Rolf Peter Ingvar Storm (born August 27, 1953), better-known by his stage name Peter Stormare, is a Swedish character actor with supporting roles in film, live TV and video games and animated shows. Dude showed up in Nickelodeon's Ninja Turtles of all places.
Allegedly, the reason for his name change is that he shared it with an older student. He wasn't even out of school and he made sure people wouldn't go around mistaking him for someone else.
He began his acting career with the Swedish Royal Dramatic Theatre, before his apparent discovery by Ingmar Bergman.
He made his name playing one of the Stupid Crooks in Fargo. Americans may also recognize him as one of the dino-hunters in The Lost World: Jurassic Park. Apart from that, this guy always gets typecast as Russians or Ukrainians.
Oddly, the smaller the role, the more memorable his characters tend to be. Peter Stormare (a devout Christian in real-life) is one of the best depictions of Satan in cinema....and it's in Constantine? (Implying that Keanu Reeves and Shia LaBeouf didn't turn in powerhouse performances.) He literally shows up in the last 10 minutes and steals the movie. Easily one of his best; maybe the best.
An
automotive ad campaign featured him as a German pseudo-hip hop artist/"engineer" answering to V-Dub, whose shtick was violently un-pimping ze autos by smashing them to scrap and giving their owners Volkswagens.
Notable acting roles:
Film
- Fanny and Alexander (1982) as an extra
- Awakenings (1990) as Neurochemist
- Damage (1992) as Peter
- Fargo (1996) as Gaer Grimsrud
- The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997) as Dieter Stark
- Armageddon (1998) as Lev Andropov
- The Big Lebowski (1998) as Uli Kunkel / Karl Hungus
- Purgatory (1999) as Cavin Guthrie
- 8mm (1999) as Dino Velvet
- Bruiser (2000) as Milo Styles
- Chocolat (2000) as Serge Muscat
- Dancer in the Dark (2000) as Jeff
- Minority Report (2002) as Dr. Solomon Eddie
- Windtalkers (2002) as Gunnery Sergeant Hjelmstad
- The Tuxedo (2002) as Dr. Simms
- Bad Company (2002) as Adrik Vas
- Bad Boys II (2003) as Alexei
- The Batman vs. Dracula (2005) as Dracula
- The Brothers Grimm (2005) as Cavaldi
- Constantine (2005) as Lucifer
- Nacho Libre (2006) as Emperor
- Unknown (2006) as Snakeskin Boots
- Premonition (2007) as Dr. Roth
- Switch (2007) as Tommen
- Boot Camp (2008) as Dr. Arthur Hall
- Horsemen (2009) as David Spitz
- The Killing Room (2009) as Dr. Phillips
- The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009) as The President
- Henry's Crime (2010) as Darek Millodragovic
- Marianne (2011) as Sven
- Lockout (2012) as Scott Langral
- Get the Gringo (2012) as Frank Fowler
- Tai Chi Hero (2012) as Duke Fleming
- Hansel & Gretel: Witch Hunters (2013) as Sheriff Berringer
- The Last Stand (2013) as Thomas Burrell
- The Zero Theorem (2013) as Doctor
- Pain & Gain (2013) as Dr. Bjornson
- 22 Jump Street (2014) as Ghost
- Rage (2014) as O'Connell
- Penguins of Madagascar (2014) as Corporal
- Clown (2014) as Herbert Karlsson
- The 11th Hour (2014) as The Russian
- John Wick: Chapter 2 (2017) as Abram
- Songbird (2020) as Emmett Harland
- Day Shift (2022)
Music Videos
- Sabaton's "Uprising" (2010) as the German SS commander
Television
- Seinfeld (1998) as Slippery Pete
- Hitler: The Rise of Evil (2003) as Ernst Roehm
- Prison Break (2005) as John Abruzzi
- Transformers: Animated (2008) as Meltdown
- Entourage (2009) as Aaron Cohen
- Weeds (2010) as Chef
- Hawaii Five-0 (2010) as Drago Zankovic
- Adventure Time (2010) as Sir Slicer
- NCIS: Los Angeles (2012) as Interpol Agent Martin Kallstrom
- The Blacklist (2014) as Milos Kirchoff A.K.A. Berlin
- Arrow (2014) as Werner Zytle / Count Vertigo
- Longmire (2014) as Chance Gilbert
- Manhattan (2016-2016) as Lazar
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2015) as Lord Dregg
- American Gods (2017) as Czernobog
- Castlevania (2018) as Godbrand
- Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2020) as Kristoff Van Bradford
- Animaniacs (2020) as Nickelwise
Video Games
- Icewind Dale II (2002) as Isair
- Quake IV (2005) as Pvt. Johann Strauss
- Mercenaries (2005) as Mattias Nilsson
- Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 (2008) as Dr. Gregor Zelinsky
- The Secret World (2012) as Dr. Aldini, Huiginn, Muninn
- The Elder Scrolls Online (2014) as Jorunn the Skald King
- Destiny (2014) as Dead Orbit Faction Leader
- LEGO Jurassic World (2015) as Dieter Stark
- Until Dawn (2015) as Dr. A.J. Hill
- Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 (2019) as The Replacer
Tropes associated with him:
- Awesome, Dear Boy: Peter Stormare cameos in the music video for Sabaton's song "Uprising" as the unnamed German SS officer leading the crackdown on the Polish Resistance. According to bassist Pär Sundström, Stormare found the offer in a pile of offers he got from his agent when he was looking for his next gig, and just thought the idea was really cool.
- Bilingual Bonus: Sometimes speaks and/or swears in Swedish in some of his non-Swedish movies, most prominent in Minority Report and The Lost World: Jurassic Park.
- Chronically Killed Actor: Due to his tendency to play villains, his characters wind up dead.
- Evil Is Bigger: He stands at 6'3 and plays a lot of unsavory dudes.
- Fake Nationality: His knack for foreign accents has allowed him to be cast as a variety of nationalities, mostly East European. Even in Sweden he was not allowed to use his real accent for a role until Varg in 2008. Nowadays, he only accepts Swedish roles where he is allowed to use his real northern Swedish accent.
- He played an Italian Mafia boss in Prison Break. Not that his accent was much of a clue.
- He un-pimped many autos portraying a German engineer with a fake German accent butchering rapper lingo in a Volkswagen ad campaign for the Golf GTI.
- The German nihilist in The Big Lebowski.
- And of course the Russian astronaut in Armageddon (1998).
- Husky Russkie: Seems to end up playing one of these fairly often. Still Fake Nationality.
- Large Ham: He acts in a very over the top fashion, and it usually makes the characters he plays much creepier for it, as they seem like they're genuinely insane. Inverted in Fargo (not detracting in the slightest from the creepy part, though).
- Manly Tears: Caused some headlines in Sweden when he was the only man to openly cry at Ingmar Bergman's funeral.
- Plays Great Ethnics: The Trope Codifier. He's frequently cast as vaguely European types due to his ambiguous accents.
- Stage Names: Arguably one of the few actors whose real name (Rolf Ingvar Storm) is cooler than his stage name.
- Star-Making Role: Gaear Grimsrud.
- The Stoic: Many of his roles, most notably his Star-Making Role as the terrifyingly emotionless Gaear Grimsrud.
