How Viggo Mortensen Helped Me Survive the Pandemic…and Other Confessions of a Devoted Fan

By Kevin Renick

“I started seeing certain performances, certain movies, where it wasn’t just, do I like the story? Do I think it’s a good adaptation of the novel? Was I moved? A question started popping up inside me. Which was, “How do they do it? What’s the trick? How is it that I feel so strongly about this?’”
— Viggo Mortensen, interviewed about how he became interested in acting.

So, I’ll say it like this: Viggo Mortensen was instrumental in helping me weather the miserable pandemic of 2020. No, I don’t know the man, and it wasn’t a particular thing he said or DID that helped me get through. But he went from being merely a “favorite actor” to unquestionably a “personal hero” during the plague, and that had a definite impact. I became a major league “Viggo-phile.” But let’s back up a little bit.

One of the questions I’m always interested in when I discuss showbiz matters with people is whether or not they have a favorite star. I’ll ask, “Who really impresses you consistently?” Or maybe, “What first made you a fan?”  Whether it’s an actor or a musician, you can definitely learn a lot about a person from hearing what arouses their passions. And given a chance, almost everyone is willing to expound on the reasons why a certain celebrity floats their boat. It’s fun, it’s harmless and it most certainly teaches us something about ourselves. The performers who become a big deal to us either reflect our values, impress us repeatedly with their talent or, simply, really turn us on. Sometimes all of the above. As an avid TV and movie buff for most of my life, I’ve revered/collected on various stars here and there, going so far as to put binders of photos and clippings together on past favorites like Lesley Ann Warren and Winona Ryder and in music, Brian Eno. I had the opportunity to become a movie reviewer, also, and I was only too happy to praise a talented individual if their work impressed me. Performers who stand out SHOULD be recognized. And I was one of those guys who yelled out loud at shows like the Golden Globes or Oscars if one of my favorites was in the running. Don’t most of us enjoy that kinda thing? Hoping our idols get rewarded?

With Naomi Watts in David Cronenberg's Eastern Promises

These are some of the thoughts I wanted to share to preface my discussion of Viggo Mortensen, a multi-talented and singular performer who literally helped keep me engaged during an utterly horrific year-plus—one in which I lost income, was unable to do my normal things (like many other people), and found myself watching a ton of movies…and thinking about them. I’ll try to convey how this one man has come to mean far more to me, at least in the realm of cinema, than any other actor/celebrity has before. That includes becoming a role model, redefining the notion of “creative focus” for me, and providing a movie-watching experience that’s simply NOT like watching the films of any other star I admire. No, Viggo Peter Mortensen Jr. has ascended to a much loftier place in my mind. He exemplifies something about storytelling integrity, creative choices and authenticity that I find genuinely inspiring. Viggo’s an unmatchable hyphenate in the world of the arts: he’s an actor-writer-musician-painter-photographer-publisher-producer and, as of the 2020 film Falling, a director. He’s also a hyphenate by nationality: a Danish-American-Argentinian multi-lingual who is able to star in any films that require him to speak those languages. But even that isn’t all: he spoke French and some Arabic in 2014’s Far From Men, and a bit of Russian in David Cronenberg’s Eastern Promises. Viggo can seemingly do anything, and though his acting career started later in his life compared to many other stars (the superb 1985 film Witness was his first real movie; he was already in his mid-20s by then), and he was mostly stuck with secondary roles until, arguably, Ridley Scott’s 1997 film G.I. Jane, he ascended to leading man status with the phenomenal success of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Now he’s in demand all the time and can mostly pick the projects he wants to do. A long career of solid, well-crafted and usually memorable performances has led to a high degree of creative freedom for Viggo. And that’s seemingly what he’s always coveted.

But maybe you’re wondering, what’s the personal connection here? Sure, he’s an acclaimed and popular actor, one whom many moviegoers have swooned over and idolized since that peerless, iconic turn as Aragorn in JRR Tolkien’s epic saga of Middle earth that New Zealand director Peter Jackson managed to make movie history with. But what makes ME want to devote a Cinememoir essay to the subject? 

Viggo and co-star Maria Bello with director David Cronenberg on the set of A History of Violence

Let’s start with this: I BELIEVE him. No matter what character he portrays, whether good or unlikable, fully fleshed out or just a “bit part,” playing somebody real or totally fictional, I’m absolutely convinced that character exists after seeing the naturalistic way Viggo plays him. This is an important distinction in storytelling. Often I’ll admire someone’s well-crafted portrayal—it’s clear how they’ve gone to great lengths to inhabit a character and prove themselves a capable actor, even under tons of makeup or prosthetics. But in my mind, Viggo’s characters ARE actually out there, along with the world they inhabit. Whether it’s the tough Navy seal Master Chief John James Urgayle in G.I. Jane (who puts lead actress Demi Moore through hell to make sure she knows what can happen to you if you’re captured by the enemy), the London-based Russian mobster Nikolai in Eastern Promises, the freewheeling but soulful hippie blouse salesman in A Walk on the Moon, the idealistic and off-the-grid father of six brilliant kids in Captain Fantastic or the humble French teacher stuck with a thankless task in war-torn Algeria in the 1950s (depicted in Far From Men), Viggo is not just acting in the normal sense of that word. Technically, sure. But he SO channels and inhabits those roles that you become convinced those people exist. It’s something Viggo does that is seemingly effortless, organic and often transcendent. Admit it, didn’t his most famous role as Aragorn in LOTR helped you buy into that fantasy world just a little bit more deeply? Didn’t he anchor that entire big-budget cinematic adventure with a performance of such gravitas and soulful authority, that you BELIEVED Middle-earth existed and that Aragorn was indeed destined to be King of Gondor? And still exists as the benevolent ruler of a kingdom once under siege, until he overcame unspeakable challenges and dangers on the road to fulfilling his destiny? I believe it. His work is that convincing, the power of Viggo’s contribution to the storytelling art unimpeachable. He IS all those guys he plays. He’s not merely acting. He is CHANNELING people that exist, or might. They are just too REAL not to believe in.

“Viggo came in and he just had this quality…of somebody who just knows secrets. He knows something that nobody else knows. And he’s incredibly charismatic. And just one of the best actors that you’ll ever work with.”
— Director Philip Ridley (The Reflecting Skin)

Okay, you say, but it IS, in the end, ACTING. We’ve had tons of great actors…Gary Oldman, Daniel Day-Lewis, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Christian Bale, Al Pacino…Oscar winners all. And there are movies I adore by all of them. But there is something indefinable and consistently authentic about Viggo’s work. It’s the look on the face of his characters, the quiet inflections in his voice (and the exacting line delivery), the piercing intensity in his eyes, the sense you get of hidden depth… He’s just always, ALWAYS totally committed to the work. In interviews, Viggo has said more than once that he wants to know what happened “before page one” of a story, and he researches every role so that in his mind, at least, he knows where a character came from and WHY they are behaving as they do. Sure, many actors have such dedication. But Viggo’s commitment is always evident.  He traveled solo across the backroads of Russia to invest a character with a certain kind of secretive underworld vibe (Eastern Promises). He observed and worked out with a major league baseball team just to be able to throw pitches convincingly and discuss the sport in a few scenes with his leading lady (21 Days). He read the same books Sigmund Freud read in order to understand the man’s views and theories about psychotherapy before portraying him (A Dangerous Method), and went the extra step of seeking out first editions. He asked the director of A Perfect Murder for permission to use his own paintings to convincingly play the role of a devious artist. The point is, Viggo takes that extra step, every time, in his roles. And it makes him a delight to watch, even in less than stellar movies.

Viggo playing guitar in Captain Fantastic

Early in the pandemic, I decided to watch as many Viggo films as I could, and it soon became genuinely therapeutic, even oddly reassuring. I don’t think I’d ever seen an actor change so much from film to film. There were the big critical favorites like A History of Violence, in which Viggo portrays a beloved family man and smalltown diner owner who undergoes a shocking transformation back to his former life as a Philadelphia gangster. It’s a powerhouse role that I honestly can’t see anyone else pulling off so convincingly. And a personal fave, Captain Fantastic, where Viggo plays Ben Cash, an off-the-grid, idealistic and opinionated father trying to raise six brilliant kids in the woods of the Pacific Northwest until a tragedy forces him to confront the limitations of his parenting style and expose his kids to the big bad world out there. There’s A Walk on the Moon, part two of what I call the “romance trilogy,” where Viggo plays Walker Jerome, a hippie blouse salesman who offers Diane Lane’s character, a restless housewife longing for something she can’t quite articulate, the romance of her life in New York’s Catskills during the eventful summer of 1969. One after another, as I watched and rewatched movies featuring Mr. Mortensen, I grew more and more awestruck. Something about his dedication and believability was resonating off the dial for me. I began to realize that NO other actor had so affected my emotions and drawn me so deeply into such a variety of stories. I looked FORWARD to watching my little DVDs (some of which I had to track down on Ebay as they were a bit rare) on lonely nights, enjoying behind-the-scenes featurettes (when a disc contained them) and loving the various observations Viggo made about each role. He always seemed happy to be doing whatever film it was, and truly astute about his character’s part in the story. Viggo received Best Actor Oscar nominations for three of those critical favorites: Eastern Promises, Captain Fantastic and 2018’s Green Book, winner of the Oscar for “Best Film” that year. This raised his already considerable profile in Hollywood, but didn’t necessarily influence his choice of roles.

Fully immersed in the Viggo universe by summer of 2020, I then proceeded on to what I call “deep Viggo,” the stuff earlier in his career that casual fans might not know. This would include the two films directed by Philip Ridley, The Reflecting Skin and The Passion of Darkly Noon. The former, released in 1990, is a visually stunning and unashamedly weird film that has become a cult classic, gaining new fans when it finally hit DVD years later. Viggo says on the featurette in that one that fans sometimes showed up at events wanting him to sign copies of their DVD. More significant for me was the fact that I realized one day with a jolt that my brother Kyle and I had gone to see that film in a theatre the year it came out. I’d somehow forgotten! At the time, I knew nothing about the young lead actor; but I remember thinking the movie was beautifully creepy. And Kyle and I also saw Viggo’s second movie, Prison together, a straight-up horror film. I didn’t even make the connection that those two films shared the same actor. Like I said, it was a jolt. But back to “deep Viggo.” The actor had only a single memorable scene in a big movie anchored by Al Pacino, Carlito’s Way, directed by Brian de Palma. He was a wheelchair-bound Puerto Rican drug dealer in that one, but it was enough to get him positive notices and make increasingly high-profile directors seek him out for various roles. These included Jane Campion, who cast him as one of Nicole Kidman’s many suitors in The Portrait of a Lady, and Tony Scott, giving Viggo a marginally bigger role as a Naval officer in Crimson Tide. I always found something to enjoy in these bit parts, but the one that really delighted me in terms of “deep Viggo” was his role as Lucifer in 1996’s The Prophecy. The film itself is a Christopher Walken vehicle which tells a fuzzy and fantastical religious tale that’s part horror and part very black comedy. Viggo doesn’t even show up until the last 15 minutes, but oh, what an impression he makes! He’s a charismatically striking, confident devil who makes Virginia Madsen an offer she can’t refuse while he chomps on a raw plant stem. And you can’t take your eyes off him, honestly.

Viggo in 28 Days as baseball pitcher Eddie Boone

I had something of a revelation watching Viggo in this small but memorable role. It was clear that he could play virtually ANYTHING, and that even when portraying unlikable or disturbed characters, which he mostly was in the Sean Penn-directed The Indian Runner (as a self-destructive Vietnam vet), he somehow made it truly memorable to simply experience the character and watch the story unfold. He challenged your emotions in a variety of ways. Viggo’s work always made me feel. I could generally lose myself in any film in which he starred, and that made it possible for me to watch those films over and over again. I did this during the pandemic. For me it was almost like listening to classic rock albums. There was always something there to enjoy, always a fresh nuance to certain scenes or lines of dialogue thanks to Viggo’s creative choices as an actor. By the time my collection of Viggo movies passed the two dozen mark, I was mixing it up between the recent movies (2014’s Far From Men was simply a marvelous surprise; it’s a fantastic film with one of Viggo’s most distinguished performances) and the older ones such as American Yakuza, G.I. Jane and the final movie Viggo made before the LOTR trilogy, 28 Days. That Sandra Bullock vehicle represents a special case and I want to say a couple of things about it. The movie makes me mad on a certain level because it’s about substance abuse and rehab facilities, a subject with which I have plenty of knowledge, and director Betty Thomas clearly couldn’t decide if she was making a comedy or a drama. Many scenes are played for laughs, yet there is plenty of poignancy on display here and there. I HATED the first 10 minutes of this film, and there’s a role in it (that of Sandra’s boyfriend, played by Dominic West) of which I’ll just honestly say, I detested BOTH the character and the actor. Ugh! I dock the film one letter grade just because of him. Bullock, once you get past the opening, does turn in something of a gradually credible performance. But ah…Viggo. HE is the reason to see this film. He plays a lean, handsome baseball player struggling with both his womanizing ways AND substance abuse. He is fetching and completely believable whenever he’s on screen, and delivers one of the movie’s most amusing lines. When he carries an unconscious Bullock into the clinic after she’s fallen from a tree, the receptionist recognizes the well-known ballplayer “Eddie Boone” and says, “Eddie, you can’t bring a girl in here!” To which the mischievous Boone replies with a grin, “Well I wasn’t gonna KEEP her!” It’s a great entrance for Viggo’s character. If Thomas hadn’t wasted so much time in this film on less interesting characters, she would’ve retooled the script to include more scenes with Viggo and Sandra, which are always terrific. One of Viggo’s most fun scenes EVER is when he teaches Sandra how to throw a good pitch, when they are alone together in a practice area.

On the set of Green Book with Mahershala Ali and director Peter Farrelly

Anyway…by the time I had thoroughly absorbed all but a handful of Viggo’s lesser early roles (he was quite active in the 90s), I came up with a little imaginary exercise to convince any novices of just how versatile this actor truly was. The suggestion would go something like this: Start out with a big meaty Hollywood role like that of Tony Lip in Green Book. Here, you are seeing a largely true story with an important theme, and a fun character who wisecracks with a Brooklyn accent, slowly evolves and leaves you with a powerful sense of truth and understanding at the end. It’s a traditionally big, splashy film that earned Viggo one of his three Oscar nods to date. From that one, go right to A Dangerous Method, and take in Viggo’s authentic work as the bearded Austrian psychotherapist Sigmund Freud, who speaks in absolutely precise, formal language and chooses every word carefully. If you didn’t KNOW for sure, it would be hard to imagine the same actor was doing both Freud and Tony Lip. Now jump to the film I just talked about, 28 Days, with studly baseball hunk Eddie Boone trying to befriend Sandra Bullock’s alcoholic journalist Gwen Cummings. Gosh, THAT’s the same actor? Can it BE? And now for another unbelievable transition…watch The Road, a dark, end-of-the-world drama (from the novel by Cormac McCarthy) about a desperate, ailing father trying to protect his young son in a lifeless, dangerous landscape. He’s a ruined man in a ruined reality, showing every bit of the bleakness of the story on his face, wielding the pathetic pistol he’s got containing only two bullets, against a fearless cannibal, with uncommon strength. Then you can maybe jump to Eastern Promises and watch the Russian mobster “Nikolai” in London trying to play two sides of a riveting character in order to help the charming midwife “Anna,” played by Naomi Watts, solve a pressing problem involving Nikolai’s employer. As an aside, I’ll just say this is one of my five or six favorite Viggo movies overall, and it has one long scene, a violent fight in a bath house in which Viggo is naked, that has become absolutely legendary—raising the cinematic bar for fight scenes, and revealing just how fearless Viggo is as an actor.  It goes on and on like this in my make-believe exercise, and you don’t even have to get to that Aragorn guy to showcase Viggo’s stunning range as an actor. But okay, we kinda have to go there…

As Aragorn in The Two Towers

Lord of the Rings, with its epic, sweeping, three-chapter story of good and evil, friendship and sacrifice, dark and light, became one of the most successful and awarded film trilogies of all time, eventually taking 11 Oscars for the concluding chapter Return of the King. The original actor signed to play Aragorn was let go early in filming, and Peter Jackson was in a real jam. Viggo Mortensen rode in like the cavalry to save the day, even though he wasn’t at the time familiar with Tolkien’s epic. His son Henry had to persuade him to take the role. The astounding results have been talked about ever since. Many, many people share credit for turning LOTR into the sublime epic it became: Elijah Wood as the hobbit Frodo, the wizardly Ian McKellen as Gandalf, Peter Jackson’s visionary, impassioned directing and a special effects team that broke new ground on every conceivable level to bring us this stunning new cinematic world. But I’ll make the case to anyone who will listen that Aragorn, as portrayed by Viggo Mortensen with some of the most potent, charismatic acting ever put on screen, gives the trilogy much of the authenticity and challenging emotional undercurrents that such a fantastic tale needs. Viggo became a VERY big deal after these movies, able to pick and choose his roles, able to launch his pet project (the publishing company Perceval Press) and able to make audiences around the world absolutely swoon. Lord of the Rings was an undeniable game-changer. Viggo knows it, and so do all his fans.

“He is the most committed, most devoted, the most…He transforms his entire life into the character. I’ve never seen an actor go there the way this guy does.”
— Sean Astin

“From the moment that I saw him onscreen, I thought, ‘Shit, he looks incredible! Here’s a character I don’t have to pretend to be in love with.”
— Mirando Otto

With co-star Gwyneth Paltrow in A Perfect Murder

This brings me, naturally, to another reason to discuss Viggo’s likability, and I’d be dishonest if I didn’t talk about it. The man is incredibly attractive, on the deepest of levels. It should never be a big deal for a man to say another man is visually appealing; women do this all the time and nobody blinks. If I feel shy to make such observations, I’m reflecting my generally conservative upbringing. But attractiveness is absolutely NOT always about what we might call “traditional sex appeal”. It can be the way someone carries themselves, the depth of humanity in their eyes, the unknowable energy they project that makes you want to know more and more, and listen extra closely when they speak. Viggo Mortensen effortlessly strikes most of his fans, I’d wager, as a beautiful human being inside and out. He’s ruggedly masculine yet his eyes reveal tenderness and compassion, letting you see hints of a whole world of wisdom, and any emotion, whether hard or soft, that a role calls for. Those eyes never lie, and never miss anything. Viggo is known for often disarmingly low-key line deliveries and he’s almost always soft-spoken in interviews. But when a part calls for him to let loose the anger or authoritative voice—scenes from Far From Men and Captain Fantastic come to mind, and of course his memorable “It is not THIS day!” speech to his troops before the climactic battle in Return of the King—it always proves incredibly compelling. Viggo embodies a brand of soulful charisma very few male stars can claim. But that’s not all; it’s also what you start to see in him AFTER experiencing his art and learning more about his life. He’s an environmentalist and animal lover. He’s a poet and a painter. He’s a musician—he even scored his own directorial debut Falling, for crying out loud. He’s made records. He takes great pictures; there are books of his photography out there. And he’s smart and thoughtful; read interviews with him or listen to him talk, and you see this contemplative, tuned-in, CARING man that in many ways, represents the best in ethical behavior. Viggo KNOWS things, like the quote I shared from Philip Ridley. He has a curious, inquisitive mind, and he wants to make sure that he tells every story, and offers every piece of art he does, with his most authentic voice, his best effort. As this becomes obvious when you’re a fan, the value and inspiration from it can’t help but make the man even more appealing. It didn’t take long for Viggo to become the closest thing I have to a role model, honestly; he’s a genuine renaissance man, and one of the most compelling creative figures out there. But as I began to watch ALL the movies, and really delve into his world as a multi-faceted artist, what was mere admiration before became…gratitude. I truly enjoyed having someone in the industry I could be consistently inspired by, and someone who could speak eloquently about a whole range of subjects I too found compelling: the state of politics, the complexity of relationships, the value of storytelling, the importance of the natural world and much more. Viggo is never showy or egotistical, he’s never smug or condescending. He’s just quietly confident and authoritative, and engaged in all the cool things life has to offer. Is that why so many moviegoers are drawn to him?

“Viggo Mortensen is an extraordinary person, (but) I suspect him to have a serious defect somewhere. That is just not possible, I never met someone who has no defect at all. He’s got everything: He’s kind, he’s generous, he’s tender, he’s a pacifist, tolerant—I am also like that, I like tolerant people—and he helps everyone. He writes poems, he makes photos… That’s extraordinary. He’s handsome, he acts well… Then you say to yourself, it is NOT possible…such people don’t exist! I didn’t succeed in finding it, but there MUST be a defect…you can’t be like that, perfect!” 
— Omar Sharif

There’s been a major fun side for me, I’ll say, in reading about Viggo’s endless appeal on social media. The character of Aragorn was SO magnetic, so profoundly appealing, that I recall at least one public comment on a fan page where a woman said that “Aragorn had ruined all other men” for her. Entire pages can be found on the internet of passionate fans talking about their favorite Aragorn moments: his initial mysterious introduction as “Strider,” the memorable swinging wide of the doors when he returns from the “dead” in The Two Towers, the empathetic line “I do not think that will be your fate” that Aragorn tells Eowyn when she explains that she wants to fight and is not afraid to die, in that same film (the way she looks at him afterward undoubtedly resonated far and wide), his tender words to Frodo just before the Hobbit takes off on his own in the first film, stating gently as he closes Frodo’s fingers around the One Ring, “I would’ve gone with you to the end, to the very fires of Mordor”. And of course, the rousing speech to the assembled fighters as they prepare to approach the Black Gate in ROTK, and that beautiful little smile Aragorn gives when he merely says, “For Frodo.” You could go on and on, and frankly, I just don’t see another actor being able to convey so much so simply.

With co-star Diane Lane in A Walk on the Moon

As Sigmund Freud in A Dangerous Method, with Michael Fassbender playing Carl Jung.

But if we’re talking romantic appeal, we must mention Tony Goldwyn’s directing debut A Walk on the Moon, in which Viggo was cast as traveling blouse salesman Walker Jerome in 1969 Catskills-resortland. I saw that movie before the LOTR trilogy was even a thing, and thought this guy was pretty cool. Clearly the ladies did, too…one of the first Viggo chat threads I ever read was about the reported romantic footage CUT from that film, and how these women wanted to start a petition to get that footage included in a new version. Co-star Diane Lane was supposedly willing to donate part of her salary from the movie to get Viggo cast (he was not yet a sure thing at the time). She said this of the star:

“I think he has a quality of self-knowing that challenges everyone that he meets, perhaps unwittingly. But the electrical charge of that challenge of ‘How well do you know yourself? Cause I know myself real well.’ You know, that’s kind of the unspoken Viggo experience. He’s also fascinated by other people. And when you combine those elements, it’s very charismatic. It can definitely be interpreted as sexy.”

With Omar Sharif in Hidalgo

Escapist romantic fare is not common in Viggodom, but you can find titillating scenes here and there: the first playful sex scene with Maria Bello in A History of Violence comes to mind. And one of Viggo’s most popular films with a certain contingent of his audience is Hidalgo, in which he spends much of the movie on horseback. Viggo’s a very experienced horseman—no surprise, that—and at least half a dozen of his films have showcased this. Hidalgo, one of the handful of films in which he portrays a real-life character, in this case long-distance rider Frank Hopkins, plays on Viggo’s unique charisma and soft-spoken nature winningly. In all honesty, there aren’t many films who have a male lead that looks as downright cool and heroic as Viggo in this film’s closing moments. An article in the New York Times magazine stated that “Viggo Mortensen is one of the few actors for whom the ‘female gaze’ has been possible.”  When my devotion as a fan finally compelled me to join a few Viggo fan pages on Facebook last year. Amidst emojis of beating hearts and little Cupids shooting arrows, one woman posted comments like “My beautiful, fabulous Viggo” every time a cool new photo showed up. Expressions of absolute adoration for the man were as regular as clockwork. “I love this man so much!” and “Be still my heart!” are the sorts of comments that pop up regularly. Yes, this guy had apparently captured hearts worldwide, no question. I had to click on “translation” to read what fans in various foreign countries were also saying in their posts.

So yes, I started having big FUN learning about Viggo, reading about Viggo, discovering new films or writings about him. And hence, another one of the reasons that Viggo fandom during the pandemic was diverting and rewarding for me: there were tons and tons of things out there to dig into and research. Viggo was NOT one of these stars who are reclusive, don’t grant interviews or “prefer to let the work speak for itself.” On the contrary, there are scads of interviews and public appearances on YouTube and elsewhere. If you’re curious about ANY phase of his career, you can go digging and you’ll likely be rewarded. Viggo energetically promotes his projects. Over the course of about a week or more, I immersed myself in clips and shows having to do with Captain Fantastic, with an entire half-hour Sundance appearance showcasing the whole cast in a virtual love-fest talking about this amazing film. Even the young actor who played Ben Cash’s son Nai is interviewed about how he got the role, and he adorably tells of how excited he was to meet, as he exuberantly tells the interviewer, “Viggo Mortensen!” Whether they know him from the LOTR films (quite likely) or something else, it seems like everyone jumps at the chance to work with Viggo. Ed Harris, who had co-starred with him in A History of Violence and loved his work, approached Viggo to star in a western he planned to direct called Appaloosa. Viggo wasn’t sure he could do it; there was a scheduling conflict. So Harris simply delayed the whole shoot until Viggo was available.

“I think it was perfect casting. It’s one of those things that once it’s done, no matter how hard you try, you can’t re-cast it in your mind. He BECAME the character. People say that all the time, but with Viggo it’s really true. And all that stuff they say, you know, the ‘No-ego Viggo. He’s not a star, he’s an actor.’ That is so true. He’s such a class act.”
— John Fusco, screenwriter of Hidalgo

As "Man" in The Road, with Kodi Smit-McPhee

I spent many, many evenings in 2020 and even early 2021 looking up interviews with Viggo and scouring articles on brego.net, which is a pretty damn fun and wide-ranging internet site on the actor. In my memorabilia-collecting past, I had accumulated volumes of photos and tons of movie magazines, most of which I ended up selling. In the digital age, paper products just took up too damn much room. I learned that the hard way. But during the pandemic, I slowly started saving digital images of Mr. Mortensen. I have dozens of these stored on my computer now, many dozens. It crossed my mind that I could put together a book or booklet somehow, celebrating this man and his unique place in pop culture. But for now, why not start out with just an article, about how these things come to pass, and how they evolve? How do you go from admirer to “fan” to “mega- fan” to….well, having someone become your hero and role model? That’s different for everyone, obviously. But for me, to sum up, it evolves something like this: take a star with amazing charisma and watch him in a couple of films that make a big impression on you (A Walk on the Moon, A Perfect Murder). Now, experience that star anchoring the most spectacular film trilogy you’ve ever seen, finding yourself immersed in a filmed performance like never before (the LOTR saga). Now take note of the incisive, relatable things the star says in a series of interviews in which he seems to embody all the humanistic values you personally share. Now watch the star’s “creative capital” rise in a sequence of widely diverse films that ALL make a strong impression on you (Hidalgo, A History of Violence, Eastern Promises, The Road). Cap things off with a movie that you find personally captivating on every level and that jumps rather quickly onto your list of all-time favorite films (Captain Fantastic). Now, get ready for a mind-numbing pandemic that erases your regular routine, and settle into a very long groove of watching movies and scouring the internet, realizing that there are scads of Viggo Mortensen films out there to discover and tons of interviews and memorable insights to hear him express… and ADMIT to yourself that this is not simply diverting; it is genuinely THERAPEUTIC, experiencing the endlessly diverse work of an amazing, talented, trailblazing artist who seems to embody most of your own cherished values. Yes, this is roughly how it happened for me. A couple of friends have teased me about my level of fandom, calling Viggo my “man crush.” But so what? I am happy Viggo Mortensen is in this world. I’m happy he’s out there with the power to choose his roles and now, sometimes, even to direct them. The man inspires me, challenges me, and takes me into stories on a deeper level than I could have imagined. It’s constantly fun, and yes, it has provided many, many hours of entertainment for me during an awful period of time. What could be bad about that? Can fandom turn excessive? Well sure, I know people who’ve spent way too much money on collecting, obsessing over and building shrines to some performer they like. I had a few elements of that kinda thing in my past. But no; actually, Viggo is unique in the level of admiration I have for him these days. Most stars don’t affect me that way anymore. I’ve become way more cynical the past few years, way more pessimistic about many things, especially as an American citizen. To have Viggo out there in the world of pop culture and cinematic storytelling is quite personally joyous for me. It keeps me connected to big ideas and old-fashioned HOPE. And I need more of that. Don’t we all?

A day may come when the enthusiasm fades, when the hours spent watching  Viggo Mortensen movies for the tenth time reveal self-doubt and wasted energy, when cinematic indulgences set in far-away places lose their appeal and show the emptiness of a human spirit longing for greater success and more genuine security in a world gone mad.

But it is not THIS day!

“He gives immeasurable depth to what he does…full commitment, full conviction. He’s a man of mystery, for sure, that’s rule No. 1. He’s being true to himself. And people here are not really used to that or comfortable with it. And I love the fact that, as far as I have been able to see, he has not given away any of his mystery. People want to figure you out so they can move on. But HE’S the one who moves on.” 
— Diane Lane

Viggo’s best categorized by four “trilogies”:

The ROMANCE trilogy: A Perfect Murder, A Walk on the Moon, 28 Days

In which Viggo’s characters woo vulnerable women with varying degrees of success: a shifty painter providing sensual pizzazz for the alienated wife (Gwyneth Paltrow) of a malevolent scumbag; a charismatic and attentive blouse salesman offering “skyrockets in flight” to a bored housewife who never experienced any such thing (Diane Lane) before their 1969 summer fling; and a hotshot ball player sincerely trying to befriend an alcoholic journalist (Sandra Bullock) as they both struggle through rehab while trying hard to stay within “behavioral lines.”

The LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy

In which Viggo plays Aragorn, conflicted heir to the throne of Gondor, in a spectacular Peter Jackson-directed series based on JRR Tolkien’s beloved novels. It was game-changing, career-defining and mega successful on every possible level, with Return of the King garnering no less than 11 Oscars.

The DAVID CRONENBERG trilogy

In which Canadian auteur Cronenberg gives three absolutely meaty, complex roles to an actor he hit it off with: that of a smalltown Indiana diner owner with a terrible secret (A History of Violence), a Russian mob chauffeur struggling even harder to hide a secret from a London midwife while fighting off multiple enemies (Eastern Promises), and Sigmund Freud, one of the grandaddies of all psychotherapists, as he confronts a rival (Carl Jung) who threatens his place in psycho history (A Dangerous Method).

The CRITICAL FAVORITES trilogy

In which Viggo finally impresses both critics and fans equally as an unmistakeably watchable leading man, with roles including that of a beleaguered French teacher in the Algerian War in the 1950s (Far From Men, 2014), an idealistic Noam Chomsky-quoting father raising six brilliant kids in the wilderness of the Pacific northwest but having to leave their idyllic life due to tragedy (Captain Fantastic, 2016), and a Brooklyn bouncer, Tony Vallelonga (in a true story), who is thrust into a job as a driver for Don Shirley, a popular Afro-American concert pianist, through the racist American south in the 1960s (Green Book, 2018, winner of the Oscar for Best Film at the 2019 Academy Awards). Two of these films earned Viggo Oscar nominations for Best Actor and firmly established him as one of the most versatile and “wanted” actors in the Hollywood pantheon.