Why Mads Mikkelsen equates fame with buying Coca-Cola: “They all serve me in a special way”
If you’re thinking about starting off 2026 by doing ‘Dry January’ in about seven weeks’ time, then there’s a movie that will help you out considerably if you give it a watch before trying to cut out the booze. And that movie is Another Round, starring Mads Mikkelsen, the story of four lifelong mates who decide to see if life is better when constantly slightly pissed.
A fantastically acted and engrossing story, it is tragi-comic in the extreme, as the experiment to keep a certain amount of alcohol in the system at all times while doing day-to-day jobs like teaching starts off great and then slowly descends into all-out chaos.
Mikkelsen, who is brilliant as the husband on the brink of divorce who believes ‘Dutch courage’ will be the cure to all his problems, received a raft of awards, including a Bafta nomination for his performance in the 2020 film, which won ‘Best International Film’ at the Oscars, along with a ‘Best Director’ nomination for the Dane Thomas Vinterberg. Perhaps ironically, it is the most famous soft drink of them all that Mikkelsen thinks of when he looks back on 30 years of acting.
Asked by Vulture about Pusher and the effect it had on day-to-day life in his native Denmark, Mikkelsen replied: “It came out, and all of a sudden, the world was different. Everybody recognised me. And I was fairly old at that point: 30-something. Since then, I’ve never bought a normal Coca-Cola. It’s always like, ‘Here’s your cola, Master Mads,’ or ‘Get your fucking Coke, and get out of my shop.’ There’s no neutral Coca-Cola anymore. They all serve me in a special way, with hate or with love.”
Despite that initial blast of getting noticed at home, it took some time for Mikkelsen to have a real global hit movie, and it came by way of James Bond. 2006’s Casino Royale was the first time Daniel Craig had stepped into 007’s shoes, and he came up against the steely glare of Mikkelsen’s ‘Le Chiffre’.
It sparked a decade of playing bad guys and tough guys, which culminated in Mikkelsen playing Hannibal Lecter to worldwide acclaim in the TV show Hannibal, which ran for three seasons. He then really moved into the big leagues, first with that Marvel movie opposite Benedict Cumberbatch, and then into the Star Wars franchise with Rogue One.
As if that weren’t enough major franchises, Mikkelsen then took on leading roles in not just the Harry Potter spin-off Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore, but also the fifth Indiana Jones movie, The Dial of Destiny, in 2023.
Very soon, he’ll be seen in the much-anticipated horror Dust Bunny, from the creators of Hannibal. Co-starring Sigourney Weaver, it tells the story of Mikkelsen’s hitman who is hired by a young neighbour to get rid of the ‘monster under her bed’ who killed her family. He’ll also play another hitman next year in The Black Kaiser alongside Vanessa Hudgens.
As for how he deals with being recognised these days, he is still very relaxed about it. He added, “I simply hadn’t seen the fame coming. But it’s OK. I handled it fine. It was not about me. It was about the concept of me. I was luckily not 17 years old. You might believe everything.”
Concluding, “You might believe you are special. I forget it every day I go out. I walk out the door and somebody says, ‘Hey, can I get a photo?’ Then I wake up. ‘Oh, yeah, that’s right. I’m this guy.’”
