Travis Fimmel Isn't Your Typical Movie Star

I GET THE SENSE that Travis Fimmel would prefer not to do this interview. Not because he’s rude or uncooperative – as I’ll learn from those close to him, when it comes to causes he cares about, he’s nothing but generous with his time. He would prefer not to do this interview because he doesn’t like talking about himself, or, he doesn’t like talking about himself as ‘Travis Fimmel, the famous Australian actor’. No doubt, he’d much prefer to be known by a small community of country folk as a cattle farmer from the tiny town of Lockington in northern Victoria who runs a beer brand with 25 of his mates.

Unfortunately for Fimmel, we have to talk about acting. It’s because he’s a renowned Australian actor that he’s on the cover of this magazine. He’s in Europe when I reach him, for a friend’s wedding and a “small work thing”. Our phone connection is patchy, and I strain to hear what he says, the potency of his ocker accent not helping. In the background, I can hear the hustle and bustle of a day in the city unfolding – car horns, people talking, the ticking of a pedestrian crossing at traffic lights. He tells me that while filming the upcoming Dune: Prophecy, in which he plays a charismatic soldier with a mysterious past, he stayed in the heart of Budapest for seven months.

“It was a very nice place, but I was stuck in a little apartment in the city, so it wasn’t my cup of tea.” He feels the same way about the busy streetscape I find him in today. “Yeah, I’d rather just be home the whole time,” he says of the property he currently leases, just outside of Echuca, a 25-minute drive from the farm he grew up on. “People have the same mentality there; we all grew up the same. But . . . unfortunately, there’s a lot of work overseas. You know, there’s only 26 million people in Australia. You have to work overseas so you have a name. If you have a name, foreigners are more likely to buy Australian productions because of your name. But yeah, I’d rather be at home.”

A week earlier, Fimmel hosted our photographer, stylist and their teams at his ranch outside of LA, which I’ve been asked not to reveal the precise location of because the actor has the type of fans that would turn up on his doorstep if they knew. “I’m never actually there,” he says of the ranch. “It’s sort of pointless. I’ve got to sell that place.”

The photoshoot went quickly, with Fimmel taking some creative licence and suggesting we include bits of merch from his beer brand, Travla, in the photos. This could be mistaken for a case of shameless self-promotion. Really, it’s Fimmel’s way of giving exposure to something he cares about. Travla, he informs me, is one of only a few beers that’s Australian-owned, and made from 100 per cent Australian ingredients. “Nine out of 10 beers Australians drink are owned by overseas companies” is a statistic he repeats multiple times throughout our conversation. The Travla crew are also heavily involved in community projects, working with charities that support people in rural and regional communities. Clearly, Fimmel sets the tone; when telling me about Flanno for a Farmer, a Travla-supported initiative run by Australian charity Farm Angels, he asks whether I could please include the QR code to donate in this story. (While my editor vetoed including it on this page, you can head to the website to chip in.)

When I push the conversation in the direction of his other job – the one that involves lights and cameras, Hollywood-sized egos and red-carpet premieres – he makes it clear this won’t be a conversation about “the art and the attention of it all”. “It’s just a job. Like any other job, really. I mean, I certainly wouldn’t be doing it for free.”

FIMMEL HAS BEEN ACTING since the early 2000s. His first onscreen cameo wasn’t in a film or TV show but the 2001 music video to the Jennifer Lopez track ‘I’m Real’. He basically played himself – an attractive young farmer who locks eyes with J-Lo as she cruises through the Californian countryside on her lowrider. Two years later, Fimmel landed the role of John Clayton in a contemporary TV retelling of the legend of Tarzan, which, despite receiving good reviews, wasn’t renewed for a second season. A string of small roles in larger productions followed; alongside Matthew McConaughey and Woody Harrelson, he played a beach bum in the 2008 stoner comedy Surfer, Dude, and was Patrick Swayze’s right-hand man in the 2009 crime drama The Beast.

Next to Billy Bob Thornton and Eva Longoria, he was a wise-cracking vigilante killer in 2012’s The Baytown Outlaws. Guy, the Brooklyn pickle entrepreneur and sperm donor to Greta Gerwig’s Maggie in 2015’s Maggie’s Plan, was one of Fimmel’s most idiosyncratic characters – and a rare foray for the actor into the romcom genre. Fimmel gained notoriety as the central character of Anduin Lothar in Warcraft: The Beginning, a film adaptation of video-game phenomenon World of Warcraft. More recently, he’s appeared in a handful of Aussie productions – he played Lyle, the daggy, well-intentioned but ethically dubious stepdad in the 2024 Netflix adaptation of Australian novel Boy Swallows Universe, and later this year, he’ll return to the role of James Cormack, a detective tormented by his brother’s disappearance, in the crime series Black Snow. But (yes, I’m getting there), it was his portrayal of Ragnar Lothbrok in the phenomenally successful History series Vikings that brought Fimmel to the world’s attention and earned him the type of fans that would pay good money to know his home address.

“It’s just a JOB. Like any other job, really. I mean, I CERTAINLY wouldn’t be doing it for FREE.”

Fimmel was the face of the show, and, ultimately, the reason for its runaway success – Vikings ran for six long seasons, with spinoff series, Vikings: Valhalla, now in its third season on Netflix (it was recently announced it won’t be renewed for a fourth).

“When we started casting for Vikings, I was very sure I didn’t want the clichéd version: the big, loud, brutish, hairy fighter that had existed for a long time in folk memory,” explains the series creator, British screenwriter Michael Hirst. “We got pretty close to the date of production when we received a self-tape from Travis, [recorded] from his farm in Australia. He didn’t bother to put on any viking gear, and he didn’t shout. He was pretty quiet. He hesitated often in delivering the lines, as if he was really thinking about them.” It was his air of thoughtfulness – and his piercing blue eyes – that landed Fimmel the starring role. “He absolutely inhabited that role. He did not ‘play’ a viking; he was a viking,” adds Hirst. “Travis was one big reason why the show grew as big as it did. He was our lead. He was our poster boy. He was our signature. He redefined for a modern audience what a viking was. He smashed the old clichés forever.”

‘Smashed’ is an understatement. If, before Vikings, your impression of Norsemen aligned with the folk memory Hirst describes, Fimmel’s Ragnar Lothbrok probably blew your mind. In addition to being a devoted parent and husband with a soft and curious side, Ragnar Lothbrook was hot. But his hotness didn’t just stem from his physical assets – which, glimpsed in steamy sex scenes soundtracked by primal grunts, didn’t leave much to the imagination. It came through in the intellect and depth Fimmel brought to the character.

“My goal was always to make the character a family man who would do anything for his kids. You know, a lot of tough love, but it comes from doing what he thinks is right for his family,” Fimmel explains. “I think the character had a lot of flaws, so sometimes he didn’t necessarily see straight. But everyone’s got flaws; it’s just about not letting your flaws beat you.”

When I ask Hirst about how Fimmel approached his role, the writer gives a frank response. “Travis wasn’t always easy to work with. He had – or he developed – his own ideas about his character, and we started a dialogue which continued until Ragnar’s death,” he says. “I believe that we respected each other, and our meetings – which we both often dreaded – nearly always turned out to be positive and productive.” Hirst recalls one crucial moment towards the end of the series’ fourth season, when Fimmel believed Ragnar shouldn’t say a word for an entire episode. “He told me that he was sure Ragnar could communicate his desires and responses just by looking, just by ‘being’. So I reread the script. I noted that other characters in the scenes could indeed convey the information that was needed. And it was also true that I had come to realise how much meaning and emotion Travis could convey simply by ‘looking’. It’s a gift that very good actors have.

“I agreed to Travis’ request but swore him to secrecy,” Hirst admits. “Our American paymasters could never know, because they would never have agreed.”

THE CATEGORY OF FAME that comes with being the handsome star of a niche historical drama, especially one with fantastical elements, can be intense (Game of Thrones star Kit Harington once referred to feeling so objectified by fans and critics, it was “demeaning”). And certainly, there are fans out there who follow Fimmel for his good looks first, and his acting second. To those who line up for his autograph at Comic-Con conventions – teenagers in cosplay, men who larp on a Tuesday night and middle-aged mums that turn to speculative fiction as an escape from reality – Fimmel is the perfect man. Or, rather, Ragnar Lothbrok is. But in their minds, there is no difference.

On the Travis Fimmel Facebook fan page, which has over 65,000 followers and admin that upload photos and updates daily, posts attract comments like “handsome man”, “him so cute” and “be still my beating heart”. “If I get to go fishing with him, I don’t think we would be doing much fishing,” writes one fan beneath a photo of Travis holding a fishing rod, accompanied by a few tongue-out emojis. Fimmel’s personal Instagram – he has three million followers on the platform, while only really posting about Travla – is also flooded with declarations of love and admiration.

Fimmel isn’t in it for these reasons. To him, fame is something he’d rather go without, while recognising it’s a necessary evil – you can’t make money in Hollywood when no one knows your name. “Too many awards and attention in that industry. I’m not that interested in that,” he deflects. “We’re not saving the world or anything. I don’t get too deep into it. As long as it makes money, I’m happy.” I seek to clarify that although he enjoys acting, unlike method actors and tortured-artist types, for him, it’s just not that deep. “I’ve never once enjoyed it, not once,” he says, without the slightest hesitation. “I mean, it’s deep work-wise – you have to be deep to continue working. But I don’t get bogged down in it. Like I said, it’s just a job.” Delicately, I ask why he continues to do something he doesn’t enjoy and never has. “Well, I haven’t made enough money to retire yet. As soon as I do, I’ll move home for good . . . I don’t know what else I’m going to do. What keeps a guy working in the mines? What keeps a carpenter working all the time? What keeps anyone getting up in the morning and going to work? What keeps us doing it? I’m very happy for people who love their job – jealous and happy. But it doesn’t do it for me. I’m not driven by it.

“What am I driven by?” he says, repeating my next question. “That’s a good question. I’m not very driven anymore.” I can hear him chuckle. “Nah, I guess it’s just trying to do good at what you’re doing. Trying to always be better than you were the last time.”

“He absolutely INHABITED that role. He did not ‘play’ a viking; he WAS a viking. Travis was one big reason why the show GREW as big as it did.”

Those who’ve worked with Fimmel aren’t so convinced he dislikes acting. As Bjorn Lothbrok, Ragnar’s firstborn son, Canadian actor Alexander Ludwig saw firsthand the care and thoughtfulness Fimmel brought to his Vikings character.

“He’s one of the most talented and hardworking people I’ve ever worked with. I’ve seen how much time and dedication he puts into what he does. It’s the same kind of time and dedication he puts into his farm. He does everything like a farmer would. It’s very meticulous. He plants these seeds and he focuses, and he’s always prepared,” says Ludwig over the phone from LA. “But he will be the first person to tell you he’s not passionate about his craft. If you were to talk to him about the business, you would never believe that he’s someone who loves what he does. And I will literally die on this hill,” quips Ludwig with a laugh. “He’s too good. And he stuck around too long not to have loved it. I mean, he should have won awards for that show.”

“Travis is arguably one of the most beautiful men in the world, and he does everything he can not to be,” Ludwig continues. “I think that says a lot. Because . . . I mean, he’s got the talent. He could so easily have gone down that route to be one of, you know, one of ‘the guys’. I think that’s what makes him so real, is that he just genuinely doesn’t care about that. He’s just not about any of the bullshit that comes with what we do.”

Kriv Stenders, who directed Fimmel in 2019’s Danger Close: The Battle of Long Tan, is more receptive to the idea of Fimmel not enjoying what he does. He recalls one day on set, when the cast and crew had an hour to nail a particularly complex scene. “It was a hard day, and Travis was having trouble with the scene. He was in this wet kit, it was pissing down with fake rain and when I went over to talk to him, I looked back and saw what he was looking at, which was literally six cameras, cranes, all this machinery,” recalls the Aussie director. “And I went, ‘Oh, fuck’. That’s what he sees. That’s what he has to deal with every day – the pressure to be like, Everyone’s here, we’ve got an hour to make this brilliant and it’s all up to me. Now. Go. And that’s hard.

“But at the same time, Travis is cursed with a gift. He’s one of those people, when you look at them in reality, you go, ‘Okay, wow, good-looking guy’. But the minute you put the lens on him – and it’s very rare in this business – you look through the viewfinder and get blinded. The charisma that he has is just astronomical. He’s got the X factor, and people want that.” Stenders lets out a laugh. “Sorry, Travis, but you’re a movie star – whether you like it or not.”

FIMMEL’S FAVOURITE PUB is the Lockington Hotel, but he also spends a fair amount of time at The Cal, an Echuca institution where Travla is on tap. Unlike fans at the various Comic-Cons, the locals don’t gawk when he walks into the watering hole. According to a friend of mine who lives in the area, this is due in part to the fact the actor “dresses like a bit of a bum”. But also, the people here have known Fimmel since he was a kid. They know him in the way he’d like to be known.

If Fimmel doesn’t enjoy being on big-budget Hollywood sets, there’s no denying he loves filming skits for the Travla Instagram. Often, these videos feature animals Fimmel comes across on his farm, like echidnas, emus and even brown snakes, which he grabs by the tail, Steve Irwin-style. “Trav is pretty much the Travla creative director,” says celebrity chef and judge on Masterchef Australia Andy Allen, who is one of the beer brand’s cofounders. “He’s got a real gift when it comes to being creative, which you can tell from the videos he comes up with himself. He’s such a hard worker, and I don’t think it’s just for Travla. It’s who he is. He’s been brought up with those values. And what he does with Travla, it’s really an extension of what he believes in.”

Throughout our time chatting, Fimmel is most animated when talking about the beer. When I ask what project he’s proudest of (referring to his acting work), he says it’s “the beer brand”. He muses about his desire to make a beer that supports Australian farmers by using Australian ingredients and keeping the profits in the country. “I want to support the way I grew up and the people I know. We have a beautiful country and hardworking people, and I think sometimes city people can forget that. But those [country] people – they’re not trying to be anyone else. That’s where the heart of Australia is.”

“He said, ‘All I’ve got is me and my time. So, please, what can I do for you?’” says Jason Law, the CEO of Farm Angels, the charity that puts on Flanno for a Farmer, which supports farmers impacted by natural disasters, mental-wellbeing issues and the rising costs of primary production. “He gets that one of the key things that causes things like depression in farmers is that they feel a bit forgotten. They feel taken for granted and like no one cares. He wants to show farmers that we can get people to care.

“He hates interviews,” adds Law with a laugh. “He thinks he’s bad at them, and I don’t think he likes opening up. We never want to push him to do anything, but he always says, ‘If you need me to do something like that, I’ll do it’.”

I wonder if this is why Fimmel agreed to do this story. The amount of time we spend talking about Travla, the plight of Aussie farmers and the sense of duty he feels to maintain his name overseas so he can lend his platform to causes he cares about would suggest so. The text message he sent me a few days after our interview indicated he was still thinking about how to make the opportunity count: If there’s a chance can u in the article wish luck to Col Pearse. He’s a local dairy farmer from where I’m from and he’s swimming in the Paralympics this year. I told him I would. So Col, if you’re reading this, we’re rooting for you.

“Everybody who meets him for the first time is like, ‘Dude, what’s the deal with Travis?’ And I’m like, ‘I’m telling you. It takes time. You just gotta just let it happen,’” advises Alexander Ludwig. “He doesn’t let a lot of people into his inner circle. He’s just not that type of guy. But if you’re okay with sitting in silence with him on his ranch, and literally not saying a word, then, who knows?”

“I want to SUPPORT the way I grew up and the people I know. We have a BEAUTIFUL country and hardworking people, and I think sometimes CITY people can forget that."

“I remember one day on Danger Close, I was trying to film a scene one way and Travis was questioning it. He didn’t believe in it,” says Kriv Stenders. “And I said, ‘Just trust me, Trav, just trust me’. And he said, ‘Mate, I’ve trusted too many people before’. And I just thought that was really telling.”

As I put the finishing touches on this story, I decide it would be rude not to crack a Travla. The guy at my local bottle shop says the beer sells pretty well, and he’s a fan of its crisp taste and low-calorie rating (89 cals per can). I’m not a big lager drinker, but I find it refreshing.

Across the top of the can, the brand’s motto is printed: ‘Don’t fence me in’. I recall Fimmel telling me what it means. “It’s about letting people be who they wanna be. Not judging people. Just letting people say, ‘Don’t put me in a category’.” Apparently, Fimmel came up with it himself.