House of the Dragon BTS Drama: Considine's Heartbreaking Connection to Viserys
In House of the Dragon, Paddy Considine portrayed King Viserys' attempts to maintain peace between warring factions in his family. We now know that his efforts were in vain. Viserys was also battling illness and in episode 8, his health problems finally caught up with him and the king passed away.
Huge credit goes to the makeup team who cleverly showed Viserys' gradual decline over the course of those 8 episodes as the king grew ever weaker before finally succumbing to the inevitable.
His diseased appearance was not an easy watch for fans, but it was even harder for Considine who revealed in an appearance on the Adam Buxton Podcast that brought back memories of his own father's battle with cancer that sadly ended in his death.
He described how just a brief glimpse of Viserys' gaunt skeleton-like appearance at the end of episode 8 was enough to bring back those horrid memories of his dad's rapid decline from diagnosis to death.
Considine said that he didn't actually watch the episode but that his wife and daughter did. They were "pretty upset with it" he said, but his wife urged him to just watch the very end.
He did. And the skeletal image of his own face on screen was "the image of (his dad)". So much so that Considine burst into tears, describing the deathly face of King Viserys as "shocking".
He had actually put many of his mum's characteristics into Viserys, who he described as "probably the best character I've ever played". But when it came to that final scene of the king's life, he only saw his dad. "It was terrifying," he said. But he was also able to appreciate how powerful the scene and the whole story of Viserys' end of life was.
And there is a sad irony in the fact that the death of King Viserys turned out to be the catalyst for the Targaryen civil war he had been so desperate to avoid. And there, of course, the parallel ends. Viserys would have been distraught by what happened to his offspring following his death, and the chaos they caused. Paddy Considine's father, on the other hand, can look down on his son's career and be immensely proud that his boy was able to portray such a character and provide millions of viewers with a powerful and impactive storyline.