Kit Harrington Started Hating Game of Thrones After This Episode
The lead star of Game of Thrones wasn’t exactly against his own show until one point: this episode made him struggle and borderline hate his character and career.
Game of Thrones was an international phenomenon and still remains one even after the (not-so-grand) finale: millions of people regularly rewatch the show, discuss it, and develop theories and speculations. To say that the audience and even the industry in general benefited from GoT wouldn’t be an exaggeration in the slightest.
Of course, everyone involved with the show also won from being part of it — especially, the lead actors. Apart from some already famous performers like Sean Bean, many others were virtually unknown to the wider audience, and Game of Thrones turned them into global superstars. It affected the cast’s careers drastically.
But even among the younger stars, no one benefitted from the show quite as much as Emilia Clarke and Kit Harrington — the actors who played Daenerys Targaryen and Jon Snow, respectively. However, everything comes at a price, and for Kit Harrington, that price was his own mental health. He went to a dark place on Game of Thrones.
“I went through some mental health difficulties after Thrones, and during the end of Thrones, to be honest. I think it was directly due to the nature of the show and what I had been doing for years,” the actor shared on SiriusXM.
Up until one point, Harrington was pretty chill about being part of Game of Thrones, but once the focus of the show shifted to his character, the pressure was too much.
“My darkest period was when the show seemed to become so much about Jon when he died and came back. I really didn’t like the focus of the whole show coming onto Jon. When you become the cliffhanger of a TV show probably at the height of its power, the focus on you is f*cking terrifying,” explained the GoT star.
After the finale of Game of Thrones, Kit Harrington took a year off to work out his mental health and shake off the insane pressure of being the focal point of the world’s most popular TV show. This time allowed the actor to get his bearings, and once he was ready, Harrington came back in full strength to explore his career further.
Source: SiriusXM via YouTube