Liam ‘Davos’ Cunningham talks about George Lucas’s Game Of Thrones set visit

George Lucas has inspired many a man’s envy no doubt, but the collective envy of the entire Game of Thrones fandom is probably not what he bargained for.

Creating the Star Wars universe and inspiring generations of fantasy creators has its perks. And so George Lucas has something that we would happily give our sword arms for: an exclusive sneak peek into the jealously guarded world of Game of Thrones Season 8.

We have already reported that George Lucas visited the Game of Thrones season 8 set as a special guest back in May 2018. Emilia Clarke, the common link between Game Of Thrones and Star Wars universes, had a funny anecdote to share about her star-struck reception of the legendary director, remember? Now more details of that special visit are emerging, and the source is none other than Liam Cunnigham, the actor behind the ever dependable Ser Davos Seaworth.

In a recent interview with RadioTimes.com Cunningham confirmed that Lucas had paid a visit to the Game of Thrones sets.

“George Lucas was there,” said Cunningham, “Yeah, him and his missus showed up on set. It was delightful.”

Although he insists that Lucas was not there to shoot a cameo as some rumors suggested, the Onion Knight isn’t averse to the idea. In fact, he thinks Lucas would have fitted quite snugly into the world of Westeros:

“He could have, with the beard! That’s not a bad idea. We should have stuck him in.”

While he rues his lack of pro-activeness, Cunningham is not too sure about the audience reception. After all, the last celebrity cameo with Ed Sheeran in season 7 did not sit well with many fans (Sheeran even quit Twitter temporarily following the backlash):

“Then people would have gone, ‘Are you f***ing kidding me? Who’s that behind Beric Dondarrion? I’m telling you, it’s f***ng George Lucas!’ ‘Man, you and that Star Wars sh**! Why don’t you let it lie?’”

But fans can rest assured. Lucas was only visiting out of a shared interest in high-power fantasy dramas, as Cunnigham revealed. As much as he is delighted by Lucas’s visit, Cunnigham stresses the importance of not taking all this attention to his head.

“We can’t take in the size of it or the cultural impact that it has … Because you start portraying what other people see of you … That’s deeply unprofessional.”

Instead, the Onion Knight prefers to take everything with a pinch of salt:

“You have to be slightly cynical about it, just to keep your feet on the ground and do your job. But we’ve all been transformed for this. It’s opened doors for everyone.”

Here’s wishing many more open doors for our dear Ser Davos. Who knows, Lucas himself might be behind one of them?

Looking for a few more spoilers on how Game of Thrones Season 8 finally plays out? Well, now you have a sturdy chance to know at least one character’s final arc. All you have to do is, somehow get access to Sophie Turner’s flat. That’s it, easy-peasy!

In a recent interview with Rolling Stones, the actor revealed that she has the storyboard of her last scene as Sansa Stark framed onto the wall of her new flat that she now shares with her fiance Joe Jonas. The storyboard was a present from showrunners David Benioff and DB Weiss on her last day of filming Game of Thrones.

Photograph by Nicole Nodland for ‘Rolling Stone.’

Turner says it was their favourite Sansa scene in the show, and also the very last scene of Sansa’s story in it. Already emotional because she was about to leave for good, Turner says this sweet gesture on their part moved her to tears.

Turner has been in the news before for being open-handed with Game Of Thrones secrets. Given the amount of insane security that the makers have ensured for the final season, is it wise to hang something as significant as Sansa’s final scene up on the wall? Turner is not perturbed, however. She says nobody has yet realized its significance.

This likely means the storyboard does not give away anything major. But what’s the harm in speculating? For one thing, it does not seem too disturbing or violent, because that surely have attracted attention, right? We know its Sansa’s last scene, we know it’s not violent – does that mean Sansa survives?

It does seem like a strong possibility. But who knows? This is Game of Thrones after all. For now, our best bet seems just to wait for April 14.

Game of Thrones is the world’s most popular fantasy TV series. We have seen the show pioneer the genre, as well as drive the television medium to what it is today. Needless to say, everybody else is running around, trying to replicate HBO‘s success. Just take Amazon’s upcoming Lord of The Rings series. However, there’s some bad news for Game of Thrones in all of this – there’s a possibility that we might not get to see our favourite Game Of Thrones stars in some of the upcoming fantasy shows.

Speaking at MCM Comic-Con Birmingham, Game of Thrones actor Ian Beattie (Ser Meryn Trant) said that Game of Thrones actors are banned from auditioning for a certain upcoming fantasy show, which is based on a video game. You might remember Beattie, who had quite a remarkable exit from Game of Thrones:

Beattie said:

“It’s quite unusual because there was another show, that I’d rather not name if you don’t mind, which was auditioning. It’s based on a video game and I can’t remember if Amazon or Netflix were doing it. But at the bottom of the casting call: ‘No Game of Thrones actors’.”

There are rumors that say that Beattie is speaking about the upcoming The Witcher TV series, which is set to star Henry Cavill.

He continued:

“And that’s not the first time that’s happened. And I’m thinking, there’s some pretty bloody good actors in Game of Thrones. What the heck? But they did not want any form of brand recognition. That’s to do with the identity of the show. This is obviously a show that sees itself as a Game of Thrones-type show.”

Beattie makes a good point. If you’re a big production house that wants to create a competitor to such a big franchise, you obviously don’t want to make it too similar. With Game of Thrones, the actors are very recognizable by the fan base, and as a series in the same domain with chances of sharing the fan base, this kind of a decision seems smart. Not so good for Game of Thrones actors looking for their next break, though. Beattie threw some shade on the project on his way out:

“It isn’t out yet, it’s being made I think as we speak. So they obviously don’t want any crossover whatsoever, which is fair enough. I won’t be watching it, but OK.”

What do you think about the whole thing? Talk to us in the comments, down below!

Game of Thrones has been HBO’s poster child for nearly a decade now. Game of Thrones came in at a time when the television medium was at a decline. HBO managed to make the bold decision of bringing it to TV, and boy did it pay off. As we move towards the end of the show, HBO is already gearing up for a follow up, with multiple prequels for the show already in development. Former HBO CEO Richard Plepler recently said that these are “something special.”

Plepler was the one who greenlit Game of Thrones. After the recent buyout of HBO by AT&T, Plepler decided it was time to leave the company, and is no longer at HBO. On his way out, however, Plepler is still proud of Game of Thrones and the direction it is taking, moving forward.

A recent piece that Variety did on Kit Harington mentions Plepler’s comments on the prequels. Plepler said that the idea behind the prequels is:

“…something special. We weren’t just trying to re-engineer the genes of what ‘Game of Thrones’ was, but we had a fresh, exciting perspective that didn’t let the franchise go away.”

Plepler also discussed the show’s high point, where the public curiosity surrounding Jon Snow‘s death was at a record high. even the then President of the United States, Barack Obama, a well known fan of the show, asked Plepler about whether Jon was really dead. Plepler apparently replied with:

“Mr. President, even your security clearance isn’t high enough to give you the answer to that.”

Well, we hope Plepler has a fruitful future outside of HBO. As someone who made the decision to give us this beautiful show, he totally deserves it. What do you guys think? Talk to us in the comments, down below!

 

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