV's Sexiest Men of 2011".^[8]

Coster-Waldau starred in the 2013 horror film Mama alongside Jessica Chastain. He went on to play Sykes, a military weapons expert in the science fiction action thriller film Oblivion.

Filmography

Non-English language

(Danish unless indicated)

• Nattevagten (1994)
• Nattens engel (1998)
• Vildspor (1998; also screenwriter)
• Antenneforeningen (1999)
• Misery Harbour (Norwegian; 1999)
• På fremmed mark (2000)
• Manden bag døren (2003)
• Stealing Rembrandt (2003)
• Den gode strømer (2004)
• Supervoksen (2006)
• Underbar och älskad av alla ("Wonderful and loved by everyone", Swedish, 2006)
• De unge år: Erik Nietzsche sagaen del 1 ("The Early Years: Erik Nietzsche part 1", 2007)
• The Kautokeino Rebellion (Norwegian; 2008)
• Himmerland (2008; also co-producer)
• Ved verdens ende (2009)
• Headhunters (Norwegian; 2011)
• Aurum (2012; executive producer)

English language

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Nikolaj Coster-Waldau.

• Nikolaj Coster Waldau at the Internet Movie Database