Enchanting Emilia Clarke

September 01 2017

Press: Costume Designer Says Dany’s Outfits Reflect ‘Chemistry’

HUFFINGTON POST – On “Game of Thrones,” no detail is too small.

That’s especially true for Michele Clapton, longtime costume designer on the HBO hit that claims millions of fans across the globe. Clapton has taken charge of designing dresses, cloaks and armor ― with occasionally unexpected objects ― over all but one season of “Game of Thrones,” but not even she always knows what to expect from the show’s famously secretive creators.

Still, Clapton takes care to reflect internal journeys outwardly among the wide-ranging cast of characters, meaning there’s often more than meets the eye when you’re watching. Because she gets input from showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss, along with other insiders, taking a good, hard look at the outfits of each main character can sometimes lead to some valuable insights.

As many fans have speculated, that’s certainly the case for Daenerys (Emilia Clarke), whose scaly militaristic dress reflects her Season 7 mission to retake control of Westeros for her house ― all while negotiating her relationship with a certain puppy-eyed Northern leader.

“This season seemed to be the right time for Daenerys to start to embrace the shape and colours of her house,” Clapton told HuffPost in an email. “She is in touching distance of her desired place … so I liked this flowering, this visual expression of her growing confidence that she could maybe take the throne.”

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August 29 2017

Press: Han Solo: Emilia Clarke’s Character Name Revealed?

SCREENRANT – The name of Emilia Clarke’s mystery character in the young Han Solo spinoff movie seems to have been revealed. Like all modern day Lucasfilm projects, the second Star Wars anthology film has been closely shrouded in secrecy as new director Ron Howard makes his way through production. Among the questions fans have are the identities of the fresh faces viewers will meet in this adventure through a galaxy far, far away. As was the case with all its predecessors, Han Solo is introducing some new characters to appear alongside Han, Lando Calrissian, and Chewbacca. Only one name has been revealed so far – Woody Harrelson’s Beckett, Han’s mentor.

This means we still have much to learn about most of the ensemble, including Clarke. The Game of Thrones star is locked in to play the female lead, promising her character is “awesome” and celebrating Instagram milestones with Chewbacca on-set. She seems to have a prominent role, making her the subject of much interest as fans wait for the film to come out. Finally, one detail about Clarke’s character has been revealed – her name.

In an interview with Vanity Fair, actor Michael K. Williams (who just left Han Solo due to scheduling conflicts), spilled the beans when he said his alien character had “a link between Han Solo and Emilia’s character, Kira.” The website Making Star Wars followed this up, assuring this is “not a misquote,” but spelled slightly differently. Per their sources, Clarke’s character is called Kura. It’s unknown at this point in time which will become official canon come next May.

The other interesting tidbit included here is that Williams was portraying someone with a connection to Han and Kira, making it sound like he had an important role in the story. Of course, with Williams now off the project, some will wonder if the script was retooled to account for his leaving, or if the role has been recast. So much of Han Solo is being kept under wraps, so it’s difficult to say at this juncture how all the pieces fall into place. Hopefully, more information about the movie comes out soon, painting a clearer picture of what to expect.

Some fans may recall that Kira was the name originally used for Rey during pre-production on The Force Awakens before it was obviously changed, so Lucasfilm apparently liked the sound of it and wanted to use the name for another character. Viewers should not take that nugget of trivia and run with wild “Kira is Rey’s mom” theories, as this connection is most likely a coincidence. The point of the standalones is to show how expansive the galaxy can be, and “everyone’s related to each other” is already a widely-mocked trope in the Star Wars franchise. Kira (or Kura) should be someone free of any ties to the saga, giving Howard and company the freedom to create something new and fascinating.

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August 29 2017

Press: Emilia Clarke on Daenerys’ ‘heartbreaking’ loss

I meant to post this last week and didn’t but I wanted to make sure the fans saw it.

EW – It finally happened: Daenerys Targaryen lost one of her priceless children. The death of Viserion the dragon was the unexpectedly steep cost of Jon Snow’s mission to bring a wight south as proof of the Army of the Dead. Taken down by a spear hurled by the Night King himself, the twist proved that Mother of Dragons’ children are not as invulnerable as they usually seem. Potentially even worse is that the Night King then resurrected the dragon’s body to join his force, giving his undead army a powerful new weapon.

“It’s a heartbreak,” star Emila Clarke tells EW. “Not only losing it but having that being given to the other side.”

For Daenerys, the death of Viserion makes defeating the Army of the Dead all the more crucial, Clarke notes. “My dragon could not have died for nothing, so this is now so important,” she says. “For the first time, you’re starting to see her defenses broken.”

The actress admits she found it amusing, however, that of all the dragons to “join” the Night King’s team, it’s the one Dany named after her devious brother Viserys that was converted. “Of course it’s the rotten egg, of course you’d turn,” she quips.

Yet this moment of vulnerability shouldn’t let viewers forget that Daenerys has been making some rather brutal choices lately — such as her decision to roast the Tarlys that has Tyrion so concerned that she could eventually become as dangerous as her Mad King father.

“The biggest question this season for Dany is what side of the coin she’s on,” Clarke says. “The unequivocal nature in choosing to be this aggressive is something you haven’t seen before. She’s practiced patience and has this savior-like quality, but now it’s game on.”

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August 29 2017

Press: “Game of Thrones” Director Reveals Secrets Behind the Season 7 Finale

Here is a snippet from an interview with Jeremy Podeswa – Director of Episode 7.07 ‘The Dragon and The Wolf’ THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER

The revelation about Jon’s true origin comes juxtaposed with Jon and Daenerys’ first love scene. There’s some cognitive dissonance in play as a result, since this is arguably a heroic moment and a romantic moment … but Freud would have a field day, as well. What was the tonal balance you were trying to strike?

You’re getting an epic revelation in this sequence. It’s an epic revelation about the past, and an epic revelation that’s suggestive of the future and what’s going to happen. For us, it was very important that there be a question about what could possibly happen after this moment. We know now the full history that led to this moment, but now what’s going to happen? In the script, it described the fact that they were love-making, but it didn’t go into great detail in terms of what was going on between them as characters in that moment. We built in a moment between Kit and Emilia where they stopped for a moment and looked into each other’s eyes. The intention from my point of view, and their point of view too, is that they’re driven by passion into this. They don’t even fully understand what it’s all about and what the consequences of it are. They really can’t stop themselves. It’s almost destiny that’s bringing them together. There’s a moment where they’re like, “Are we actually going to continue doing this? Are we actually doing this?” And they can’t stop themselves. For me, that was really important, and that gets played out with Tyrion, too, because now he knows that this has happened and there are big questions for him and for everybody what the larger consequences of this are going to be.

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July 31 2017

Press: Game of Thrones stars discuss their first on-screen meeting

EW – This story contains spoilers from Game of Thrones season 7, episode 3, “The Queen’s Justice”

On Sunday night’s Game of Thrones, ice and fire finally came together.

Daenerys Targaryen (Emilia Clarke) and Jon Snow (Kit Harington) met for the first time in season 7’s third episode, “The Queen’s Justice.” And surprise-surprise — they didn’t exactly hit it off. Dany demanded Jon declare House Stark’s allegiance to her Targaryen claim for the Iron Throne while Jon begged for her assistance to help him fight the Army of the Dead — something she doesn’t believe even exists. Eventually, they struck an uneasy agreement, yet it’s unclear where they go from here.

“I predicted, like everyone, they would meet this season, but I don’t think I predicted it quite as quickly,” Harington told EW. “But then again, you’ve got to take yourself out of the mindset of the viewer. As far as Jon knows, he’s just meeting this queen he’s heard of and trying to negotiate with her — he’s not meeting Daenerys, who the audience has been watching for so many years. That helps with the surprise of it. He walks into the room and doesn’t expect to see such a beautiful young woman of similar age to him. Any young man’s reaction is going to be, ‘Okay…’ but he puts that aside, because he has to.”

Adds Clarke: “I had an idea it was coming this season, sure. It was fun to play — she doesn’t like him and she doesn’t believe him.”

It’s a meeting that showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss have been excited to unveil for years. “It was really fun to watch that scene and I thought they did a great job,” Benioff says. “There isn’t instant chemistry. He’s annoying and she’s annoying and they have to figure out how to make peace.”

Of course, as the audience has known since last season, Jon is very likely a Targaryen himself — and Dany is his aunt. Only Bran knows both sides of Jon’s parentage for certain, and he’s back at Winterfell.

One moment that gave Harington a bit of concern, however, was his scene with Tyrion (Peter Dinklage) on the cliff where he was wearing a long billowing cloak. “It was a beautiful location with 50 mph winds and I was wearing a cape next to a cliff,” he recalls. “There was a danger of me being blown off! I’m not sure it’s the way I would have wanted to go.”

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