Christened Berit Elizabeth, in her professional life this actress used Bibi. She is best known for her work with the Swedish filmmaker Ingmar Bergman. She graced some of his finest films, along with what must be the finest group of women actors to work with a single artist. Intriguingly, her first work with the famous artist was at age 16 in an advertisement for a detergent.

He [Bergman] also wrote and produced a series of commercial for Bris, a deodorant soap manufacturer by the Sunlight Corporation. It marked his first contact with teenager Bib Andersson who was to become part of his acting stable both on film and in the theatre, and with whom he was to establish a Higgins-Eliza relationship, a Pygmalian liaison that the actress eventfully would withdraw from. (Birgitta Steene in Ingmar Bergman A Reference Guide, Amsterdam University Press, 2005).

Andersson appeared in the eighth of nine episodes, ‘The Princess and the Swineherd’; a variation on a tale by Hans Christina Anderson. In the commercial version the swineherd attraction is a ‘remarkable soap.

Her early career involved study at the Royal Dramatic Theatre School and then work at the same Theatre in Stockholm. An early film role was as a supporting player in Alf Sjoberg’s film version of Strindberg’s ‘Miss Julie’ (Fröken Julie, 1951). Another regular of Bergman also appearing in a supporting role was Max von Sydow. She then had a supporting role in Smiles of a Summer Night (Sommarnattens Leende, 1955), one of my favourite Bergmans with a fine cast and fine production values.

Her early major role was in The Seventh Seal (Det Sjunde Inseglet, 1956) as Mia, the wife of Jof, the juggler, and mother of their child Mikael. Mia and Jof provide a simple and good family in contrast to the either cynical or villainous characters mainly encountered by Max von Sydow’s world weary knight. At the film ends, cutting from a stark silhouette of death and his victims, we see the family ride on in the sunshine in a new day.

This was followed by another major Bergman film, Wild Strawberries (Smultronstället, 1957). Birgitta Steene notes that the English title does not quite catch the-Swedish sense:

Literal translation would point to a spot where smultron or wild strawberries grow. Since these berries are rare in Sweden, places where they grow are often kept a secret in the family. But the word smultronstället also carries symbolic meaning and refers to a person’s ‘jewel of place’ or special retreat.

Bib Andersson plays Sara who the protagonist, Isak Borg, sees in a reverie from his past. Sara is picking wild strawberries while being courted by Isak’s brother. Andersson also plays another Sara in the film present. Both Sara’s are involved in the final comforting sequence. Alongside Bibi Andersson, Isak is played by the veteran filmmaker and actor Victor Sjöström. This and the way that the film mixes reality with dream-like sequences creates a masterful and complex relation between past and present.

Brink of Life (Nära Livee, 1958) takes us to the other end of life, set in a hospital maternity ward. Three women: Cecilia (Ingrid Thulin) who suffers a miscarriage: Stina (Eva Dahlbeck) is overdue: and Hjördis (Bibi Andersson) is considering an abortion. The three actresses, along with Babro Hiort af Ornäs who plays Sister Britta, shared the Best Actress Award at the 1958 Cannes Film Festival whilst Bergman won the Best Director Award.

After a couple more leading roles Bib Andersson joined Liv Ullmann in what I believe to be Berman’s finest film and one of the great modernist art works; Persona (1966). Andersson and Ullmann are alone together for almost the entire film. Liv Ullmann as Elisabet Vogler is a famous actress who has suffered withdrawal and become mute. Bibi Andersson is Alma, the young nurse, who is to care for Vogler. In order to help the pair move to a summer house on an Island where they are alone. The relationship is intense though not always obviously. As Elisabet’s silence continues Alma becomes more and more voluble. There is one sequence where Alma recounts an earlier sexual encounter to the mute Elisabet; it is all on the voice and is one of the most erotic sequences that I have seen on film. At one point the two characters appear to merge and the ending is suitably ambiguous.

Alma’s monologue on her sexual experience was cut in the English translation for the US release as was an erect penis seen in the pre-credit sequence. Bibi Andersson won a BAFTA as Best Actress in 1967 and in 1968 the US National Society of Film Critics honoured the film’s direction, screenplay, acting [Andersson] and cinematography. Bergman later commented that he had written the screenplay with the two actresses in mind. It is possibly the best work of both. Perhaps Andersson won the awards because Ullmann has virtually no dialogue; her acting is still superb.

Andersson made several more films with Bergman, including a major supporting role in Scenes from a Marriage (Scener ur ett äktenskap,1973). This drama, spread over six/four sections and an extended period, was seen on Swedish television as a 281 minute mini-series and in a film print that was reduced to 167 minutes. Then, as Birgitta Steene noted, Andersson pursued a career away from her personal mentor.

She was, though, involved in theatrical productions directed by Bergman, including playing Ase in Ibsen’s ‘Peer Gynt’ in 1991. She made a number of programmes for both television and radio about Bergman and his work; some involving Bergman himself.

She also had an extensive career in Swedish films by other directors and in international and US based films. She also worked in the US theatre. And in the 1990s she directed theatrical productions in Sweden.

I have seen hardly any of these and it remains that her reputation rests on the films she worked on with Ingmar Bergman. These are some of the best of Bergman’s films and are rightly classics of European and world cinema. Surely films like Persona will remain classics in the years to come and Bibi Andersson will remain an important actor in cinema history.