It’s hard to imagine Game of Thrones without the High Sparrow, the humble but extremely dangerous High Septon. But actor Jonathan Pryce didn’t see himself in the cult HBO project at first! In 2015, he admitted that he wasn’t immediately sold on the idea of participating in the series.
“I just flipped through the script, saw the weird names, the weird dialogue, and thought, ‘No, this isn’t for me,’” Price recalled in a comment to BBC Radio 4.
He felt that the world of dragons and white walkers wasn’t his genre.
A Second Chance for Sparrow
As Price explained, he was offered to star in Game of Thrones long before the fifth season, but he didn’t say who exactly the actor was supposed to play. In an interview with Sky News, he only admitted:
"Fantasy, space and similar blockbusters have never attracted me. And Game of Thrones initially fell into this category."
However, when he was offered to play the High Septon in the fifth season, Pryce changed his mind. This character was written into the already established struggle between "good" and "bad" heroes from the very beginning. And the actor himself understood: such a chance cannot be missed.
Without Sparrow, there would have been no explosion
Pryce's role became one of the key ones in the development of the events of the series. It was because of the actions of his character that Cersei lost power, freedom - and then the remnants of sanity. The High Septon, with his mere appearance, turned the order in King's Landing upside down. But, alas, faith in the Seven did not save His Sparrow from an explosive finale.
