07/23/2021 7:00
Clarín.com
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Updated 07/23/2021 7:00 AM
For the role of Tadzio in the famous film
Death in Venice
, director Luchino Visconti was looking for a teenager with unique characteristics.
In Thomas Mann's novel, the character has an almost unreal beauty that leads him to become the object of
Gustav von Aschenbach's
obsession
.
With which, the actor must also have those
dazzling and overwhelming
beauty parameters
.
Visconti
knew from the beginning that the selection was not going to be easy and he also did not lower his parameters or pretensions.
Björn Andrésen played the role of Tadzio in Death in Venice.
One of the first names he took into account was Miguel Bosé.
But her father, the bullfighter
Luis María Dominguín
, opposed her taking on a role with these characteristics.
Thus it was that
Visconti
continued his investigations, with the horizon set throughout Europe.
For this task, which is even captured in a documentary, he toured skating rinks, schools, squares in
Budapest, Helsinki, Warsaw and Stockholm
.
He selected hundreds of possible candidates.
All of absolute beauty, but none of them made up for it.
Today Björn Andrésen is 66 years old and seems to be experiencing a rebound in her career.
Until he found Björn Andrésen,
a 15-year-old Swedish boy
.
His particular features: a lock of hair on one side of the face, the look with some sadness, the enigmatic smile and the spiky body.
No one could remain indifferent to his presence and that happened to
Visconti
.
Mann's
great text
gives the precise traits of the character's requirements.
"In his walk and his posture, in the movement of his knees, when he placed his foot in white shoes, there was an extraordinary grace", says one of the paragraphs.
And
Visconti's sharp eye knew Andrésen was the right person
.
"I had no doubts that it was him," confessed the Italian director a year later at the film's premiere at the
Cannes festival
, 50 years ago.
A scene from Death in Venice, with Dick Bogarde and Björn Andrésen.
The early years of Björn Andrésen
At the time of the casting,
Björn
had already had some troubles in life.
His mother had died when he was 10. The one who believed that his father was his foster father.
And his great desire was to find his roots.
In this context, when he got his chance to be part of
Death in Venice
and later, with success at his feet, the relief was more than welcome and he even believed it to be eternal.
His fame immediately exploded and job proposals multiplied.
In a short time, he
did dozens of advertisements, was an anime model - it is said that he promoted the style of renowned artists -, he was summoned for interviews and even recorded two pop songs in Japan
.
Fame was short-lived for Björn Andrésen.
Being on top, without understanding it
A hint of the turmoil of those years can be seen
in the documentary The Most Beautiful Boy in the World which premiered this year at the Sundance Film Festival
.
In an excerpt,
Björn says
that on the night of the film's presentation in
Cannes
,
Visconti
took him and the team members to a gay bowling alley: “They looked at me cheekily, as if I were an appetizing dish.
He couldn't react, it would have been social suicide.
It was the first of many such encounters.
People don't understand what effect this can have on a boy. "
"I would not have accepted the role of Tadzio if I had known how it was going to affect my life. I admit that I came across interesting people, but all things considered, it
would have been better if they had left me alone. It was like a roller coaster and I was not prepared for it
”.
The Most Beautiful Boy in the World is the documentary about his life.
The slow decline of the most beautiful young man in the world
After this rage,
Björn
returned to
Sweden
and tried his hand at his true passion, music.
But the flow of calls and proposals was not the same.
Many of the offers were for gay youth roles.
These were times of strong stigmatization and he had tried many times to remove that label.
Such forceful participation without support or prior experience was crucial.
The following years Björn had increasingly sporadic appearances and in minor films.
Björn Andrésen was chosen by Luchino Visconti for her beauty.
At the same time, some newspaper reports say that the attempts to reach his biological family continued for a while longer.
Now
Björn
is 66 years old, has a daughter and lives in
Stockholm
with his girlfriend.
He had previous gay partners.
He married a woman and divorced after the sudden death of their nine-month-old baby.
His current physiognomy wears an important beard.
Maybe to get rid of the pressure of perfect beauty.
He went through various financial heartaches.
Although it
had a resurgence in the last time.
On the one hand, for his appearance in Midsommar, a Swedish production that was very successful.
Also for the premiere of the documentary The Most Beautiful Boy in the World directed by Kristinaa Lindström and Kristian Petri
.
Perhaps a long-awaited vindication will now come.
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