Agneta Ekmanner

Agneta Stensdotter Ekmanner was born on 4 December 1938 in the parish of Sankt Goran in Stockholm. Her father, Sten Ekmanner (1910 to 1990), was a dentist, and her mother was Birgit Essen (1913 to 2008), daughter of the journalist and diplomat Rutger Essen.

She studied political science and history at Lund University but never took a degree. Alongside her studies she was active in Lund Student Theatre in 1963 and 1964. From 1965 to 1968 she trained as an actor at the Scenskolan, the theatre academy in Malmo, where her classmates included Claire Wikholm and Thomas Hellberg. For a short period she also worked as a photographic model.

Ekmanner made her screen debut in 1965 in Karlek 65 and Hej. Her breakthrough came with Puss & kram (Hugs and Kisses, 1967), directed by her husband Jonas Cornell, in which she starred with Sven-Bertil Taube and Hakan Serner. Over the following decades she appeared in around forty films and many television productions, among them Korridoren (1968), Susan Sontag's Duet for Cannibals (1969), the Danish film Kaere Irene (1971), Per (1975), for which she won the Bodil Award for best actress, Paradistorg (Summer Paradise, 1977), Brodera Mozart (The Mozart Brothers, 1986), Svart Lucia (1992), Roseanna (1993), Polismordaren (1994) and the television series Gosta Berlings saga (1986) and Stora teatern (2002). Her last screen role was in Fjallbackamorden: Strandridaren in 2012.

On stage she was a member of the permanent company of Stockholm City Theatre from 1968 to 1989. Her roles there included Anna in Volpone (1968), Helena in All's Well That Ends Well (1971), Dona Elvira in Moliere's Don Juan (1974), Agnes in Suzanne Osten and Margareta Garpe's Josses flickor (1974), Ilse in Wedekind's Spring Awakening (1976) and Masha in Chekhov's Three Sisters under Otomar Krejca (1983), and she also played in The Misanthrope. She worked with Suzanne Osten at Unga Klara as well.

From 1989 to 2006 she acted at Dramaten, the Royal Dramatic Theatre, working with directors including Ingmar Bergman and Pia Forsgren. Her best known performance there was the Comtesse de Saint-Fond in Bergman's acclaimed production of Mishima's Madame de Sade. She also played Ranevskaya in The Cherry Orchard (1997), Ella Rentheim in John Gabriel Borkman (2006), Mrs Alving in Ghosts at Helsingborg City Theatre (2000), Esme Allen in Amy's View (1999) and Amanda Wingfield in The Glass Menagerie (2007). She performed Joan Didion's The Year of Magical Thinking as a monologue at Gothenburg City Theatre, the first production of the work in Sweden, and recorded audiobooks including Didion's book and Virginia Woolf's Mrs Dalloway.

Ekmanner was also a television presenter, hosting the debate programmes Eftersnack (1970), Sant ar livet (1977) and Nattugglan (1978).

In 1965 Ekmanner married the film and theatre director Jonas Cornell (1938 to 2022), with whom she frequently worked. They had two children, the director Frida Cornell and Johannes Cornell, and a granddaughter, Stella Reveman Cornell.

She was politically active throughout her life and took part in the student occupation of the Stockholm student union building in May 1968. In 2006 she was one of the summer hosts of Sommar i P1 on Sveriges Radio, speaking about women she had met on stage and in real life.

Agneta Ekmanner died on 9 November 2026 in the Hogalid district of Stockholm, aged 87. Her family announced her death to Dagens Nyheter, and it was reported the same day by Expressen and other Swedish media. The cause of death was not made public.

Her daughter Frida Cornell told Dagens Nyheter: "Mum was always intellectually curious, both in her private life and in her profession. It showed not least in her roles. She had such range." The Dramaten actress Elin Klinga remembered her as a remarkable mentor and colleague, with a singular intensity and depth on stage. No funeral arrangements had been announced at the time of the reports.

Ekmanner belonged to the generation of Swedish actors who brought the political and artistic ferment of the late 1960s into the national theatres. Colleagues described her as something of a star who played all the great roles and loved to talk about the art of acting. Her performances in Puss & kram, Per and Bergman's Madame de Sade, her long years at Stockholm City Theatre and Dramaten, and her honours including the Thalia Prize and Litteris et Artibus secured her place among the leading Swedish stage actresses of her time.