Magnus Lennarth Betnér is a Swedish

Sweden

Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....

 comedian

Comedian

A comedian or comic is a person who seeks to entertain an audience, primarily by making them laugh. This might be through jokes or amusing situations, or acting a fool, as in slapstick, or employing prop comedy...

 who has been acting in Swedish comedy shows such as Parlamentet

Parlamentet

Parlamentet is a satirical panel gameshow on on TV4, which parodies Swedish political debate. It was first broadcast in 1999 and is currently in its 23rd series. The current presenter is Anders S. Nilsson, who has hosted the show since 2004. Current team members include Babben Larsson, Robin...

, Tack gode Gud, Veckans nyheter

Veckans nyheter

Veckans nyheter is a Swedish satirical news and sketch comedy television program that aired on Kanal 5 for two seasons in 2006. Henrik Schyffert hosted the first season, with André Wickström taking over for season two....

, Extra! Extra!, Stockholm Live and Sverige dansar och ler, and early September he made his own show named I ditt ansikte (In your Face). In 2005 he got an award as the best Swedish comedian. In 2010 he became the first comedian to regain this award, with recognition that he is "on the right road to be great in the United Kingdom".

Betnér has been performing increasingly in English, in the US, UK and Ireland. In August 2010 Betnér performed a complete run of hour-length shows in English at The Stand Comedy Club

The Stand Comedy Club

The Stand Comedy Club are three stand-up comedy venues in the cities of Edinburgh, Glasgow and Newcastle upon Tyne.-History:The Stand hosted its first regular club night on Thursday 21st September 1995: seven people came and the total box office was £22....

 during the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, receiving praise in mostly four star reviews.

Comedy style

Betnér uses dark comedy, often offensively, against Swedish celebrities such as Linda Rosing

Linda Rosing

Linda Thelenius is a Swedish model, singer, author and politician...

, Ebba von Sydow

Ebba von Sydow

Ebba von Sydow is a Swedish journalist, author, columnist, TV personality that also run one of the most influential fashion and lifestyle blogs in Sweden...

, Mikael Persbrandt

Mikael Persbrandt

Mikael Åke Persbrandt is a Swedish actor. In Swedish films he usually has lead roles and “tough guy” parts. He is perhaps most famous for his recurring role as the no-nonsense police officer Gunvald Larsson in the latest installment of the Martin Beck movies...

, Per Gessle

Per Gessle

Per Håkan Gessle is a Swedish pop singer-songwriter, guitarist, and harmonicist. He is the lead singer of the Swedish pop group Gyllene Tider and formed Roxette with Marie Fredriksson...

 and many more. His stand-up comedy has garnered him much criticism and even death threats from Swedish neo-Nazis and rappers, but he finds it humorous that people can get so angry about jokes.

Betnér often has to answer questions on why he is so offensive. He often replies that people should accept the jokes, since they are only jokes.

Betnér was awarded the "Swedish comedian of the year" award in 2005 and again in 2010 in connection with the Swedish stand-up gala. Betnér's characteristic humour is often political and provocative; for example, in one show, he ironically proposed to give his daughter a "pussy piercing" as a present for her second birthday, but ultimately opted against it, citing "why would you buy a pussy piercing for your two-year-old daughter? It would grow shut in a couple of weeks!" as the reason.

Betnér has also released four DVD movies: Live från Norra Brunn (Live from Norra Brunn), Magnus Betnér UnCut, Inget är heligt (Nothing is sacred) and Tal till nationen (Speech to the nation). He later chose to discontinue appearing in the program Extra! Extra!, as he considered himself censored when they would not allow him to joke about Runar Søgaard

Runar Søgaard

Runar Søgaard is a Norwegian leadership trainer, life-coach and a motivational speaker.In May 2004 he created some reaction during a speech in Stockholm, by saying that Muhammad had been a pedophile - see also criticism of Muhammad#Aisha...

. He has been visiting the TV programs Robins, Förkväll and Belinda. In the autumn of 2008, Betnér's own TV program I ditt ansikte (In your face) was broadcast on Channel 5 in Sweden. After that Betnér went on to make a permanent contribution to SVT's Debatt (Debate).

Personal life

Betnér is living together with Helena Sandklef, but has a daughter, born in 2006, from a previous marriage. Because of Betnér's dislike for certain kind of newspapers, he almost never exposes himself in the media, but in some of his old acts he talked about his daughter. Sometimes when it comes to Christianity he refers to his father who is a pastor. Betnér however is not a Christian and considers the world to be better off without religion. He believes that everybody is bisexual.

DVD releases

• Live från Norra Brunn (2006)
• Magnus Betnér Uncut (2007)
• Inget är heligt (2007)
• Tal till Nationen (2009)

Appearances in other shows

• Parlamentet
  Parlamentet
  Parlamentet is a satirical panel gameshow on on TV4, which parodies Swedish political debate. It was first broadcast in 1999 and is currently in its 23rd series. The current presenter is Anders S. Nilsson, who has hosted the show since 2004. Current team members include Babben Larsson, Robin...
  
  (1999–present)
• Stockholm live (2005–2007, 2 episodes)
• Extra! Extra! (2006)
• 100% (2006)
• Veckans nyheter
  Veckans nyheter
  Veckans nyheter is a Swedish satirical news and sketch comedy television program that aired on Kanal 5 for two seasons in 2006. Henrik Schyffert hosted the first season, with André Wickström taking over for season two....
  
  (2006)
• Sverige dansar och ler (2007, 3 episodes)
• Tack gode gud! (2007)
• Robins (2007)
• Debatt (2008)

External links

(channel for videos in English)