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Stannis Baratheon actor Stephen Dillane doesn't understand Game of Thrones' success

The actor also claims he agreed to star in HBO's fantasy epic 'for the money' 

Jacob Stolworthy
Wednesday 02 March 2016 10:10 GMT
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Stephen Dillane as Stannis Baratheon in Game of Thrones season five
Stephen Dillane as Stannis Baratheon in Game of Thrones season five

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Apparently getting cast in one of the most culturally impactful TV shows of the millennium isn't enough to make one an extremely grateful actor.

Game of Thrones season 6: Everything we know so far

Following in the footsteps of Ian McShane, who this week surmised HBO's Game of Thrones as merely being "tits and dragon," is Stannis Baratheon himself, Stephen Dillane.

Speaking to French magazine Liberation about his time on the fantasy series, Dillane's words were translated as follows:

'“I do not regret having done Game of Thrones, but I have nothing to say. I understood neither the series nor its success when I was attending. The experience was very strange, it passed under my nose. For a role like it to me, I must get interested could, which was not really the case. I was a bit overwhelmed." Why, then, it be undertaken? Long silence, increasingly exasperated. “Among other things, for the money.”'

In Dillane's defence, the show - while close - wasn't today's behemoth back when he joined the series for its second season in 2012 and considering he probably didn't read any of his fellow actor's scenes, it's fair to say that he genuinely was quite clueless about the show's plot.

To say that he did it for the money, however, may be respectably honest, but does do a disservice to the impressive work that goes on behind-the-scenes of such an epic series.

Spoilers for the show's fifth season below

Dillane's character was killed by Brienne of Tarth (Gwendoline Christie) in the show's fifth season finale. Perhaps he's just bitter it happened off-screen.

McShane's comments were in reaction to the fury he incited upon revealing key details about a character he plays in the show's upcoming sixth season which begins on Sky Atlantic in April.

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