After the huge success of the Swedish romantic TV drama series Young Royals, that centred around a fictional Prince and his budding gay romance with a fellow student, a new teen royal romance story is available on Netflix.

This time based in Norway, Royalteen is a film that follows Prince ‘Kalle’ as he falls for fellow student Lena, who is going on a personal journey coming to terms with her past.

Nordic Watchlist caught up with its two young leading stars, Ines and Mathias, to hear from them what to expect from this new movie.

Hi Ines and Mathias! Tell us about your characters in Royalteen?

Ines: So my character is Lena – she is fleeing from her problems and has this aspiration to start a new and better life in Oslo. There she meets Mathias’ character Kalle but she soon finds out that she can’t really flee her problems – especially in this modern age with social media.

Mathias: Kalle really wants to be represented in the right way through social media, he is a very careful character as he is a crown prince so he has a lot of pressure on his shoulders.

One of the great things in the movie is the chemistry between the pair of you, how did you prepare for that especially as there are some intimate moments?

Mathias: Well we actually went to the same school so we knew each other pretty well. We both so excited to be able to act with one another.

Ines: It was great, it is really wonderful getting to meet new people and I guess it was like a new way for us to meet aswell. We went to the same drama programme a high school where we were in the same class but then it was split into two seperate groups so we never actually got to act together.

So it became like another level of friendship for us and felt really comfortable to be around someone who you can be open with and joke around with because you have this shared history to can both rest on with.

We’ve seen the success of Young Royals – what is it that you think people love about Scandinavian royalty?

Ines: I think it is really interesting landscape because of how royalty is viewed as this untouchable unit and so from the outside looking in you have all these assumptions about that but then when you break up that perception of it you realise that people are just people.

When all eyes are on you is a feeling that everyone has these days – we are all on apps, social media, and trying to find themselves as something. Sometimes that really fails and sometimes it is successful – the relationship between that of being seen and seeing someone else is so complicated today. Thats what draws people in.

Mathias: I think it is a really popular landscape these days with the likes of Young Royals and then there is The Crown. It is interesting to see how much contrast there is in something like a formal dinner, then being at school with your friends. I like the contrasts in that.

There is a scene involving a big bag of candy – are you big candy lovers in real life and if so which ones do you love the most?

Ines: Oh well, I am very Nordic and just love black liquorice. It’s just the best!

Mathias: It has to be chocolate!

Instagram, Tik Tok, other – or no social media – what do you prefer?

Mathias: I have never really been on social media a lot.

Ines: I am on Instagram and Facebook, I kind of used them as a I grew up with them as the hype was all around me then. I have noticed that now I have started to fall off a little bit, I am not following all of the TikTokers and actually just starting to reduce it all a little bit. I think it is important to have an equal life that is off your phone that doesn’t take over completely.

It is quite funny though with Mathias because he hasn’t any social media, he has been so good with it, and everyone always would ask: ‘how do we get hold of Mathias?’ to invite to plan studying or socialising.

What music have you both been listening to and enjoying recently?

Mathias: I have been listening to a lot of this Italian artist called Blanco and also a UK based beabadoobee – those are my main two artists at the moment.

Ines: I have a very eclectic taste in music – I do love the songs that are used a lot on Tik Tok, that is the thing with music on Tik Tok it is the mise-en-scene of songs and stuff which you can do with social media is really exciting. Other than that I have been listening to Interpol’s new album too.

Royalteen is available to watch on Netflix now

Interview by Alex Minnis