Olivia Cooke mum on GoT prequel

Does she know when it’s due to start shooting? “Um … this year.”

And where’s it being filmed? “Oh God, I’m so nervous about giving anything away … I’m telling you, I don’t even know where we’re shooting it.”

But she’s got all the scripts? “Yes. Are you trying to get me killed?”

The veil of secrecy around the spin-off isn’t surprising. This is a show which, as actor Nikolaj Coster-Waldau (who played Jaime Lannister) once revealed, shared its final season scripts with its cast via a novel app which self-destructed once they’d been read.

Also, even two years after its controversial finale aired, the franchise remains HBO’s key breadwinner. After another proposed prequel, set to star Naomi Watts, was suddenly scrapped by the network in October 2019, HBO’s programming chief Casey Bloys described House of the Dragon as the network’s “top priority”, a big vote for a station responsible for Emmy winners such as Succession and Barry and the upcoming reboot of Sex and the City.

Cooke says she only caught up with the original series during London’s lengthy COVID-19 lockdown and only after she’d secured the series role in October. But she’s aware of the coming scrutiny.

“I understand the responsibility, but also I can’t come into the job with the weight of all these fans on my back; I’d never do a good performance. I’ve got to kind of leave that at the door, because I’m never gonna please everyone with whatever I do in this role.”

Right now she’s starring in the comedy film caper Pixie, an Irish spaghetti western (a colcannon western?) by industry veteran Barnaby Thompson. For all its Guy Ritchie-style shenanigans, crisscrossing plotlines and cast of misfits – including Alec Baldwin as the head of a criminal cartel of Catholic priests and Black Books′ Dylan Moran as a particularly sadistic drug runner – the film is a vehicle for Cooke’s charm.

Cooke, who broke out with major roles in indie hit Me and Earl and the Dying Girl and Steven Spielberg’s Ready Player One, and more recently inspired acclaim for her sensitive portrayal opposite a dynamic Riz Ahmed in Amazon’s Sound of Metal, says Pixie – an opportunistic young woman out for a final financial score following the death of her mother – offered a unique chance to indulge in a complicated yet “unapologetic” female lead.

“She’s just so manipulative and conniving and completely in it for herself, and yet so aware of the allure she has around guys and just uses it to her advantage,” she says of the character.

Shot in Belfast in Northern Ireland and the brawny west coast of Ireland around Sligo, the film’s rugged scenery is its own big-screen revelation.

“It’s gorgeous, just beautiful,” says Cooke recalling the two-month stint on location. “The Irish travel board must be thrilled.”

Pixie opens in cinemas on Thursday.