The Game of Thrones PR machine is roaring into the last few hours before the season 8 premiere, with cast member Kit Harington sat down for a playful interview with Instyle.com. No show secrets are spilled, but he comes up with some interesting stuff.
When asked about how he feels now that Thrones production has ceased forever, Harington responded with an anecdote:
I remember being at the airport and someone came up to me and said ‘Are you Jon Snow?’ and I said “Not any more,” and then I started crying.
“You don’t feel one thing; you feel a hundred,” Harington continues. “Sadness. Elation. Excitement. Dread, definitely. But more than anything there’s just this flickering light at the end of the tunnel. Once it’s aired and done, I think I’ll just have this great sense that something’s been lifted off my shoulders. I’ve underestimated how much pressure has gone with the show for 10 years.”
And what about Harington’s part in the famously brutal season 8 shoot, which includes a massive battle sequence filmed at night in cold, muddy weather? Previous 10 episode-long seasons were shot in six months, but the six final episodes required nine months. Harington explains why:
You’d come in (on prior seasons) for a week and be off for two weeks. But I was there the whole time this year. I barely left Belfast. For the last couple of seasons I’ve done more days than anyone else because of the nature of my character. There are just a lot of the battles and the action sequences.
“I think I got my final day changed about 18 times,” Harington says, “to the point where I didn’t know when it was. I was like, ‘Just don’t tell me.’ Then it came, and I had that final scene, which was very average. I was just walking somewhere with Liam (Cunningham) and Jacob (Anderson, who plays Grey Worm).”
So the last scene he filmed wasn’t a big one, but It was a rough final day. “It couldn’t have been more of a wet fart of a scene,” he said, and you’re all free to read into his meaning there. “But I completely broke down after it. I’d seen Peter Dinklage do his last scene earlier in the day, and he broke down. I’d been at other people’s wraps, like Sophie Turner’s. You just saw them collapse. And it happened to me. It was a beautifully weighted ending. Then it was like, ‘OK, I’m actually done with this show. I love it. It’s my pride and joy, and it’s been a pleasure to be a part of it, but I’m done.’”
Keep in mind that the last scheduled scene Harington shot was not Jon’s actual last scene. “I still don’t trust that the ending that was written down is the actual ending,” he teased. “I think they kept it from all of us. The secrecy this year was just huge. No one I’ve spoken to has guessed the actual ending. No one has got it right yet.”
Harington was also asked when he realized Thrones had become a worldwide phenomenon.
I think the first realization of the global impact of Game of Thrones was season 4. I think it was after the Red Wedding, and I just remember it going from a show that was doing really well to a show that was being watched everywhere, and I think it was the reaction to that (the Red Wedding), from around the world, that made me realize it was a global show.
How much is Harington like Jon Snow? “It’s always a confusing question,” Harington answers, “seeing as I am Jon Snow. And also that he’s a character. So I’m not like him at all but I am like him because he’s me and I don’t know who’s who anymore.” Sounds confusing. Use that.
Harington is currently starring on the London stage in the Sam Shepard play True West. “I love characters that self-destruct,” Harington admitted. “I’m not interested at the moment in playing a hero. After 10 years of playing a troubled guy who is a good person, I want to play someone who’s not good.”
But, no matter how many bad guys he plays, Harington knows that Jon Snow will always be a big part of him and his future. “I’m always going to be ‘that guy.’ For all its wonderful things, it brings difficult things too. The most important job I’ll ever have is about to finish … [W]ell, not the most. Hopefully, I’ll be a father.”
For lots more of the interview with Harington, click here.
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