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Skrivet av Christian Hofverberg
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2008-12-18 18:34 |
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Sida 1 av 2 
He’s been a bodyguard for James Brown, a pilot and a flight technician. Now 75-year old actor Nathaniel Richardson sits down with Urbanlife for a talk about unexpected opportunities, black identity in Sweden and why he’s scared of “Mr. Copenhagen”.
While he plugs in the electric cord to his laptop Nathaniel Richardson gets a few glances from other guests in the lobby of the Royal Viking Hotel, close to central station in Stockholm. A fair guess is that they might mistake him from Hollywood star Morgan Freeman.
 “On my last trip to the US I went to see Morgan”, he starts of telling. This was on one of the many trips that Nathaniel Richardson takes between his native US and his second home Sundbyberg, a northern suburb of Stockholm. This trip however, was more than a regular visit to see friends and family back home.
“I went to see Morgan Freeman because I wanted to interest him in this movie I’m trying to create”, he continues. The movie Nathaniel Richardson wants to make is a semi-biographic tale of the first black military pilot Eugene Bullard. Unfortunately, due to the illness of a friend to Mr. Richardson, he didn’t get the chance to pitch his idea to Freeman. But they have met. Three photos of a surprised and somewhat bewildered Freeman shaking hand with his fellow actor is proof of that.
But Nathaniel Richardson is more than a celebrity look-a-like, and he’s by far not your average senior citizen. Back in 1993 he’s at the headquarters for SVT, Swedish public service television, accompanying a friend of his.
“I’m at the TV-station and this man goes by me. He looks at me, goes away, comes back and then he says: I want you to be in my film”, he recalls with visible amusement.
That marks the start of Nathaniel Richardson’s career as an actor and the man that wanted him to be in the movie was none other than legendary  Swedish director Gunnar Hellström.
The movie itself, titled Zorn, is a story about the life of famous Swedish painter Anders Zorn. Nathaniel Richardson’s performance in Zorn gets him his second role as the character general Denen in the TV-movie Zonen. Here he stars alongside Peter Haber, one of Sweden’s most famous actors today.
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