NEW YORK, Sept. 13 (UPI) -- Irish actor Pierce Brosnan says his personal history made it easy for him to connect to the story and characters in his latest romantic comedy, "Love is All You Need."
Written and directed by Susanne Bier, the film is known in Europe as "The Bald Hairdresser." It is about Ida, a woman in Denmark who discovers her husband is cheating on her as she battles breast cancer and prepares for the wedding of her daughter in Italy. Brosnan plays the groom's father, Philip, a man who initially irks, then intrigues Ida.
Trine Dyrholm, the leading lady from Bier's Foreign Language Film Oscar-winning film "In a Better World," plays the heroine in "Love is All You Need."
"It wasn't a great stretch, particularly," Brosnan told United Press International in New York in May when asked how he went about bringing the character of Philip to life.
"I use so much of myself in everything I do. I think every actor does because you have no one else to go to but yourself and your own imagination. In the context of this film, I know what it's like to be a father, a widower, single parent," said the 60-year-old actor, whose first wife, Australian actress Cassandra Harris, died of ovarian cancer in 1991 at age 43, leaving behind their son, and her son and daughter from a previous marriage, for Brosnan to love on his own.
"So, those ingredients were part of my own psyche and I think you really keep it as simple as possible and play the moment, play what the drama of the scene is, the conflict of the scene. Come to it as neutrally as possible. Try not to premeditate because you don't know anybody else until you get there and then you sit across the table from some actor like Trine, who is a brilliant actress, and makes you real because she is so powerful and you follow her."
Harris' daughter Charlotte lost her battle with ovarian cancer at age 42 in June, just weeks after the interview was conducted and the film was released in theaters.
Co-starring Kim Bodnia, Paprika Steen, Sebastian Jessen and Molly Blixt Egelind, "Love is All You Need" is now available on DVD and Blu-ray.
