Video: Emilia Clarke explains the complex English-to-Dothraki translation process

HBO continues to tease the special features on the Game of Thrones Season 6 home boxset, coming soon to a DVD or Blu-ray player near you. It’s already debuted a deleted scene (featuring fan favorite characters Olenna and Mace Tyrell) and one of the many animated shorts in its History and Lore series (“The Children of the Forest vs the First Men“).

Now, Buzzfeed has posted an excerpt from one of the behind-the-scenes features: an interview with Emilia Clarke where she explains the complicated process of translating English to English again and then to Dothraki. And then to beatboxing. Watch it below.

Okay, so as far as I can tell, this means that the writers write lines for the Dothraki-speaking characters in English. Then someone, probably Dothraki language creator David J. Peterson, takes that English line and turns it into a different English line, but using words for which there are Dothraki equivalents. (As he revealed during a Reddit AMA, Dothraki only has about 4000 words total, far fewer than a fully-developed language like English.) And then it gets translated into Dothraki. That’s more involved than I imagined.

And then it gets handed back to the actor, who may or may not turn it into a song while dialogue coach Jan Haydn Rowles, who’s been working on the show since Season 2, beatboxes. You can also count on Clarke for some high-spirited antics like that.

Rowles, incidentally, has a pretty interesting job, teaching Game of Thrones stars how to talk properly between beatboxing sessions. If you want to learn a load of accents, she has some advice you:

The Game of Thrones Season 6 home box set, which will include the Clarke interview alongside many, many other features, comes out on November 15.