While Game of Thrones was filled with despicable characters, arguably the worst of the lot was Ramsay Bolton, played to chilling perfection by actor Iwan Rheon. A tyrant and a sadist, Bolton combined ruthless cunning with shocking cruelty to give audiences some of the most talked-about scenes in the series. In an interview, Rheon revealed the most difficult scene he ever filmed for the show was when Ramsay forces himself on Sansa on their wedding night.
“That was horrible. Nobody wanted to be there. Nobody wants to do that, but if it’s telling a story then you have to tell it truthfully. They didn’t sensationalise it or anything. It was very, very hard watching. It’s a horrible thing that happens, unfortunately, and it shouldn’t be. It was the worst day of my career. Chopping someone’s finger off you don’t really see it, and when you’re doing like a close up, it’s a piece of plastic. We’re just acting, it’s not real. Then something like that where you’re in the actual reality of the situation is very difficult to deal with. It was a horrible, horrible day.”
The scene in question occurs during the fifth season of the show. By then, the audience was already very familiar with Ramsay’s twisted nature, and his propensity for cruelty. Yet, there is something especially disturbing watching him force himself on Sansa, considering her difficult history with marriage. From Rheon’s account, filming that scene was every bit as difficult as it was to watch.
Still, while the actor had to do unspeakable things in the role of Ramsay, and exited the series in the most ignominious way possible when he was torn apart by his own ravenous hounds in the presence of Sansa, Rheon has warm memories of the show, even going so far as to praise the much-maligned final season.
“[The final season] was always gonna be divisive. I don’t think it was gonna be any other way, to be honest. Obviously, you can’t please everyone. I felt that they made a very strong decision to where they thought the season would go and I think they went with it and told the story really well. I thought the Battle of Winterfell was absolute genius, the best television I’ve ever seen. I thought it was really brave and they went for it.”
Since making his mark on Game of Thrones, Rheon has appeared in a number of film and television projects. Most recently for Halloween, the actor participated in a horror interactive game, Screamfest IV: The Kraken’s Revenge, in which players were able to control him and guide him through a terrifying maze of horrors to escape a creature called The Balthazoid. Despite Ramsay Bolton critics rooting for the Balthazoid to eat him, Rheon enjoyed the experience.
“After a couple of them it was following a similar pattern. And then one went a different way and it was genuinely terrifying, you can just see the monster in the corner of your eye making these weird noises. There were fully committed actors involved.”
This latest insight into the now iconic series Game of Thrones comes from metro.co.uk.
