The documentary Superswede about Formula 1 legend Ronnie Peterson opens August 16 in Sweden on more than 200 screens via NonStop Entertainment, making it one of the biggest theatrical releases ever for a documentary film, while the crime show Hassel starring Ola Rapace premieres exclusively on Viaplay on September 8.

Superswede is your directorial debut. What convinced you to carry the entire project on your shoulders?
Henrik Jansson-Schweizer: I have some directing experience within television, but never for film or TV drama. This has been my dream project for many years and when the opportunity came I simply had to direct this amazing story. (Note: spoiler alert coming).

What personal memory do you have of Ronnie Peterson?
HJS: He was my childhood hero and I had posters of him and small F1 cars to play with. He was the Zlatan Ibrahimovic of the time. When he crashed, I watched it live, alongside three million Swedes. It was very spectacular. I went to my mum in the kitchen and said: “Mum, Ronnie has crashed!” Together, we watched the rescue operations. At the beginning, it seems to be going all right. But the following day, when I went to the tobacco shop where my mum worked, I saw the headlines announcing Ronnie’s death. It was a huge shock to me. For the first time, I understood what death was really about and I’ve carried this story ever since.

How did you get the opportunity to make this film?
HJS: I started working on this project about 10 years ago. At the beginning, I wanted to do a live action feature film. At Nice Drama, we even went into development with a Ronnie Peterson film and TV series project. But around the same period, a great F1 US film came out, Rush by Ron Howard. We then felt we wouldn’t be able to raise the necessary financing for our project. However, when we saw the theatrical success of some docu biopics in Sweden - Searching for Sugarman, I am Ingrid - we said: hey, let’s make a documentary instead!

How did you get in touch with Nina, Ronnie's daughter and what was her involvement in the making of the film?
HJS: I met Nina for the first time via our fantastic producer Mia Sohlman. Nina told us she actually had no memories of her father. At that very moment, I knew how I would tell the story. I would tell Ronnie’s story for Nina who was only three when he passed away. She liked the idea and decided to be part of the project. It’s been a fantastic journey for me, and for Nina I hope.

How was it to interview Ronnie's contemporaries Niki Lauda, Emerson Fittipaldi, Sir Jackie Stewart, Mario Andretti, Jody Scheckter, John Watson who reveal fascinating details about F1 at the time, the spirit of camaraderie outside the tracks?
HJS: It was a dream come true to meet all these legends, with very different personalities but all humble and smart gentlemen. Niki Lauda is very direct and tests your knowledge about F1. Emerson Fittipaldi was so eager to discuss Ronnie, that he flew from Sao Paulo to meet us in New York and went back the same day. It shows how he was attached to Ronnie and Ronnie’s impact on people.

When Niki Lauda says about Ronnie Peterson: “He taught me how to drive”, you can sense the immense influence that Ronnie had on his peers…
HJS: Ronnie was Niki’s idol when he started in the early 70s. They were in the same team for two years. Ronnie was a very quiet person, unglamorous, very Swedish (J) and genuinely nice. Everybody liked him. In the 60s-70s, as many as 47 drivers were killed while racing. It was extremely dangerous. On the track, the drivers were like modern gladiators, fighting for their lives, but off the track, they were really good friends, travelling together like with a circus.

Can you explain your aesthetic choice of using black and white and colour at specific moments? HJS: The contemporary scenes are shot in black and white while the period material is mainly in colour. I wanted the audience to differentiate easily the two time periods, and for me, F1 was perhaps more colourful and glamorous in the 60s-70s.

What type of theatrical release is NonStop putting together for the film and what is the international distribution strategy?
HJS: Non-Stop has done a fantastic job and the film is coming out on around 180 screens in Sweden. This is perhaps the biggest theatrical release ever for a documentary. The film premieres simultaneously in Denmark [August 17, Miracle Film]. We don’t have a sales agent attached yet.

Viaplay has exclusive second window rights and will show the documentary in the spring 2018. The streaming giant is also going to show exclusively early September your crime drama Hassel starring Ola Rapace. How do you work with Viaplay?
HJS: I work with Viaplay just like with any other broadcaster. They’ve been very aggressive the past year to get the best content possible. Viaplay is part of MTG Group that has broadcasting rights for F1 in Scandinavia, so it made sense for Viaplay to pick up Superswede. Regarding Hassel, it is an iconic show in Scandinavia, like Wallander or Beck. Viaplay was very eager to have it in their catalogue and liked our idea. Olov Svedelid wrote 29 books about Roland Hassel and SVT made a couple of TV movie adaptations in the 80s-90s that were fantastic when they came out. But we felt it was time to do a reboot and decided early on to collaborate with Viaplay.

As co-writer, what was the challenge of bringing back to the screen the iconic detective and personally, what is it that you like about the character?
HJS: First of all, I co-created Hassel together with Morgan Jensen and he was the main writer on Thicker than Water as well. We’ve worked together 15-20 years and we have a unique collaboration. Hassel the character is very hard-boiled. We felt that to make it a long running series relevant to today’s audience, we had to integrate family and social elements, running along the main crime investigation. The series starts as a classic noir with a family twist, but it ends up as a political thriller in Brussels. So we go from a Stockholm-based street cop series to an international political thriller.

We used as well some of our experience from Thicker than Water that is mainly a character-driven family story with a crime twist. We tried to make Hassel a crime show with a family drama, taking the best of both worlds. 

Ola Rapace is very charismatic and brings perhaps one of his best performances. How involved was he in the creation of his character?
HJS: He came in very early and in a way, we created his character together. He liked having the dysfunctional family element running alongside the crime plot. For him it was very important not to do yet another cop series.

What were your inspirations for the show?
HJS: Together with the main director Amir Chamdin, we looked at cop shows from the 70s and you can see the 70s New York style in it.

The music plays a major part and immediately gives a hip and cool feel to the show…
HJS: Amir is a great musician and music video director and he had a cult band in the 90s called Infinite Mass. For Hassel, he asked himself: what does Stockholm sounds like? He brought in music producer Nicke Anderson and asked him to create the score. I think it was a brilliant move.

Has the series been sold internationally?
HJS: Beta Film is handling world sales and I hope it will travel like Thicker than Water and Midnight Sun that did fantastic internationally. 

What's next for you at Nice Drama?
HJS: The next challenge would be to make a smart English-language series. Our next original project, Andersonville is about the Swedish community in Chicago in 1910. Andersonville was the part of Chicago where lots of Swedes were living at the time. It will be a Nordic noir and family chronicle set over there - and not far from Thicker than Water in tone, but of course in a totally different arena. Morgan Jensen and I are finalising the pilot episode and discussing how to produce it in the best way. I hope to go into production next year.

What about Thicker than Water 3? Any desire to continue with the Waldemar family?
HJS: I hope it will continue. I don’t feel I’m finished with them yet!