Dolph Lundgren

Dolph Lundgren was born and raised in an academic, middle-class family in Stockholm, Sweden. Despite an early interest in playing the drums and clowning around in high school comedies, Dolph decided to follow in his father’s and older brother’s cerebral footsteps and pursue an Engineering degree. After having completed his military service in the Swedish Marine Corps, Dolph enrolled in the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, studying the same subject as his older brother: Chemical Engineering. He attended both Washington State University and Clemson University in South Carolina, studying Chemistry.

He graduated from The Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, completing his Master’s Degree in Chemical Engineering in an exchange program with the University of Sydney, Australia. Graduating at the head of his class, Dolph was awarded a Fulbright scholarship to the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston; one of the world’s top engineering schools.

That same year the young PhD student met the exotic singer Grace Jones, and fell in love. He decided to move to New York City and take up modeling, to make some extra cash. A bit too muscular for a model’s size 40, Dolph was to begin at MIT a few months later. Dolph then took up acting, on a friend’s advice: “Hey man, you look like you should be in the movies;” and this is where it all began.

His motion picture debut came in the James Bond feature, “A View to a Kill” in 1985. However, it was Dolph’s memorable performance in “Rocky IV” later that year that definitely got him noticed worldwide. After a nine month audition process (among 5,000 hopefuls), Dolph was cast by writer-director Sylvester Stallone as his fearsome Russian opponent, ‘Captain Ivan Drago.’ Dolph grit his teeth for the role and then managed to build quite a career as an international action-hero, and has since starred in more than 40 feature films.

Throughout the years, Dolph has always stayed close to the martial arts: “Karate and physical fitness have kept me reasonably sane in a very tough and sometimes inhuman business.”

In 1997, Dolph was awarded his third degree black belt by the World Karate Organization in Tokyo. His other athletic accomplishments include being the captain of the Swedish National Karate Team and the individual champion of the Swedish, European and Australian Heavyweight Full Contact Divisions. In addition to his Karate expertise, Dolph was selected by the U.S. Olympic Committee to serve as the Team Leader of the U.S. Olympic Pentathlon Team during the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games.

As well as being a seasoned actor, Dolph has directed five feature films. His production companies Thor Pictures and Red Orm Productions, are currently developing several projects in which he will produce, star and direct. His latest directing project is a feature he co-wrote and directed, “Command Performance,” produced by Avi Lerner and Nu Image Films. Dolph explained, “Years of experience in front of the camera does give me a certain edge in my favorite part of directing: working with the actors.”

Dolph is also a founding member of Group of Eight an off-Broadway theatre group started in 1994. “I am currently speaking to a Swedish director about doing stage in Sweden. It would be a first on two fronts: a full-length stage play and also in Swedish. All of my acting so far has been in English and performing in my native ‘emotional language’ would be very exciting.”

In May of 2011, Dolph co-starred with fellow action star Jean-Claude Van Damme in “Universal Soldier- Day of Reckoning,” a sequel to the film that paired the two European actors in the 90s.

Millennium Films