Reasons Why Alexander Skarsgård Quit Fame At Age 13

Before he played a brooding vampire in "True Blood" or a frigid android in "Murderbot," Alexander Skarsgård was a reluctant child star trying to make his way through the glare of national attention in Sweden. In a frank new interview on the Armchair Expert podcast, published on Monday morning, the 48-year-old actor opened up about the time he retired from acting, and, no, it was at the age of 13.

A first taste of fame for Skarsgård arrived when he was a child star on the 1989 50-minute TV film Hunden som log (The Dog That Smiled). Yet in 1980s Sweden, where there were just two TV channels, anything shown was de facto national viewing. And once the film was televised, Alexander was suddenly recognized by just about everybody on the block. And that visibility was suffocating for a shy kid desperate to just be normal.

"I didn't like being recognized," he said. "I didn't like going to school, and kids at school being like, 'Hey, I saw the movie." While most young, aspiring actors dreamed of center stage, Alexander did not. Instead, he said, he found himself yearning for obscurity, for the basic stability he observed in other people's lives. "For someone who's longing for a father in a gray suit, driving a gray Saab to the gray office, it was rough," he said.

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Even though he is a member of a famous acting family, with his father being Stellan Skarsgård, and his brothers being Bill and Gustaf. Alexander felt the weight of early fame leave him with little confidence. The gossip in the halls, casual mentions from classmates who had spotted him on TV, all wore at his identity. Instead of capitalizing on his early momentum, he pulled back. "My confidence was just down the drain," he said of why he gave up acting during his teens.

Now, Skarsgård is in what he considers the second phase of his career, but he is a rarity: a reminder that fame, especially when it arrives early, doesn't always feel like a gift. Sometimes it's a weight a person will spend years growing into. And for Alexander Skarsgård, that step back was the first step back toward reclaiming his passion on his own terms.