Nathalie Emmanuel talks about Missandei's evolution into a “career woman”

Game of Thrones is full of great characters, and we keep getting new characters which are equally as good. The thing that sets them apart from most other TV shows, that the characters seem to change a lot. Many of the characters we first hated are now some of the best characters on the show, and many of those who started off seeming weak, are now the strongest characters on the show. One such character is Missandei, who went from being a slave to Daenerys Targaryen‘s trusted translator. Nathalie Emmanuel, who plays the role of Missandei on the show, recently talked about her transformation. Read on!

Nathalie Emmanuel, on her recent visit to Cape Town and South Africa, went over to the KFM Breakfast radio show. She talked about a lot of things, including, obviously, Game of Thrones. Watch the full video of the interview, below:

She started off talking about how she ended up on the show. She recalled:

“When I auditioned for Game of Thrones, I was like [a] hardcore fan, fully invested in seasons one and two. And I feel like only a really small percentage of people knew of the show. It was usually people that had read the books. It was a really niche thing. And it’s amazing to see how universal it’s become, and so many more people watch it. You’ve got the “show fans” versus the “book fans” —it’s all like a big [thing.] And it’s great!”

She continued to talk about how it was a great opportunity for her. She said:

“To be a part of that show has been such a blessing, and it definitely opened up doors for me, because people wanted to talk about it when I went into auditions and it broke the ice straight away. That was the one thing that I really used to struggle with going into auditions. Now they would be like ‘Oh, I love the show!’, ‘I really like this’, and you know. So it’s automatically helped me in my auditioning cause I get to feel relaxed in the room, because people want to talk about this thing that I’m excited about too. Off the back of that, it definitely put me in vision of the producers or of the writers of the Fast and Furious franchise.”

Now, we know that Game of Thrones is a show that doesn’t hesitate killing off major characters, but somehow Missandei hasn’t met that fate yet. Nathalie seems to be pleasantly surprised with that. She talked about it when asked if the cast thinks about who will make it to the end of a season :

“To be honest, because of the show’s history (and the books’ as well, if you’ve read them), I think everyone has this ‘I’m probably gonna die’ thing, you know what I mean? And I think that I had that too, from the beginning, and the fact that we’ve got season seven coming out is insane —and I’m still there! It’s like ‘okay, no one’s noticed I’m here, maybe.’ They’d be like ‘oh yeah, she’s here! We should kill her!’”

She then talked about the evolution of Missandei on her duration on the show. Nathalie said:

“When I auditioned for that part, it was really vague in terms of the commitment. They were like ‘Three to five episodes, maybe future seasons…’ It could’ve been three episodes and that’s it. So, for me, the fact that my character has grown and become such a part of the show and a part of Daenerys’ journey has been such a joy and a blessing. I still pinch myself a little bit that she’s still there. [To] get to develop a character over a number of seasons, for any actor, is so fulfilling. It’s really fun playing Missandei and seeing her come from indoctrinated slave to freethinking, free-feeling, official ‘career woman.’”

We do agree that Missandei has had quite a run on the show, and we feel like she might just make it to the end. What do you think? Tell us in the comments, down below!

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