Bengt Ekerot


Nils Bengt Folke Ekerot was a Swedish actor best known for portraying Death in The Seventh Seal directed by Ingmar Bergman. He directed in Stockholm in 1956 the world premiere of Long Day's Journey into Night, the masterpiece of US playwright Eugene O'Neill.

Biography

Ekerot was born in Stockholm. He had several roles in Swedish films, but in Ingmar Bergman's The Seventh Seal he portrayed Death as a white-faced man in a black cloak. The decision to perform the role in this way was a joint decision between the actor and director. Bergman wrote in his autobiography Images: My Life in Film that the two men "agreed that Death should wear a clown mask, a white clown’s mask. A fusion of a clown mask and a skull."
A man with a self-destructive personality, health issues from smoking and excessive drinking affected Ekerot's later career resulting in him losing potential roles. He died from lung cancer in 1971.

Partial filmography