“It was a very special moment for me, which I won’t forget,” reveals Gwendoline Christie about her highlight scene from fantasy drama blockbuster “Game of Thrones,” in which she plays the stoic Brienne of Tarth. In “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms,” the second episode of the final season of the show, when Brienne is knighted her unbridled joy is a sight to behold as she has finally achieved her dream, after years of perseverance, pain and heartache. Watch our exclusive video interview with Christie above.
Brienne of Tarth is one of the most beloved characters among the show’s cast of thousands, played by Christie as a formidable and fiercely loyal warrior. For years she has fought valiantly alongside armies of men, striving for recognition and equality, her journey culminating in a profoundly touching moment in the show as she is finally knighted by none other than Jaime Lannister (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau), the man she has grown to love.
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“Brienne doesn’t smile, I really took that on board,” the actress explains when reflecting on how special that scene was to her. “I was thinking with each season, it was always in the back of my mind, when will she smile? When would it be appropriate for her to smile? I didn’t want to throw it away and I didn’t want to waste it,” she says. “When she’s knighted, it felt to me that that’s the time that we see Brienne smile because that’s about her achieving her dreams on her own terms. That she is made a Ser. That she achieves the impossible. That she steps outside of gender boundaries, and it’s just about the choices she’s made and how she’s chosen to live her life.”
“It hit me very strongly, and it all came out in that smile,” Christie admits. “It really struck me and for the character to feel that kind of support and the magical radiance in that moment.”
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After seven seasons on the most popular show on the planet, Christie says that she will probably never get tired of talking about her experience playing a character like Brienne. The character means so much to her not only because of how it has changed her life, but mostly because of what she represents: “a woman with an innately feminist outlook,” she explains.
“I think that’s what I love about playing the character is that there’s this incredibly unconventional character who nobody liked. She’s mocked, she’s very much outside of that society, she is a misfit. But she creates her own path, and through her own self-belief she creates her own life and her own identity and its uncompromising. Also, she has a truly altruistic outlook and she dedicates herself to a life of service,” Christie reveals. “But we see her evolve over the last couple of seasons and particularly in the final season her get in touch with her own wants, needs and desires, and we see her vulnerability and we see her take risks and it be about her as a woman as opposed to being about her as a machine.”
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