Alicia’s duets with the banjo-playing man from UNCLE

ALICIA VIKANDER knew working on The Man From U.N.C.L.e. was going to be a riot when director Guy ritchie invited her and cast members over to rehearse in his living room. ‘There was a whisky bottle and a vodka bottle for props, and i ended up rolling around the floor wrestling with illya Kuryakin,’ she recalled, trying to stifle a laugh as we had breakfast in London.

she and her leading men — henry Cavill, who plays high-end rogue-turned-suave spy Napoleon solo, and Armie hammer as determined russian agent illya Kuryakin (pictured inset) — bonded during sessions at ritchie’s home.

‘i was a bit nervous before i started making the film,’ Alicia admitted in between sips of her caffe Americano. But not for long. ‘Guy creates an open environment,’ explained the 26-year- old swedish actress.

The actors had scripts, but a lot of funny business that emerged during that work on the wrestling scene was added to the film.

The Man From U.N.C.L.e. was originally broadcast on TV for four years, from 1964 with robert Vaughn and David McCallum playing solo and Kuryakin.

ritchie sets his big-screen retro re- working at the height of the Cold War. Alicia plays Gaby Teller, the daughter of a nuclear scientist who has been abducted by a murky crime syndicate, controlled by a sleek mobster ( actress elizabeth Debicki).

We first see her wearing a pair of greasestained overalls. Alicia smiled sheepishly as she revealed that her character is, among other things, a car mechanic.

‘i don’t have a licence!’ she admitted, although she did have a few driving lessons on the back-lot of the Warner Bros studios at Leavesden in hertfordshire.

For the car chase scene that opens the movie, a stunt driver was concealed under Alicia’s seat in the beaten-up old vehicle she’s at the wheel of.

‘one of the amazing stunt drivers drove the car for me,’ she said. ‘i was sitting on top of him, pretending to be steering.’

she said ritchie called that scene the ‘car ballet’ — and it is a marvellously choreographed and edited sequence.

Alicia observed that Gaby isn’t just summer blockbuster crumpet. ‘she’s the girl, but she’s a strong girl,’ she insisted. The actress is new to the summer movie game: until now, her films have included things such as ex Machina, where she played an eye- popping android, or Testament of Youth, i n which she portrayed Vera Brittain.

Filmed and primed for release are Tulip Fever, with Christoph Waltz and Dane Dehaan; and The Light Between the ocean, opposite Michael Fassbender.

i’m also hearing reports of a ‘luminous’ performance in Tom hooper’s The Danish Girl, in which she stars with oscar-winner eddie redmayne.

her next film takes her into a rare genre where action thriller meets art. Paul Greengrass is back behind the camera with Matt Damon for a new Bourne adventure — about which Alicia is not allowed to say much, except that she’s ‘very excited about it’.

Vikander was already a fan of the Bourne series, having seen Greengrass’s earlier efforts several times each. Apart from being action films, they have a different sensibility to U.N.C.L.e.

For starters, i bet director Greengrass doesn’t play the banjo between takes.

‘i was looking for Guy after we’d shot a scene,’ Alicia told me. ‘i said: “Are you watching what we’re doing?” And he’d answer: “Yes — and playing the banjo.”

‘After that, every day we’d print out the lyrics to Johnny Cash songs and bring them in for singing, with Guy accompanying us on the banjo. it was exactly what i needed, i think, coming off some quite heavy dramas. it was cool. The music was cool. The clothes were cool.’

For inspiration, she watched lots of films from the sixties.

‘i saw a lot of pictures with Audrey hepburn and sophia Loren,’ she said, noting that she thought about hepburn in roman holiday for one scene in U. N.C.L.e. that took place on rome’s the spanish steps.

Another of her co-stars, italian actor Luca Calvani, gave the cast tips on restaurants and bars to visit. ‘We were r i ding Vespas around rome and discussing what food we were going to have that night and what wine to drink,’ Alicia told me.

The Man From U.N.C.L.e. opens here on August 14.