Kit Harington says playing Jon Snow led to “mental health difficulties’
After the show's conclusion in 2019, the Eternals star took a year off from acting
TV News Kit Harington
Game Of Thrones’ Kit Harington has opened up about the “mental health difficulties” he experienced during filming and after the show’s end. In his appearance on The Jess Cagle Show this week, the actor reveals he took a year off from acting once the show concluded, and discusses how working on the intense and violent HBO show took its toll on him off-camera.
“I went through some mental health difficulties after Thrones, and during the end of Thrones, to be honest,” he explains. “I think it was directly to do with the nature of the show and what I had been doing for years.”
Harington famously played the heroic Jon Snow in the fantasy series over the course of 62 episodes. He’s talked before about how the reception of his character in the beginning of the series affected him, namely when people called his Jon Snow “boring.” He also contended with the built-in pressures of playing such a prominent character. In 2019, it was reported that Harington checked into a mental health and wellness facility for “personal issues.”
After taking a much needed year off following GOT’s wrap up, Harington stepped into a lighter role in Amazon’s second season of Modern Love, based off The New York Times column of the same name. He’s to star in one of the many romantic storylines as Michael, a man who sparks an unexpected connection with a woman (played by Lucy Boynton) while on a train ride.
“Doing this Modern Love episode was a bit like, you don’t have to live in that intense place all the time. Why don’t you do something that takes the weight off?” Harington says. “Why don’t you do something fun? I think that was part of my thinking on this one.”
Despite being one of the most prominent characters in Game Of Thrones, Harington made it clear he would not be return to the role for any of the spinoff series, even before the original series reached its end. While he might not suit up as Jon Snow any time soon, he will appear as a different type of hero—the Black Knight—in Marvel’s forthcoming Eternals, directed by Chloé Zhao.
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“While he might not suit up as Jon Snow any time soon, he will appear as a different type of hero—the Black Knight—in Marvel’s forthcoming , directed by Chloé Zhao.“Though, the Black Knight has his own problems…
You’re a week late. We don’t care about this any more.
It makes sense that Jon Snow seemed boring in the show to some people, but it’s kind of interesting to contrast it to the book. Robb was a nothing character who basically only existed to have Jon’s status as Eddard’s firstborn, but in the show, he was much more a typical fantasy hero than Jon. It makes the Red Wedding hit completely differently.
Yeah, it always struck me weird how they weren’t able to do Jon’s chapters justice in the show. They’re always a breeze to get through compared to other slogs (sorry Cat and Bran). But in the show they’re just kind of there. I get that some of it’s budget and runtime, but Kit’s performance never really struck me as boring, just the writing.
Robb was also much younger, yes? Like 14-15, IIRC (and kind of a war strategy prodigy) as opposed to the show’s Robb who was clearly an adult.
Yeah. They were basically the same age because Eddard’s betrothal to Catelyn was pretty close in time to his relationship with Jon’s rumored mother, but I don’t think Jon’s parentage has been definitively addressed in the books, even now. I stopped watching the show after they started lapping the books, but I heard that they did end up settling it there.
It’s been hinted at strongly but never outright confirmed
It’s essentially confirmed at this point. The showrunners got that plot twist directly from Martin and all involved were pretty forthright about the process. Including the show and the author’s involvment it has been made quite clear that R+L=J is 100% true.
It’s been years since I read them but the hints seemed screamingly obvious to me.
Yeah, there’s a story about how GRRM felt comfortable with the showrunners because they guess that R+L=J, and I remember hearing that and being absolutely stunned that GRRM’s bar for feeling comfortable with a showrunner was that they had read at least one of the books.
I suppose it could have been a major red flag if they couldn’t guess R+L=J.
I think Jon is pretty boring in the books, too, at least at first. It’s like complaining that Jack Gleeson made Joffrey seem an intolerable piece of shit.
I like book Jon’s development better. At least book Jon goes from mopey, naive teenager to an at least somewhat competent leader. I get why a lot of that isn’t in the show, it’s not terribly exciting to show someone restoring the wall outposts or advising Stannis to take the mountain route to develop alliances with the hill clans, but it meant show Jon seemed more like hapless schmoe who kept failing upward, as opposed to someone who had shed a lot of his illusions about honor and glory to try and become a practical leader.
Oh, I agree. I like boring dumb Jon anyway, so it’s not like that characterization on screen was going to bother me much. Of course, almost all the characters were better in the book than on screen, with only some skilled performances of secondary characters like Littlefinger and Varys being possible outliers. Maybe Robert too, for all that his character just has to be fat and bad at his job, then die.
??I was really into Robb’s story in the books; I did not find him to be a “nothing”.
Which meant the Red Wedding definitely knocked me off my chair. It also put me on notice with regard to GRRM–just because a storyline and character seem to be going somewhere interesting does not mean they are.
Yeah, in the books Jon Snow’s role, as stated by the author, is that of “the handsome, strong and brave archetypal male fantasy hero” and everything he goes through is to subvert expectations and inject “reality” into fantasy, like in various circumstances when Jon can’t easily determine what is “right” or honorable because there aren’t easy answers. Robb Stark in the books is much more of a supporting character, not really fleshed out much at all.
The “chosen one” at the center of a sci fi or fantasy property is usually the least interesting character and most devoid of personality. Can’t be giving them too many personality flaws or let them have inconvenient emotions, after all— that’s for the quirky cast all around them.
The “chosen one” at the center of a sci fi or fantasy property is usually the least interesting character and most devoid of personality. Can’t be giving them too many personality flaws or let them have inconvenient emotions, after all— that’s for the quirky cast all around them.You’re not wrong, but there are notable exceptions. Jon Snow in the book at least grows significantly; I mean, Robb was pretty boring and died off while Jon started out pretty interesting and grew into the role of a leader. So it was weird to see Jon played so…safe, I guess, or just not show the nuances that actually demonstrated what a great leader he became. Harry Potter is a geeky kid who goes through some pretty cringeworthy growth ala. a normal teenage boy dealing with things as immature kids often do. Then look at characters like Shinji Ikari in Evangelion. Maybe not the most interesting character, but holy shit is he flawed and filled with virtually nothing but inconvenient emotions. Samurai Jack seems to be a pretty unflawed character, but feels very rich, somehow, and interesting for his inflexible moral code that he religiously sticks to. I think he feels very human, but is a classic hero because he works to still do the right thing and be a beacon of strength and morality
Of course, I could make a list of perfectly fine, normal, and otherwise boring “chosen one” in fantasy or sci-fi. Tannis? Great guy, great leader, boring as shit. Bilbo and Frodo? Loveable and great arcs, but…not the most interesting character in their respective books. Luke Skywalker (or worse, Anakin)? Same deal, I think, although the character and the actor really grew up in Empire Strikes Back and in Jedi so I think Luke went from a safe, boring farm boy to a character that at least expressed some serious rage in his fights with Vader.
Just saying there are enough examples for them to draw from where they could have made Jon more interesting on the show. What’s worst is, one of those examples was the source material (at least in my opinion). Jon wasn’t as interesting as, say, Tyrion, but I thought he was more interesting and showed more in the books in a myriad of ways than they showed him on the show. They told us he was a great leader, but they didn’t show us quite so much.
I’m rather fond of the Discworld novel ‘Monstrous Regiment’ for making the main character, while very interesting and complex, ultimately a supporting role in the arc of the story’s actual “chosen one”. (She’s not a supporting character in the novel itself, but she realises she’s a small part of someone else’s destiny.)
At least Harington’s Jon Snow was less boring than the Jon Snow that the poor schmuck on The Expanse is stuck with.
Indubitably.
Seven Days in Hell needs more love.
Well lucky for him and his mental health issues, he is going to be in a comic book movie. Whose fans are always the most warm and sane people who love everything about the movies and are never vocal assholes on the internet 🙂
Yeah but like 3 people read The Eternals, and his part isn’t likely to be when half the audience screams THIS SUCKS SHOW ME MORE TITS AND DRAGONS!
Might do that when I see it though.
About as many people read Guardians of the Galaxy, and those movies turned out all right.
That’s kinda the point they were making, innit?
To be fair, Dave Bautista satisfied both the tits and the dragons quotas in those movies.
What if we gave the dragons tits?
“I found the movie disappointing, but harbour no ill-will against the actors involved, who, their performing choices aside, were just part of the creative vision of the director and the demands of the studio machine.Sorry, I meant t0 say HARRINGTON SUCKS SHIT AND ALL HIS FAMILY SHOULD DIE!”
Nobody cares enough about Black Knight to complain if there are any changes.
Sounds like this guy doesn’t know anything.
hodor.
May I present:
https://www.reddit.com/r/thingsjonsnowknows/The creator of the subreddit locked it immediately after creation, so nobody can post, and it will always be empty.
He knows where to stick himself (that is, into therapy).
also into Rose Leslie.
Or was that the joke? She’s very attractive.
I feel for him. The last couple of seasons of that show did not do his character any favors. If he were perceived as boring and brooding before then, it was nothing compared to what came after. Glad he took some time off to enjoy life a little. I hope his new Marvel gig is a bit more fun for him.
I mean his portrayal half the time was utterly fucking boring monotone and understandably memed to death (“I don’t want it”). He has done better performances but Jon Snow was so fucking beige which made his pairing with Emilia Clarke’s increasingly crazy-eyed self-believing prophet psycho performance very unintentionally funny towards the end.
Was there ever a connection between the Eternals and the Black Knight prior to the upcoming Eternals film? It seems weird to shoehorn in a character like that.
He dated Sersi when they were both in the Avengers.
I loved his portrayal and Jon Snow and yes, I have read the books. People are insane with their hyper criticisms of something they could never achieve themselves.
Holycow, all these famous people telling the world how they have mental health issues, is giving me a mental health issue of my own. Except I cant quit anything, since I don’t have anything. Grrrr, another meltdown for me now.
“I’m done playing a knight who wears black!” moments later “I will play the Black Knight of course. To try something different.”
Ok let me put this out there: Everyone has mental problems, everyone. Stop reporting on stuff everyone has. Newsflash, Jon Snow has 10 toes!
Never watched the show so I have no dog in that race, but I’m always here for people speaking up about their mental health struggles (as long as they feel comfortable doing so). The more people do it, the more normalised it becomes and the easier it is for anyone to get the support they need.
Was anyone on that show having a good time? Esme Bianco got fridged for refusing to go nude any longer, Emilia Clarke almost died of an aneurysm, Ian McElhinney was written an embarrassing death scene because he dared to be passionate about the character from the books, Peter Dinklage looks like he’s about to chug a whole bottle of Jack Daniels from season 6 onwards from all the braindead shit they had Tyrion do, Jack Gleeson got bullied to shreds by fans because he was a good actor, Stephen Dillane had barely any direction on what he was doing, Lena Headey and Jerome Flynn apparently had to be kept apart on set…Jesus Christ.
Maisie Williams also developed some body dysmorphia issues
Actors are such pussies and yall love it.