Hej!
Soooo, I went back into the abandoned hospital today.
The reason why I've had the opportunity to visit this place is because we filmed some scenes for the Lights Out movie there these past two days. While the film team was in another building I could lurk around however much I wanted.
So after my scenes were done and I could get back into my normal clothes I sneaked away for an hour or so again. This time to the basement, the kitchen and... the morgue... (more on that soon).

When you find a room with a locker that spells Disaster wrong, all you can do is scream.

"They did WHAT here?"

What is this shiny thing? And who is that person?

"I think you're right Marge, this cafeteria seems to be closed today."

Then I found the kitchen. What's cooking in that big ol' cauldron to the right?

Who is making noise?! Stop it immediately!

And then, it took a turn for the weird(er)...
I found the morgue.
And thought to myself: I wonder what is inside those metal cabinets in the walls. Imagine if it was a dead person.
I opened one of them...

...AND FOUND THIS!!!!

(It's a doll. Yes. I'm sure. There's yellow foam where his ribs should be. And that nose is just a little bit too perfect. Plus, I looked -very- closely)

The weird thing is that I kind of expected it to be there. I had already told my scared brain that there might be a dead person in there so when I first saw the scalp I was like "Oh, yep, there's the dead guy."
What mean person decided to leave that there after filming?!?!
Apparently CSI have been shooting here. So maybe they are responsible for scaring the crap out of me.

But it was quite awesome to go back to set and show my "find" to everybody in the crew...

After seeing the "dead guy" I was actually a bit shaken and all the dark rooms looked super scary instead of exciting so that was the end of today's self portrait bonanza. But what a great ending, ey?
And here's a photo in which you can see me three times. One of me is in the back, acting away. The other two on the screens.
It felt great to be filming again. I really love it, and hope I get to do it more and more in the future!

But look at this cool GIF I made!

Talk to you soon!
/Lotta

Hey!
I'm just popping in to show you two things.

First: Lights Out was featured at a film festival at the island Gotland in Sweden. In an old ruin at night.
This feels like the perfect way to see our shorts! I so wish I could have been there to see it, but I was really happy that they sent us this photo that gives a good idea of the atmosphere there.

In other Lights Out news: we counted the views on all the different uploads of Lights Out. It's up to a total of 104 million views.
That is just completely bananas.
A few weeks ago we found this facebook upload that has an insane amount of views, and there's a bunch of uploads on youtube as well (this is our official upload though).
I still can't grasp the enormity of this thing. I probably never will.

And the other thing I wanted to show you is this photo I took of David yesterday. He needed a photo for professional reasons and we had maybe four minutes to take it before he needed to get to work and I had to get ready for my Accent Reduction lesson.
I am so happy with the result because take a look at that handsome man! My husband who hates getting his picture taken, looking all happy and relaxed. And beautiful.

Okay, that was all for today.
Hope you'll have a great weekend, and talk to you soon!

/Lotta!

Something I’ve heard a lot, especially after coming to LA, is the notion that Men can’t write women characters because they don't understand how women think.
This is like the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. Let me tell you why.

It’s mostly men who say this in an attempt to explain why there aren’t as many complex female characters in movies as there are male (why they don’t go out of their way to hire more female writers then is a another question).
The men who say this, men working in various departments in the film business, but also men who are nowhere near the film business, seem to think that women are so completely different from men that they can't possible understand ”how women think”.
Do you know what their problem is?
They believe that every single thought that comes from a woman must be driven by the fact that she is a woman. Not that she is a person.

When a man in a film responds to something happening to him he does so as a human being first, but when a woman responds to the very same thing she has to react as a woman only.

Every female character written by a man who believes women are fundamentally different from men, will be portrayed like that.
She will be driven by motherhood, her menstrual cycle, her longing for a family, her clinginess, her need to ”talk things through”.
All things stereotypically female traits that (if even true?) aren’t everything that makes up a woman. Or a person.
This is why there are so few women in the movies because ever time you have a woman in it she must be all about those feminine things, like getting all mushy when a baby pops into view (Like Scarlet Johansen in the last X-men movie), or being home waiting for their men without doing anything else except waiting (and taking care of family) while their men are doing important things (like in every single action/thriller/adventure movie ever made).
Of course that is boring! But that’s not really how Every Woman is, right?

My (very revolutionary idea) is that if men would write women characters the Exact Same Way as they write men we wouldn't have this problem.
Women wouldn't feel like they were misrepresented in the movies, and men would KNOW how to write female characters.
Because we’re really not that different.
There are more differences between individual people than there are between men/women.

I can honestly say that I rarely think about the fact that I am a woman in my every day life and thoughts. If it’s not pointed out to me like when I’m being exposed to sexism (which happens a lot when I come in contact with the world). Society wants me to remember that I am primarily a woman and not a person, but in my head, in my life I am a Human Being first.
The facts that I am a Swede, that I’m white, are huge parts in making me who I am. Just like it’s important that I have lived a very secure life in a wealthy country with free healthcare. It affects me that I was bullied when I was a kid, that I love theatre and acting, that I’m crap at maths, that I enjoy singing and talking to myself, that I have a half sister that I didn’t live with growing up but still see as my ”real” sister, I’m terrified of bees, that I am a bit scared of doing things wrong even if it’s the first time I try something.
That I am a woman in a world who treats women like we’re not worth the same amount of respect as men.

These are some of the million components that make me who I am and what makes me act in certain ways. Things that make me into a person.

Male writers who believe that they ”must know how women think” to be able to write women into their movies should not be allowed to write scripts.
At all.
Because if you see your female characters as caricatures instead of complex persons, then you are worthless in your job as a writer. And you have crappy imagination.

(Also: Women writers have successfully written male characters throughout the history. Is this more proof that there should be more female writers because men are worthless at imagination?)

Hej hej!

Today Swedish radio station P3 aired an interview with me for their segment about Swedes abroad (Svensken i Världen, Verkligheten i P3). I talked about the amazing journey it has been, and still is, after Lights Out went viral but I also mentioned the not so great experience of having my looks reviewed by men on the internet.
If you know Swedish you can listen to it here.
It was so much fun to be interviewed about this whole experience and I think it went really well.

And let's take a look at some photos from the two days filming my scenes in Lights Out the other week.

I had a trailer to relax in, just like "real stars". And obviously I had to take silly self portraits to show off my new found Diva status.

Looks familiar?

Being pampered between takes by Hair, Makeup and Wardrobe.

I had a blast filming and really hope this is just the beginning for me. I was quite nervous before shooting because this was the first time I acted in English. It's scary to act in another language than your own, but I think it went well.

This week it's been 38 celsius degrees outside, and that is just way too many celsius degrees for me! On friday we're going to Palm Springs over the weekend (because on monday next week we celebrate our two year wedding anniversary!) and it's supposed to be around 42 celsius degrees there. I'm terrified.
I will be staying in the pool the entire weekend, that's for sure!

Talk to you soon, dear friends and readers.

/Lotta