A ‘Game Of Thrones’ Star Is ‘Thankful’ He Was Killed Off The Show

Sansa, Bran, and Arya survived all eight seasons of Game of Thrones, but not every Stark was so lucky: Ned was beheaded, Rickon zigged when he should have zagged, and Catelyn was killed during the Red Wedding. Robb also didn’t make it out of the wedding alive, after he was stabbed by Roose Bolton, but actor Richard Madden thinks his early departure from the series was a blessing.

As part of the “Actors on Actors” series, Variety had the Bodyguard star speak to Amy Adams, who asked him when he was killed off Thrones. “I died at the end of season three,” Madden replied. “It was such a hard thing to finish because from first pilot to my death was five years. But five years was a great time to be on the show.” The actor said he learned a lot from “shooting 30 hours of television” and doesn’t envy his former co-stars who were for the full run.

“You really start to learn the trade doing that. And then I was thankful to leave it. The actors on it now must be 11 years into playing these characters. Give these guys some medals, because that is a marathon.” (Via)

Those actors, including Emilia Clarke and Kit Harington, would probably settle for an Emmy. Speaking of, the following cast members submitted themselves for Emmys consideration: Harington, Clarke, Alfie Allen, Pilou Asbæk, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Peter Dinklage, Richard Dormer, Gwendoline Christie, Lena Headey, Sophie Turner, Maisie Williams, and Carice van Houten. Amusingly, the episodes that are widely regarded as the best in season eight, “Winterfell” and “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms,” were deemed not-Emmy-worthy by HBO, but the polarizing finale, the D.B. Weiss and David Benioff-written and -directed “The Iron Throne,” was. It’s like Bohemian Rhapsody being up for Best Film Editing at the Oscars all over again, and we know how that played out.

Anyway, here’s Madden’s chat with Adams.

(Via Variety)