Game of Thrones Kit Harington (Jon Snow) recently spoke at the Esquire Townhouse to promote his appearance in a production of Sam Shepard’s True West, opening at the Vaudeville Theater in London’s West End on November 23. Naturally, he also talked about Game of Thrones, and specifically how being on the world’s most popular show has forced him to grapple with fame. “I’d be lying if I wasn’t saying I was at drama school dreaming of going into a big TV show, walking red carpets, going to the Emmys or the SAG awards,” he said. “Of course that’s what I wanted and Thrones threw that like a ten ton truck at [me].”
When you’re a lead character on Game of Thrones, notoriety is part of the package. Harington has learned to deal with strangers asking after him in public, even if they don’t always do it at the best of times. “Sometimes it’s like, ‘Mate, not now.’” Not long ago, he was saying goodbye to wife Rose Leslie, who was leaving for months, at the airport, “and this guy walks up, and I went, ‘No! No. Go away. Turn around. Walk away. Not a good time.’”
Once he was done shooting the show, Harington was looking forward to the moment someone asked whether he played Jon Snow and he could respond, “Not anymore.” But when that actually happened for the first time, he was overcome with unexpected emotion. “I started crying in front of this girl who was like, ‘Oh,’ and just sort of backed away.”
So fame or no fame, Jon clearly got under Harington’s skin. You can watch the full interview here.
In other news, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (Jaime Lannister) talked a little Thrones to Extra about his work with the United Nations Development Programme, where he’s a goodwill ambassador, and dropped a couple of sound bites about season 8 while he was at it:
“It’s gonna start right after season 7,” Coster-Waldau promises. I can’t tell if he’s giving a joke answer or if he’s actually saying that season 8 will pick in the immediate aftermath of season 7, right after the Wall falls. Either is an appropriate answer. “It’s one hell of a last season. I’m very proud of it.”
And I can’t end the article without mentioning Harington’s story about the time when, in between seasons 5 and 6, he went to Wimbleton and sat next to Camilla Parker Bowles, Duchess of Cornwall. “And Camilla turned to me and went, ‘So are you dead?’ And I went, ‘F**k!’” Surreal stuff.
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