Game of Thrones actress Hannah Waddingham, who played Unella on the hit HBO show, has shared new details on what it was like filming a particularly painful scene that she described as the worst day of her life (besides childbirth).
Cersei (Lena Headey) gets revenge on Unella by basically waterboarding her. You might have thought this would be done through CG or some kind of camera trick, but this was a practical stunt. And it was horrible, Waddingham said to Collider.
“And there I was strapped to a wooden table with proper big straps for ten hours. And definitely, other than childbirth, it was the worst day of my life,” she said.
“Because Lena was uncomfortable pouring liquid in my face for that long, and I was beside myself. But in those moments you have to think, ‘Do you serve the piece and get on with it or do you chicken out and go, ‘No, this isn’t what I signed up for, blah, blah, blah?'”
She decided to go forward with the shoot, and the scene is indeed very brutal and uncomfortable to watch. Showrunner Dan Weiss told Waddingham that, in order to sell the scene as authentic, Cersei would need to pour a lot of wine on Unella. So she agreed to film the scene with the hope that the production company would call cut if things go too scary.
“It was Dan Weiss that came up to me and went, ‘Look, in the script it says Cersei empties the remainder of her glass of red wine to wake up Unella. People aren’t gonna think that’s enough. What you’ve put her character through, that is not enough retribution for Cersei, especially the kind of person that she is. It needs to be more like a three quarter full [glass], also if we can cheat it even more carafe of wine,'” Waddingham said.
“And that’s what I mean about that moment of fight or flight. I just thought, ‘Do you know what?’ The one thing I kept thinking to myself, ‘The production company aren’t going to let you die, so get on with it, be uncomfortable.’ As long as you feel like there’s not any genuine threat of something happening, push yourself, be uncomfortable. It’s the same as if people don’t cry on camera, don’t impart this emotion to the right moment. Why not? My whole thing has always been, take people to the absolute nth degree of their emotions and that’s the same thing. Give of yourself and then it gives back to you.”
Waddingham currently stars on Ted Lasso as AFC Richmond’s owner, Rebecca. The Apple TV series returns for its second season this July. Game of Thrones is continuing as well with a prequel TV series called House of the Dragon that’s coming in 2022–check out new images.
