Cannes 2026: Cristian Mungiu explains why he shaved Sebastian Stan's head for the dramatic role in Palme d'Or winner “Fjord”. “Closer to Michael”

The American actor of Romanian origin Sebastian Stan and the Norwegian actress Renate Reinsve are the two great actors who play the roles of a devout Christian couple, accused of physically abusing their children, in the film with which Cristian Mungiu won Cannes.

• “Fjord” tells the story of the Gheorghiu family, a Romanian migrant family in Norway, with 5 children. Their lives take a dramatic turn: their children are taken away by the Norwegian state.
• The event mirrors, wrote the international press, the fault between conservatives and liberals present in the whole world today.
• “There is not such a big difference between right-wing and left-wing fundamentalism”, stated Cristian Mungiu.
• Mungiu tells how he convinced Sebastian Stan to get a zero haircut, not as an eccentric element, but as an exercise in humility because he fit better into the skin of the character Mihai Gheorghiu.

Mungiu said that he met his compatriot Sebastian Stan 10 years ago, when the Romanian actor settled in the USA came to a screening of the film “Bacalaureat” in New York.

In the current film “Fjord”, Stan plays the role of Mihai Gheorghiu, the father of a family of five immigrated to Norway. Stan's character has attracted the attention of the international media due to his duality: he hits his own children, but ends up being a victim of the authorities.

“Fjord” is Mungiu's first film made in English, and the distributor is the great American company Neon.

In an interview for The Hollywood ReporterMungiu details how he worked with Stan, one of the stars of the moment.

“Because he speaks Romanian, we communicated very easily and we decided that one day we would look for something that we could do together, but something that would suit my kind of cinema and his kind of cinema,” said Mungiu.

“Stan's baldness is not a detail, but an exercise in humility”

For the film “Fjord”, Mungiu told Sebastian Stan, “I'm sure you can play dramatic roles, I've seen it in your other films, but you look too much like a Hollywood star”.

“We needed a physical change to transform him into a humble person, raised in a society where he had no rights. I said, 'How about we make you bald?' He wasn't sure. So I put an ad on Instagram in Norway: «We are looking for a fan of Sebastian Stan who wants to be shaved to be a double». I found one, I shaved it, I did the test on Stan too and he liked how it fit”, Mungiu said.

“The fact that his head was shaved helped him a lot, because he is a method actor. He needs to be very close to the character, and this modesty and the idea of ​​not being preoccupied or proud of the way he looks brought him closer to Mihai,” the Romanian director explained to The Hollywood Reporter.

It wasn't the first time Sebastian Stan changed his appearance for a movie.

For example, for the film when he played the young Donald Trump in the biographical film “The Apprentice” (2024), a role that brought him an Oscar nomination, he gained a few kilograms.

What is “Fjord” about

“Fjord” tells the story of the Gheorghiu family, a Romanian migrant family in Norway, with 5 children. A religious family, coming from a conservative community.

When one of the children arrives at school with bruises, a legal battle begins, because the Norwegian state takes the children away to protect them.

The film made by Mungiu was filmed in 36 days in Øye, a small town in western Norway, south of Alesund.

Romanian triumph at Cannes

The jury of the Cannes Film Festival awarded the prestigious Palme d'Or prize to the Romanian director Cristian Mungiu on Saturday evening, for “Fjord”, the film that tells a story that took place in Norway, the story of a family of Romanian migrants.

The BBC called it the most controversial film presented at Cannes this year.

In Romania, Cristian Mungiu is often criticized for making films for export for Western liberals. It's Cristi Puiu by contrast who is usually seen by some as more authentic and by others as a reactionary. Mungiu's new film Fjord divides the Cannes audience https://t.co/5zAWe1T4aQ

— Paula Erizanu (@paulaerizanu) May 22, 2026

Mungiu received the Palme d'Or award for the second time in his career. For the first time, Cristian Mungiu received the Palme d'Or in 2007, for the film “4 months, 3 weeks and 2 days”, a painful description of the story of “mandatory” births under Romanian communism.

With two Palme d'Or awards, Mungiu joins a select list of directors “double winners” at Cannes: Francis Ford Coppola, Michael Haneke or Ken Loach.