Q. Game of Thrones contains a lot of adult content, what was your impression when you first read the scripts and discovered that the show would be like that?
Emilia: Yes definitely, but I think its very realistic, its very true to life. It doesnt hide. It shows things as they are and it shows the kind of hardships that people have to go through and I think that is something that is incredibly important to see, especially in Dany. We had loads of discussions beforehand about the particulars, the marriage scenes for example and her first sexual encounter with Drogo. In the books theres a slightly different edge to it but we wanted to show it in terms of the harsh reality that she has to come up against. As an actor you just have to go there, you just have to trust that thats what you need to see from Dany in order to get to where she ends up. So yeah, it is raunchy and its racy and its got a lot of blood and guts and violence but thats why people like it, thats why its not Harry Potter, its not Lord of the Rings, its got some guts to it! Thats what I like about it as well.
Q. Is it not nerve racking though, to perform those types of scenes, particularly at this very early stage in your career?
Emilia: Hugely! Yeah! I was a young, inexperienced girl, not only with hardly any film experience but definitely no nudity-on-screen experience! So yeah it was petrifying but HBO were wonderful and theyve got a huge amount of integrity to them and they kind of, were there for me and I knew that I was in safe hands. And Jason Momoa is incredible, and wicked, and lovely, and just made it really simple and really easy to do!
Q. When you do scenes like that is it awkward? Funny? Strange?
Emilia: Yeah because what you see as an audience, hopefully, is an element of truth and a representation of what it would be like in real life. As an actor, when youre filming it, youve got an entire crew you know, youre in a warehouse in Belfast on like, a Tuesday afternoon and so its a matter of you as the actor trying very hard to create your own bubble, your own world, to try and make it as realistic as possible.
Q. Whats been the reaction from the male fan base? Any strange fan mail, any marriage proposals?
Emilia: (laughs) Theres been no marriage proposals as of yet! What I try to do is, when I first got the job I found myself online and I saw something that wasnt nice, it was very horrible so I vowed from then on to never look at any thing on the Internet, ever! From then on I kind of thought, the safest thing for me to do to keep my sanity, was to not look at anything at all. If someone says something lovely, or if theres something really nice out there or if the fans are happy, which is first and foremost my aim, because when youve got your favourite character in your favourite book its such a special thing, and to have someone come along and kind of make that come to life in a way that youre not happy with can be really horrible for you. So knowing that the fans are happy is wonderful but I never really have to go out and look for it, someone always ends up letting you know, and my mum will probably tell me if its bad!