It’s mortifying to watch a sex scene in a movie or show with your family, especially when you’re a teenager, but for Maisie Williams, it’s part of the job. The actress was 14 years old when Game of Thrones premiered, and she would watch the violent and sexually graphic show with her parents and grandmother (who had to be plied with “more and more gin”). “The sex was just quite embarrassing and awkward for us,” Williams told The Australian.
Williams’ and [Sophie] Turner’s mothers stopped shielding them from the show’s graphic sex and violence early on, when they debated taking the girls out of a read-through of a scene featuring two girls “going at it” — trying to keep their daughters in the dark only served to pique their interest… “Most of the gory stuff I was part of, and it’s not scary when you’re there shooting it. No one’s really getting their face ripped off. So it’s quite exciting really.” (Via)
Turner has previously said that she discovered what oral sex was after reading a Game of Thrones script (“I guess that was my sex education”). Anyway, the two women “going at it” likely refers to the scene in season one where Littlefinger explains his past while also instructing Ros and Armeca how to, um, please customers in his brothel (it led to the creation of the term “sexposition”).
Williams also discussed the criticism that Thrones mistreats its female characters. “I’ve never, ever felt like this is a misogynistic show,” she said. “The best and most powerful characters are all women… I’ve only ever been inspired by the women, and how they gain power and control and take their destinies into their own hands.” As long as they don’t have to watch sex scenes with their grandmother, that is.
(Via The Australian and Winter Is Coming)