Birger Malmsten was born in Gräsö in 1920. Like most Swedish actors, he has relied on the theatre for his daily bread, but during the late 1940s and early 1950s he was used by Bergman as a kind of alter ego in his films. He was a good deal more handsome than his director, but he was able to project on screen the inchoate anger–and anguish–of the youthful Ingmar. He veered from being the hapless blind pianist in Music in Darkness to the bitter young bohemian of Prison. Malmsten's film personality is fuelled by a romantic charge (cf. Summer Interlude) and also by a fatal weakness of character in movies like A Ship Bound for India and Waiting Women. Bergman dropped him in 1952, yet retrieved his skills for two brief roles–as the sex-object/barman in The Silence and as one of the would-be rapists in Face to Face.

Q: The first film you worked on with Bergman was It Rains On Our Love.

BIRGER MALMSTEN: Yes. It was along time ago, but I remember Ingmar was working for Svensk Filmindustri and there was another producer in Sweden, Lorens Marmstedt, who had a company called Terra Film. And Lorens Marmstedt had a story, but he didn't like the script. So he asked a famous director if he'd read it and see what he would do about it. And the director came to Lorens and said "Yes, that's a good story. We make it. We make it." But Lorens said "No, there's something wrong with that. I'll have to ask some others. I know, I'll call Ingmar Bergman and ask him."

So Ingmar said he'd read it, and he said "No, this is not good. But we can change it. We can re-write it."

"Yes," said Lorens. "How many days will it take?"

"It will take me four hours. If you give me your secretary, and a typewriter, and a hotel room. I'll fix it."

And they went to the Strand Hotel and it was exactly four hours for him to get the script to Lorens Marmstedt. And Lorens read it and said "Yes, that's right, that's right. But who do you want to play the lead part?"

And Ingmar said me, but Lorens said I'm not very well known in Sweden.

"No," said Ingmar. "We do the film with him and with me and we make a good film."

And that's the beginning of the story.

Q: What was he like as a director then?

BM: He was a little bit nervous. We were all nervous because we were young. He couldn't "own" the camera because he was a little bit afraid of it. But one day Ingmar came out and said, "Ah Birger, I get it. I know the camera, I own her, I can do exactly what I want to do with her."

Q: You also played the lead in the first film that Bergman wrote and directed, Prison.

BM: Ingmar was very committed to doing that film. And the producer said, no, you can't do it. But Ingmar said I have to do it. You have to believe me. It's necessary for me to do that film. And Lorens said yes, yes, but you have to do it very very cheaply.

Q: What was Bergman like off set at that time?

BM: We went to Cagnes sur Mer, and Ingmar was married, but I was free. And Ingmar was very moral. And one day I met an English girl who I had a feeling for, and Ingmar didn't approve. But then the girl came in a plane to wave goodbye, and Ingmar said that's fantastic. People you don't understand, you can still feel for. I'll make a film about that sometime. And I think that's the idea for The Silence.

Q: He was writing a script whilst you were in France together. Was he a very disciplined worker?

BM: Yes always. Ingmar is always working hard. I think that he learnt it from Strindberg. There are two things about Ingmar. Working very hard and women. And asking other people about their relations with women. That's Ingmar Bergman.