Game of Thrones' Natalie Dormer: Margaery Seeks to Control JoffreyBy HANH NGUYENTwo women fighting over Joffrey? Only on Game of Thrones.
On HBO's fantasy drama (airing Sundays at 9/8c), Margaery Tyrell (Natalie Dormer) is the young king's (Jack Gleeson) energetic new fiancée... and the chief rival of his mother, the Queen Regent Cersei Lannister (Lena Headey).
"It's about having power and control over Joffrey," she tells TVGuide.com.
"I'm sure many of your readers will be able to identify with having problems with the mother-in-law. It's quite a human commentary, isn't it? The husband has to reconcile the No. 1 woman in his life going from being his mother to being his wife, and that's difficult for both women. Margaery is angling for control of Joffrey. If Margaery has control of the king, her family has control of the throne. Cersei is legitimately concerned about having that power over Joffrey taken away from her."Margaery is quickly making headway with Joffrey though. Not only is she attractive, wealthy and popular with the King's Landing people, but she knows how to flatter a fellow (and his crossbow). She had better be careful, however. It's not easy to keep the bloodthirsty and unpredictable Joffrey in check. Just ask his previous fiancée Sansa (Sophie Turner), whose father Ned (Sean Bean) he had beheaded despite promises to let him live.
Will Margaery underestimate her king? Dormer answers this question and more below:
How would you describe Margaery's ambition and ability to play the political game?
Natalie Dormer: The audience is very much acquainted with Joffrey and Cersei and they know the darkness and the danger of the Lannisters. The Tyrells have come and arrived at King's Landing, underestimating the situation. They think that they can control the Lannisters and can take them on. They're going to get a nasty shock. Even though they are great politicians and pragmatists, I think the Tyrells weren't quite expecting the level of gameplay and danger that find against their in-laws-to-be. The interesting thing about Margaery is that yes, she is an opportunist. Margaery is very much the protégé of the Queen of Thorns, Lady Olenna, Diana Rigg's character. There's a pragmatism to her. She knows how to survive.
Can Margaery match the Lannisters in the scheming department? Her charity seems calculated.
Dormer: The interesting thing to play for me is where the calculation starts and the sincerity stops. I think people can get Margaery wrong; she is a sincere, genuine girl. She has genuine sympathy for Sansa. And I don't think her public PR is completely disingenuous. We're all used to politicians kissing babies ... I don't think she's necessarily a calculating bitch who likes playing the public and likes playing everyone around her. She's trying to reconcile being a good human being and being a good ruler. She genuinely thinks that if she marries Joffrey and has a son, she can create a good, strong, peaceful king sitting on the throne with her as the Queen Mother type of thing.
What does Margaery think of Sansa's revelation that Joffrey is a monster?
Dormer: I think there's genuine trepidation there, definitely. That's the way Diana and myself were playing it. This is a genuinely dark, dangerous problem. At least it's not going to be easy. Of course she's scared; she's not immune to fear. The beauty of writing Thrones is that the characters aren't immune to fear. It's now her struggle to now conquer it.
There's an intriguing line that Margaery says when she's admiring Joffrey's crossbow: "I imagine it must be so exciting to squeeze your finger here and watch something die over there." Is she just playing him or is she really intrigued by that dark side?
Dormer: Margaery is not safe. Although that scene was shot in a very sensual, sexual way, it's more psychological than that. She's trying to work out what makes Joffrey tick because if she can work out what makes Joffrey tick, she can control him. And not just control him in a nasty, manipulative way, but control him for the better of the kingdom. Joffrey is a loose cannon. Manipulation of a person is not necessarily a negative. We manipulate our children in trying to make them better people. It's about psychology. Margaery is a student of psychology.
I remember the director said to me, "He's holding a crossbow at you when you walk into the room. It's like somebody holding an AK-47 on you. That's the Westeros equivalent." The guy, my fiancé, is holding a gun pointed at me as I walk into the room. So it's like, take a deep breath and try to find a way to point it in the opposite direction. It's an echo of that previous scene when Joffrey holds a crossbow pointed at Sansa. There's a direct comparison there of, "How does that girl handle it? How does this girl handle it?" There's genuine fear there. She's working really, really hard because I think she knows how deep the water she's swimming in is.
Margaery doesn't seem to be having much luck with Cersei though...
Dormer: She has another great scene where she's trying to work Cersei out and she completely misfires. She doesn't win that scene as she does with Joffrey. She doesn't get what she needs out of it: information. She realizes that she's even more lost at sea with Cersei than she thought she was.
What is the dynamic between Sansa and Margaery?
Dormer: It's tentative because the two women are in quite a scary world, and it would be oh-so-much nicer and more reassuring if they could actually be friends. Had those two girls met in another situation, under different circumstances, it's highly likely that they'd genuinely be friends. They both come from privileged families, ruling families, and they both come from close families. We both know how close the Starks are, and it's commented on that the Tyrells are a close family as well. I don't think it's beyond the realm of reason that in different circumstances, Margaery and Sansa would be completely, innocently genuine friends.
Margaery looks up to her grandmother Lady Olenna. Is that how you view Dame Diana Rigg, who plays Olenna?
Dormer: Insofar as Dame Diana Rigg, the Tony Award-winning actress is a veteran, and when you're in the midst of a grand dame like that, you just sit back and you watch and you learn. So there's a nice parallel there for Sophie and I as younger actresses to listen and learn the way Margaery and Sansa would listen and learn from Olenna. I think that parallel is obvious and completely creditable.
Diana Rigg is a joy to work with. We had a nice glass of wine in a bar at the hotel after our first day at work. We both had our wig and wimple off. She told me old stories going back to the theater she's done, the people she's worked with back in the '60s and '70s. She's a legend. It's great to hear those old war stories. I'm sure off-camera, Olenna is doing the same with Margaery, telling her all the gossip of the old days of Highgarden and King's Landing, doing what grandmothers and granddaughters do: having a bit of gossip.
What's coming up for Margaery?
Dormer: It's about Margaery realizing what she can and can't control and who she can and can't control and what that means for the future. And the other side of the wedding, if we get to the wedding, how she's reconciling herself to this cage. The cage that Cersei herself talks about. Margaery is reconciling herself to the cage and at the minute she's struggling to see how big she can make the cage for herself.
Game of Thrones' Sophie Turner is a very down to earth princessBy BAZ BAMIGBOYESophie Turner, one of the stars of TV’s Game Of Thrones, is watched by millions. There are countless websites devoted to the character she plays in the hit drama, and Hollywood has come a-courting.
But just to keep her on terra firma, her mother gives her a daily list of household chores and, just in case that doesn’t do it, her two older brothers often watch her acting work and usually end up telling her ‘That was awful!’ — for which she’s grateful.
‘They’re not afraid to put me down, as brothers should,’ said Sophie, who has played the teen princess Sansa Stark on Game Of Thrones for the past three years.
I liked her even more when she told me she found Hollywood claustrophobic — and couldn’t wait to get back to the Warwickshire village she calls home.
‘It’s in the heart of England and has a windmill, church, some houses and cottages,’ the 17-year-old told me.
‘About 50 people live there and everyone pretty much knows everyone.
'But I don’t think they know what I’m doing and I don’t tell anyone. They probably think I’m at school.’During our meeting at the Union Club in Soho, Sophie drank nothing stronger than water.
When she’s filming (interiors are shot in Belfast and exteriors in Croatia), she joins the rest of the cast in the pub for a virgin mojito.
She may not be old enough to drink, but at least she’s now treated as an adult on set, which she enjoys. Until she turned 17, she had to work special hours, having 15-minute breaks every couple of hours.
‘I never liked taking the breaks and it meant the adult actors had to wait around if I was in the next scene. It was probably annoying for them. Now I work adult hours and I like it.’
And what about all the nudity on Games Of Thrones? (
Uggghhhh at the fact that she's already being asked questions like this.)
‘I’ve never been in any nude scenes — so far,’ she said.Playing Sansa, who for a time was engaged to cruel King Joffrey, has been a showcase for her acting talents, which have delighted viewers of Sky Atlantic in the UK, HBO in the U.S. and millions who have bought DVDs of the first two series.
The camera loves her blue-grey eyes, and she’s being sent scripts for every teen role going. She reads all of them and would like to play a variety of roles — not just princesses.Last year, she filmed the psychological drama Panda Eyes for Spanish director Isabel Coixet and it’s due out later in the year. She plays a young woman haunted by a trauma rooted in her childhood.
Sophie runs her fingers through her long, strawberry blonde hair (her tresses are dyed auburn for the show) and then scoots, entourage-free, into the street for a bit of shopping at Topshop. A very down-to-earth princess.
5 Things to Know About 'Game of Thrones' Star Oona ChaplinBy KELLY WOOA woman must be quite something to steal the heart of a king.
As the beautiful healer Talisa on "Game of Thrones," Oona Chaplin is all fire to Robb Stark's ice. She's certainly melted his heart, so much that the would-be king broke an important engagement promise to marry Talisa instead.
Chaplin doesn't just play a queen, though; she's Hollywood royalty off-screen, as well. Yes, she is related to that Chaplin, who has been called "the first truly great figure of twentieth-century fame." In the book "Fame in the 20th Century" by Clive James, the author wrote, "'The Tramp' was from the twentieth century. Thanks to the nearly universal reach of silent film, [Charlie Chaplin] was the most recognizable figure on Earth. And the man who played the role made himself famous too." Paying tribute to her grandfather, the "Thrones" star rocked his signature bowler hat on the red carpet of the show's premiere.
Here are five things to know about the 26-year-old actress:1. She's the granddaughter of Charlie Chaplin and the great-granddaughter of Eugene O'Neill.Chaplin is named for her grandmother, Oona, the daughter of the great, Pulitzer and Nobel-winning playwright O'Neill ("Long Day's Journey Into Night,""The Iceman Cometh"). The elder Oona defied her father and turned down author J.D. Salinger to marry the iconic movie star, who was 36 years her senior. The couple had eight children, including the younger Oona's mother, Geraldine.
Sadly, Chaplin never met her famous grandfather, who died almost a decade before she was born. "When people say 'Charlie Chaplin' I still think now of the guy in the moustache and bowler hat and funny walk -- I don't think of an old man who was my grandfather," she told The Independent.
"I never met him, which probably adds to the confusion. There are moments, even now, when I sort of go 'Whoa ... my blood has some of that in it? It's amazing, but it kind of freaks me out sometimes."
2. She speaks three languages.Since her mother, Geraldine, was an actress and her father, Patricio Castilla, a cinematographer, Chaplin spent much of her early life on sets and visiting family in Spain, Switzerland, Cuba, Scotland, Chile, and England. Thanks to that globe-trotting childhood, she can speak Spanish, French, and English fluently (in that order!).
3. She's an accomplished flamenco and salsa dancer.Chaplin took ballet, salsa, and flamenco dance lessons since she could walk. Some of that may have been inherited from her grandfather. "He was an incredible dancer and I can move," she said.
But it also comes from spending time with her father's side of the family in Cuba. Now, Chaplin can often be found heating up dance floors in London. "There's an amazing salsa night at the Colosseum nightclub," she told The Telegraph. "I'll be mainly found in the Cuban salsa room, which is always really hot but the people there know how to dance. I'll be on my feet until I'm kicked out at 4 AM."
4. She's besties with her "Game of Thrones" co-star Natalia Tena, who plays Osha.Not all of the "Game of Thrones" cast works together, since they film in several different countries, but one person Chaplin has gotten close to is Natalia Tena, who plays Osha the Wildling. Her Twitter pics are full of the redhead, who you may also remember as Nymphadora Tonks in the "Harry Potter" movies.
5. She was almost a Bond girl.Chaplin tried out for the role of Bond Girl Strawberry Fields in "Quantum of Solace," but her good friend Gemma Arterton got it instead.
For the movie, Chaplin was a "gloried extra. My minute and a half of glory ... I brought in a beer ... and then I ran away. It was a fun five days."While the Bond thing didn't work out, Chaplin didn't have to wait long for her break. Just a couple years later, in 2011, she landed the part of Marnie, the wife of Hector (Dominic West) in the acclaimed British drama "The Hour."
Sources:123Oona is totally awesome and does not get posted about enough, tbh. And Natalie and Sophie remain perfect. Anyway, what are you looking forward to in tonight's episode?