GoT fans are no strangers to graphic scenes and explicit content. But before the show actually aired, most viewers would have struggled to imagine just how much sex and violence was part of it.
It’s generally considered that the explicit content helped make the show the enormous success it became, partly because it helped create this gritty and sordid world the characters inhabited, but also because it didn’t feel gratuitous.
And it wasn’t just fans who were shocked by the content of the show. Emilia Clarke, who played Daenerys Targaryen, admitted to being ‘terrified’ prior to shooting intimate scenes with Jason Momoa (Khal Drogo).
Momoa was an established star when filing began on Game of Thrones, having already portrayed Jason Ioane in Baywatch and Ronon Dex in Stargate Atlantis. Clarke, on the other hand, was straight out of drama school.
In an interview with Dax Shepard in 2019 for the Armchair Expert podcast, she said it was only when she was reading the script – after accepting the role as Dany – that she realised what “the catch” was. However, she said she “approached it as a job” and accepted that, if it was in the script, it was there for a reason.
Although that didn’t stop her from feeling slightly overawed by being on set – particularly as she was naked.
“I’ve never been on a film set like this before,” she said, “and I’m now…completely naked with all of these people”.
And it wasn’t even just the nudity that made her feel overwhelmed. Indeed, she’s pretty sure she would have had “imposter syndrome” throughout filming for most of the first series regardless.
Nonetheless, standing on set with absolutely no clothes on thinking “I don’t know what I’m meant to do, and I don’t know what’s expected of me” was enough to bring her to tears. Thankfully, Momoa was there to help look after her and make the whole thing a bit more bearable.
“He was crying more than I was,” Clarke said. And he made her feel as though he cared about her “as a human being”, frequently yelling “Can we get her a f***ing robe? She’s shivering.”
In the end, of course, Clarke became a star of the show and was widely praised for her fabulous acting that took Daenerys on a massive journey of change.
As such, she’ll be remembered far more for her character arc than for the nudity that was part of the role. But at the time, when she was first stood for the first time, naked and confused on a film set, it’s easy to understand why she didn’t quite feel that way.
