This Viking Longship Crossed the Atlantic Before Starring in Christopher Nolan's 'Odyssey' as Odysseus' Greek Galley

A tall ship with a real history of open-ocean sailing has taken on a starring role in Christopher Nolan's upcoming film adaptation of The Odyssey, standing in for the Greek warship commanded by Odysseus. The vessel, known as Draken Harald Hårfagre, is a fully seaworthy Viking longship that has previously made the crossing from Norway to North America under its own sail power, and producers leaned on that authenticity rather than building a replica from scratch or relying on digital effects.

Nolan's retelling brings together Matt Damon as Odysseus and Charlize Theron as the enchantress Calypso, with the longship serving as the wandering king's ship for key scenes. To get performers ready for the physical demands of rowing a genuine wooden vessel, several cast members reportedly attended a rowing camp before filming, learning the coordination and technique needed to handle the ship's oars convincingly on camera.

Draken Harald Hårfagre was not built as a copy of one particular archaeological find. Instead, its designers drew on details scattered across numerous historical accounts and sagas describing Viking-era ships, blending those references into a single vessel meant to evoke the era broadly rather than replicate a specific wreck. That approach gave the film's production team a hull that reads as authentically ancient while still being modern enough to meet safety and performance standards for actual sailing.

The ship itself is substantial: roughly 115 feet from bow to stern and about 25 feet across at its widest point, rigged with square sails and fitted with 50 long oars for rowing when wind alone won't do. Norwegian businessman Sigurd Aase financed its construction, and the finished vessel has since proven capable of genuine blue-water voyages rather than existing merely as a dockside prop or museum piece.

That seaworthiness mattered directly to how Nolan wanted to shoot the picture. The director has built a reputation on favoring practical, in-camera effects over computer-generated substitutes whenever feasible, and a longship that can actually cut through waves under sail offered exactly the kind of tangible realism his productions typically chase, rather than a static set piece confined to a soundstage or tank.

Emanuel Persson, who serves as the ship's chief executive and also directs its expeditions, framed that realism in terms of what a camera simply cannot fake. He pointed to the texture of the oak timbers, the noise of the rigging under strain, the sail's motion in shifting air, and a crew genuinely laboring together against real wind and water. According to Persson, putting an authentic ship into authentic conditions "brings a different kind of truth to the image," a comment relayed through Artnet reporter Min Chen.

The pairing of a working Viking ship with a Bronze Age Greek epic might raise eyebrows among purists, since the two vessel traditions are separated by many centuries and different shipbuilding cultures. Still, for a big-budget film prioritizing tactile, camera-ready authenticity over strict archaeological precision, a longship with a proven Atlantic crossing under its belt offered filmmakers something no replica built purely for show could match: a hull that has already survived the open sea.

Source: Smithsonian Magazine