Hannah Waddingham – Game of Thrones

By starrymag | May 29, 2016

By: Jamie Steinberg

 

Q) What are the recent projects that you are working on?

A) Currently, on BBC One I’m on a long running, very nicely revered medical drama called “In The Club.” It’s about six ladies who go through pregnancy and child birth and everything that comes with that. I play the senior obstetrician Dr. Stone. Also, my equal passion in life is being a professional singer. I do West End shows and I was on Broadway with Spamalot. Last week I did a concert for BBC Radio with a concert orchestra. In September, I’ll be doing another one with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall on the South Bank.

Q) We are currently seeing you on the series “Game of Thrones.” What is it like for you watching yourself on such a popular program?

A) At first, I was a little bit daunted by it all, but everyone is so nice and that comes from the top. David Benioff and D.B. Weiss couldn’t be nicer chaps. They are so welcoming and it really trickles down from them. I have a great relationship with Lena Headey and it felt like I just fit right in. But there is an enormous responsibility that comes with joining the world’s number one hit. You have to slot in very carefully and knuckle down so you make sure your work is at the standard that has already been set. So, I very quickly removed myself from any of the sensationalism around the show and I thought, “If I’m going to play this very still, economic, dark woman I need to just lock in.”

Q) How was Septa Unella originally described to you?

A) I have to try to not be insulted when they chose me because in the books she’s described as a “hulking brut of a woman.” [laughs] I went along for the audition when I was nearly eight months pregnant so I made sure I had nice makeup and hair done (like we all do) thinking it may be good to meet those guys. That way, the next time once I’d had the baby, they’d think of me. Then, they offered me the role and I went, “Thank you, I think.” [laughs]

Q) You are such a lighthearted, funny person in real life. How do you get into character?

A) I actually enjoy it greatly. We have different directors for different episodes and a couple of them have said, “Wow! What happened there that they could see that you could do this?” Because I have a very animated face as well. Particularly, Miguel Sapochnik, who I did the first cell scene where I smack Cersei around the face with the ladle and all that, he was brilliant at making me reduce and reduce what I’m doing. At the time, I thought, “I’m not doing anything now,” but it really, really works. She’s a very economical woman and very simple. She doesn’t see it that she is torturing Cersei. She sees it as clarifying her, cleansing her. So, if you think about that, it makes you behave differently because that’s a very skewed way of seeing this world. Unella thinks she is doing it for the greater good and for someone to think of that some serious unhappiness must have gone on in their life. Whether it’s pleasant or not, you have to get yourself into a darker place in the beginning. That’s why I love acting because it totally removes me from who I am every day.

Q) She must have serious faith in the High Sparrow as well.

A) I’ve talked about it in the past with the writers and with a couple of the directors that I also think there may be a slightly unhealthy wanting to please element to her relationship with the High Sparrow (Jonathan Pryce). He’s God like to her. Brainwashing beyond on compare because she’s essentially his henchwoman. He doesn’t do any of it. So, one has to have been indoctrinated greatly to be asked to do that and then think it’s right. That’s what I meant about having to take myself to a place where that is all okay – and to a woman! I remember when we were filming the Walk of Atonement. We talked about whether when Cersei falls if in a moment of female solidarity, she should at least keep people away from her and help her up. I was adamant though to not help her up because I think it goes against everything she has built up and I actually really loved that they let me do that. You just see me smirking at her kind of saying, “Come on, get up. You’ve got to do this and I hope you fail.”

Q) What is it like for you working with Lena Headey?

A) We kind of get on too well. [laughs] When we’re on set, it’s like we have to suddenly go, “Stop talking! Stop talking to me! Let me just focus for a second,” and then we’re back to talking about our babies. We got on brilliantly from the word “go.” I was so lucky because, to me, she is the absolutely female epicenter. She plays it so beautifully. I constantly think that, now even knowing her. I constantly watch her and I just think she is sublime. And you never know if you have chemistry with someone or not. I guess it wouldn’t matter with us because there has to be such a fraud coming from me. But we just got on like a house on fire straight away. Of course, when we saw each other for this season it was really lovely.

Q) What have been some of your most memorable moments from filming “Game of Thrones?”

A) I would say for a starter my first ever day was the scene where we bring her at the start of the steps to do the Walk of Atonement. That was my first day on set ever and my ten week old baby was in a room somewhere on set. So, I was a little bit like, “I don’t know what day it is. I don’t know who I am. I don’t know where I am. But there is a lot of people here.” That was kind of daunting, but you just feel like a little kid to be in this vast animal…just a tiny little spoke in this massive worldwide wheel. To be given that opportunity and blessed with the responsibility to get it right. So, standing at the top of the steps thinking, “Wow! I’m really part of this.” There have been a couple of moments during this season of filming. I, obviously, can’t tell you much, but one particular day was the most demanding, testing and grueling day of my career. Without doubt, the most testing day ever. I tell you there is no one else I would have done it for then Benioff and Weiss. Because I know they know what they are doing.

Q) Is there anyone on the series you would have liked to have gotten the chance to work with?

A) I have had some great scenes so far with Jonathan Pryce and Lena. I loved my moments I had this year with Dame Diana Rigg, both on and off camera. I have to say, Peter Dinklage. I met him and I’m very rarely star struck, but he has magic dust on him. He has the presence of a 7’2 man. He walked into a room and everyone knows about it. I would have loved to have had a scene with him. I don’t know how Unella and Tyrion would meet, but I would have loved to see it.

Q) You are a part of social media. Do you enjoy the instant fan feedback you receive to your character?

A) Yeah, it’s kind of not a world that I was used to before I started doing more television. I have always been a theater girl. I do like it if I’m doing Comic Cons and stuff it’s nice to hear people can say, “It was nice to meet you.” Then, I can say it back to them – on an individual basis. But I purposely remove myself when I’m filming or just before I start filming. I have to just have nothing to do with it because I have to take myself to a very specific place with Septa Unella. It’s not easy to slot into and it’s not particularly pleasant, to be honest. I just think if we’re filming in a tiny cell, I don’t want to imagine the eyes all around the world that are casting their opinion and eye over it. I have to feel like it is just me and whoever is in the cell and what I need to get a confession out of there. It has to be intimate. If I start to engage in all that Twitter business whilst I’m filming, you lose that intimacy. It just has to be real and I’m a great critic of my own work. I would know and see my face and think, “No, I’m not buying that.”

Q) Why is it important to you to participate in conventions?

A) Because I come from a theater world, the immediacy of theater means you get it in person. You hear the roar of the crowd. You hear the applause or whatever. You see them at stage door and this kind of feels like that to me. It’s tangible proof. It’s lovely to actually meet people and they are so passionate about the show. It’s a real pleasure and they are always, always lovely people.

Q) Is there somewhere fans can go online to hear your music?

A) If you just put in my name, I’m all over YouTube with various concerts I’ve sung at. At the moment, if they go to BBC Radio 2 site and if they put in my name a load of tracks will come up with songs I’ve recently done with the BBC Orchestra.

Q) Who would you love to collaborate with on a song?

A) Well, it would have been Pavarotti. Unfortunately, it’s people like that who are just otherworldly like that in the first place. I would have loved to sing with him. I’d love to sing with Dame Shirley Bassey because I think I’d sound like I was twelve years old since she’s just phenomenal.

Q) What would you like to say to everyone who is a fan and supporter of you and your work?

A) I would like to say that I am absolutely overwhelmed. I thought I was coming in to play this little role that served the plot to take the High Sparrow to where he needed to be and to support him in that. All the fans of “Game of Thrones” and the watchers of the wall, have absolutely brought me in. To see memes created of the character and to see a satirical portrayal of her on “Family Guy” with Peter Griffin playing Septa Unella and to see the Emmys where Jane Lynch played her is more than I can ever hope for. It means I’ve made her memorable and that’s all I can ask for really.