Nell Tiger Free may not be the first name you think of when it comes to Game of Thrones stars who went on to great things, but she has definitely done well for herself after her brief stint as Myrcella Baratheon on the HBO show’s fifth season. She’s currently the title character in Servant, M. Night Shyamalan’s Apple TV+ series about a nanny with a mysterious past who can seemingly perform miracles…even if danger follows them.
On Game of Thrones, Free’s best moment probably came when Myrcella died in the arms of her father Jaime Lannister (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) after being poisoned by Ellaria Sand.
It was a strong scene at the end of a pretty weak storyline. By that point, the show had established itself as the Show Where Characters Die, so getting a death scene was a big deal.
“Yeah, there was a lot of gravitas in that episode,” Free told The Hollywood Reporter. “I was 15 when I shot that, and there was a lot of pressure. You’re dying on Game of Thrones, and you’ve got to do a good job of it.”
I was very, very new to the acting world, and it was my first big role as a young woman. I’d done stuff before, but as a younger girl. There was this pressure because Nikolaj was very acclaimed and incredibly well-known on the show. So there was a lot of pressure; there’s pressure in every moment. But Nikolaj was such a nice guy. He was so lovely to me when we were shooting that. But to be honest with you, I don’t want to say it was easy, but it was a relatively comfortable scene to shoot. I’d been preparing for it, and it actually went pretty smoothly.
Leave it to Coster-Waldau to put his costars at ease.
Nikolaj Coster-Waldau steps out to promote Against the Ice
Speaking of Coster-Waldau, here he is a gala screening of his new arctic exploration film Against the Ice, which he also produced.
And finally, just to catch you up with what another Game of Thrones veteran is doing with their time, please enjoy this extremely serious commercial for Sigr backpacks, narrated by none other than Kristofer Hivju (Tormund Giantsbane):
For real, that is one meaningful backpack.
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