Jack Gleeson, better known to Game of Thrones fans as Joffrey Baratheon, made no secret about his plan to abandon Hollywood stardom after his stint in Westeros to return to academia. Before he completely leaves acting behind, he’s appearing in an “allegorical puppet show” called Bears in Space, which opens next month in London. During an interview with the Daily Beast to promote the play, he was asked about the “often brutal treatment of women” and admitted that some scenes were difficult to film.
“Yeah, of course; it’s a tricky thing when you are representing misogyny in that way because I wouldn’t say the show ever implicitly condones misogyny or any kind of violence towards women. But, perhaps, it’s still unfair or unjust to represent it even if the gloss on the representation is a negative one,” he told The Daily Beast.
“Obviously as a 23-year-old man, I can never put myself into the mindset of a woman who has been sexually assaulted, but I think that sometimes you have to represent awful things happening onscreen even if they’re for entertainment because you have to expose the brutality of them, because the chances are you’re not going to see that anywhere. So there’s a chance it engages some kind of empathy but it is a gray area. It might be very traumatic and stressful to watch those scenes.”
He went on to say he couldn’t weigh in on Sansa Stark’s rape scene in season five because he doesn’t watch the show; not because he dislikes the direction of the series, but because he found it impossible to suspend his disbelief after spending so much time on Game of Thrones sets with other actors.
He also said he was pro-nudity… so long as it wasn’t just the ladies getting naked:
“As I say, I don’t watch it so I can’t really comment, but I have heard that there is male nudity — so I think that is one good thing, to not just objectify women but also objectify the beauty of the male genitalia! We’re all objects together.”
What a positive message! The penis definitely does need a little more time in the Game of Thrones spotlight so people can appreciate its beauty. Thus far, the show has been really great at featuring sexy man butts, but is somewhat limited in the scope of its full frontal male nudity…
(Via the Daily Beast)
