Among the internationally active Swedish movie directors there is no one bigger or more sought after. Superlatives comes thick and fast and the Hollywood stars will do anything to work with him.

On Friday, June 2nd Lasse Hallström will be 60 years old. Despite his popularity he expressed anxiety for the future when he visited Sweden in connection with the premiere of his latest film "Casanova" in January this year.

I'm worried that people will regard me as a senior citizen when I turn 60. There's competition among us directors too, we fight to get the best scripts. I can't say where my position in this spectrum is, but I'm slightly worried that I will not be considered now when I'm not to far off from becoming an old-age pensioner.

Old age paranoia? Coquetterie? Who knows. But surely it will be along time in coming before the filmmaker that was a factor in making ABBA a world renowned name and become one himself with the masterly adaption of "My Life as a dog" can retire to the park and start feeding the pigeons.

During 2006 he will be working on three movie projects. Right now he's putting the finishing touches on the editing of "The Hoax" that will have US premiere in November. The story is about the giant literary scandal that arose in the early 70's when the author Clifford Irving wrote a fake biography about movie and aviation tycoon Howard Hughes which was published by the non suspecting big media company McGraw-Hill.

Irving is played by Richard Gere, whom by the way is a neighbor to Hallström in the New York suburb Bedford. Alfred Molina plays Irvings colleague and "partner in crime" Dick Suskind. Molina, currently on the big screen as bishop in "The Da Vinci Code", portrayed the cruel Count in "Chocolat", which is Lasse Hallströms financially most successful movie grossing over $70 million.

Other stars who seem eager to be recycled by the Swedish master director are:

Johnny Depp from "What's Eating Gilbert Grape". – I would to anything for that man.

Beautiful Charlize Theron who played Candy in "The Cider House Rules" – He can change me beyond recognition if he wants to.

Michael Caine, the doctor in the aforementioned film. – He's a genius. If he wasn't a director, he would be a saint.

Lasse Hallström is supposedly doing another two films directly after "The Hoax". Nothing is yet known about the casting of "Harry & Caresse", a romantic drama about the American love couple Harry and Caresse Crosby and their decadent way of life in 1920's Paris. The second movie is "Daughter of the Queen of Sheba", based on the bestselling novel the radio correspondent Jackie Lyden wrote about her mother, who suffered from bipolar disorder and alternatively claimed she was Marie Antoinette or the Queen of Sheba.

Lena will play the mother. Then I've got a wish list with 10 names for the main character said Lasse Hallström in December.

It's obvious that the cooperation with his wife Lena Olin, the latest example being "Casanova", has whet his appetite. Lasse has also said he would like to do a low budget film (with himself holding a video camera) based on Jan Waldekranz play "Love Bombing" that was staged at the Royal Dramatic Theatre in 2004 where Lena Endre and Reine Brynolfsson did the main characters. In the filmed version he would of course want his Lena for the main female lead. That it would be filmed in America is only natural.

The longing for home has passed now and I'm rooted in America he has said.

Despite this when Lasse meets his old friends "Magnus & Brasse" - the duo that together with him revolutionized Swedish TV entertainment in the early seventies - they always and with great sincerity talk about doing something together again.

But it always comes to nothing.

His 50th birthday was celebrated with 100 invited guests in Rosendals Trädgård at Djurgården, Stockholm. His 60th birthday celebrating will be much more modest Lasse has announced.

I don't feel like making something big out of it. I'll take the family out to dinner.

Translated by Anton