How did your favorite Game of Thrones stars really feel while they were filming some of
the most dramatic, intense moments in the series?
Here are the scenes that the cast absolutely dreaded filming -- and a few that certain
actors refused to take part in altogether.
Warning: Season 8 spoilers ahead!
Cersei's "walk of shame" through King's Landing in Season 5 was brutal enough to make audiences
sympathize with one of the most diabolical characters in the entire show.
To atone for the sin of adultery, Cersei was forced to walk naked through King's Landing
while the citizens verbally and physically assaulted her.
Although many Game of Thrones stars are used to wearing nothing but their birthday suits
on camera, actress Lena Headey chose to work with a body double for this scene rather than
baring it all.
Headey said that the scene would have involved three full days of shooting sans costume,
and she didn't feel that she could accurately portray Cersei's emotional state if she herself
was exposed the entire time.
Headey is also a mother, and she noted that stripping down for certain scenes might bring
up some awkward conversations with her kids.
Headey's usual stand-in, Rebecca Van Cleave, agreed to appear nude in the scene, with Headey's
face superimposed on her body.
In response to claims that she was "less of an actress" for preferring to keep herself
covered, Headey had to stand up for herself.
She told Entertainment Weekly,
The Game of Thrones Season 6 finale had every fan on edge.
The season went out with a bang — literally.
Rather than attend her trial with the High Sparrow, Cersei decided to pull off an unexpectedly
devious revenge plot.
She set the entire Sept of Baelor ablaze with wildfire, a highly flammable and rare substance
that gives a whole new meaning to the phrase "scorched earth."
Lancel Lannister tried to save the day in vain — while in a tunnel under the Sept,
he notices three candles burning in a small pool of wildfire, and he attempts to reach
the end of the tunnel as fast as he can to blow them out.
Due to his injuries, he can only crawl, and he does not make it in time.
Actor Eugene Simon said this was his most physically demanding scene.
The directors had him spend the entire day crawling, using only his upper body strength
throughout.
He told Elle,
Euron Greyjoy is one of the most frightening characters of Game of Thrones.
He has no moral compass, and there seems to be nothing he won't do in pursuit of the power
that he craves.
Even among the other ruthless Game of Thrones characters, Euron possesses a unique form
of evil.
Actor Pilou Asbæk plays the role perfectly, yet in real life, Asbæk is nowhere near as
frightening; in fact, he was actually intimidated by one scene in particular.
In the Game of Thrones universe, every kingdom has their own unique rituals and ceremonies.
When a new king is crowned in the Iron Islands, a drowning ceremony is part of their initiation.
Of course, filming something like this is complicated, and there's no way that the cast
and crew are going to get it right in one take.
Asbæk said that filming the drowning scene was quite a struggle.
After all, it's not easy to act while you're freezing cold and unable to breathe.
Asbæk told Elle,
"What is dead may never die."
Wearing unique costumes and makeup on set is just part of the deal on Game of Thrones.
To create some of the special aesthetic effects, actors have had to wear colored contacts and
prosthetic lenses.
For example, after Arya Stark goes temporarily blind in Season 5, Maisie Williams had to
wear colored contact lenses for a few episodes until her sight was restored.
But she's not the only actor on set who had to spend a little time in the dark.
For Meryn Trant's death scene in Season 5, the cast and crew began shooting early in
the morning, and actor Ian Beattie recalls getting prosthetics in his eyes around 9AM
that day.
Unfortunately, the prosthetics basically left him blind for a full day of shooting, and
he had to leave them in for a full 12 hours.
He says that all he remembers from that particular day of shooting was total darkness from morning
until night.
He remembers his death scene as his biggest challenge on set.
Beattie told Elle,
"It was in many ways quite a surreal day.
It was very technical, but Maisie and I had worked it out in the rehearsals, and we were
ready."
Tormund Giantsbane is a fan favorite on Game of Thrones – although he is arguably a relatively
minor character, he's gotten more and more screen time throughout his tenure on the series,
to the point that it raised something of a fan uproar when his fate was left ambiguous
in the Season 7 finale.
He's a tough character who may be gruff at times, but beneath his rough exterior, there's
something endearing about him.
Actor Kristofer Hivju has appeared in plenty of crazy battle scenes where it seems like
it's hard to keep track of anything happening onscreen.
Hivju admits that by the time he was scheduled to shoot the Season 7 finale, he'd had enough
of working with the wights.
The wights that audiences see are actually a small crowd of extras, with the majority
added digitally in post-production.
Regardless, the actors had to keep up with quick choreography, and according to Hivju,
the scene pushed him to his physical limits.
He told Elle,
"In the beginning, it was tough, but in the end it became a kind of horrible dance.
It was extremely exhausting: They just kept coming, kept coming, kept coming."
Ellaria Sand and her daughter Tyene had one of the most frightening death scenes in the
entire series — and not a drop of blood was spilled.
Cersei handcuffs both Ellaria and Tyene to opposite walls of a dungeon, and then poisons
Tyene as revenge for the murder of her daughter Myrcellla, forcing Ellaria to
watch her own daughter die while she is helplessly stuck.
To make matters worse, Cersei promises to keep Ellaria alive for some time, solely for
the purpose of torturing her and prolonging her suffering.
Ellaria actress Indira Varma said that she and Rosabell Sellers, who played
Tyene, struggled with their handcuffs throughout the entire day of filming — since they were
supposed to fight against them, the cuffs would occasionally come undone, but at other
times, they got stuck in them.
Varma was one of the last people on set that day, and she found herself unable to get out
of the cuffs.
Finally, a crew member from the props department discovered a solution.
Varma said in an episode of Games Revealed,
"Literally, at the end of the day, I was like, 'Mate, I can't get it off, can someone help
me?' and everyone's gone.
"Pete from props is like, 'I think we need a saw,' and I had to be sawn out."
Emilia Clarke said that filming Daenerys' final scenes was heavy, but one scene much
earlier in the series really pushed her to her limits as an actor.
In Season 1, Daenerys eats a horse heart during a Dothraki [Doth-RACK-ee] ceremony.
The scene looked painfully realistic, and many viewers probably wondered what Clarke
was actually eating — whatever it was, it couldn't have tasted that great.
Clarke wasn't chowing down on real, bloody meat, but the "feast" wasn't much more appetizing.
"She has to eat the whole heart?
Hope that wasn't my horse."
"She's doing well."
The horse heart was actually made out of solidified jam, and Clarke said the flavor reminded her
of a nasty combination of bleach and raw pasta.
In fact, she said she was so grossed out by the taste that she barely felt like she had
to act in the scene.
And unfortunately, this was not the kind of scene that she could just get over with in
one take — shooting lasted for several days, and Clarke said that she was physically ill.
She told The Mirror,
"I ate roughly 28 hearts throughout the days we filmed that scene.
Fortunately, they gave me a spit bucket because I was vomiting in it quite often."
When Jon Snow and Daenerys finally met in Season 7, it was obvious that there was a
spark of instant chemistry between the two characters, and anyone could have predicted
that they would fall for each other.
Romance was definitely on the horizon.
At first, it seemed like destiny — fire and ice were coming together at last.
But in true Game of Thrones fashion, they couldn't simply hook up and then live happily
ever after.
Unbeknownst to either of them, Jon is actually a Targaryen by birth, and Daenerys is his
aunt.
Needless to say, actor Kit Harington had some mixed feelings about the scene.
After years of working on the show, Harington and Clarke are good friends, and filming a
romantic scene together was undoubtedly going to be a little bit awkward.
Plus, knowing their characters' family lineage, Harington thought that Jon and Daenerys were
making a mistake.
Both actors relied on humor to keep the situation a little more lighthearted.
"I like looking at her and going, 'Oh, God, I'm sorry!"
Throughout Game of Thrones, so many different characters have come and gone, and there are
always several major storylines going on throughout the known world, so it's only expected that
some major characters rarely appear in scenes together.
For the most recent seasons, this has been the case for Bronn and Cersei.
But it's not because their characters don't have any connection — after all, Bronn spends
plenty of time with Jamie Lannister, Cersei's twin brother and not-so-secret lover.
It's actually because Bronn actor Jerome Flynn and Lena Headey used to date, and the breakup
must have been fairly tumultuous, because both actors refuse to film scenes together.
Flynn and Headey nearly had to share a scene in Season 7, when almost all of the main characters
convened at the Dragon Pit summit.
However, attentive viewers may have noticed that Bronn and Cersei didn't even share a
second of screen time — Bronn made a quick exit and excused himself for a drink before
Cersei arrived.
Although the two split before late 2014, when Headey began dating her current partner, the
wounds must still feel fresh.
But perhaps they will have to set their differences aside for the final season.
After all, Bronn is now supposed to be leading the Lannister army and working for Cersei,
so it will be interesting to see how the directors work around this dilemma.
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