In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, A Song of Ice and Fire author George R.R. Martin has revealed some important details on HBO’s upcoming and highly-anticipated Game of Thrones prequel series which is currently filming in Northern Ireland.
Set around 5000 years before the events of Game of Thrones, according to Martin, the prequel will feature a completely different Westeros that is divided into a hundred kingdoms. “We talk about the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros; there were Seven Kingdoms at the time of Aegon’s Conquest,” Martin said. “But if you go back further then there are nine kingdoms, and 12 kingdoms, and eventually you get back to where there are a hundred kingdoms — petty kingdoms — and that’s the era we’re talking about here.”
Martin has also confirmed that the Stark family will definitely be included in the prequel along with their mighty Direwolves. However, the Lannisters won’t be appearing in the series yet because it will start in a period before the rise of Lannister family and Casterly Rock will be still occupied by a different clan.
Martin also confirmed that the untitled series, just like Game of Thrones, will still be led by an ensemble cast with no primary leads. “As you know for Game of Thrones, we never even nominated anybody for lead actress or lead actor [during awards season] until recently; it was always for supporting [categories] because the show is such an ensemble. I think that will be true for this show too. We don’t have leads so much as a large ensemble cast.”
On the potential title for the prequel, Martin added that the series could be titled “The Longest Night,” a slight variation on his own suggestion of “The Long Night.”
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S.J. Clarkson (The Defenders, Jessica Jones, Untitled Star Trek Sequel) will direct the pilot. The cast includes Naomi Watts, Josh Whitehouse and Naomi Ackie (Star Wars: Episode IX), Tony nominee Denise Gough (Angels in America, Guerrilla), Jamie Campbell Bower (Sweeney Todd, Mortal Instruments), Sheila Atim (Harlots), Ivanno Jeremiah (Black Mirror, Humans), Georgie Henley (The Chronicles of Narnia), Alex Sharp (To the Bone), Toby Regbo (Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald), Marquis Rodriguez (When They See Us, Saturday Church), John Simm (Strangers), Richard McCabe (Philip K. Dick’s Electric Dreams), John Heffernan (Dracula) and Dixie Egerickx (The Secret Garden).
The big-budgeted spinoff is created by Jane Goldman (Kick-Ass, Kingsman) and GOT author George R.R. Martin, written by Jane Goldman based on a story by her and Martin.
