Game of Thrones actress talks diversity in media, others land new gigs

In the words of the immortal pop star Conner Friel, the Game of Thrones cast just won’t stop stopping. With such an enormous cast, someone’s always up to something. First up, Ms. Nathalie Joanne Emmanuel spoke to Hunger Magazine about the lack of diversity in Hollywood casting.

"There has been an improvement in casting, but what I often worry about is because it’s been called out that means that now people are saying, ‘Okay, we’re going to make it really diverse.’Will it be that they just do the one film and then it goes back? If you go up for anything, you know there is always a cast of people and a small number of them are [from] a minority."

Emmanuel doesn’t implicate Thrones in her comments, but the show has been accused of a lack of racial diversity before. Emmanuel went on to praise the racial diversity of the Fast and the Furious franchise, of which she is now a part.

"Their audience is from all over the world and they have got people from all parts of the globe in those movies, of all colours and all ethnicities, and I think that is really important.For me, when I was growing up, not seeing anyone on television that looked like me or that I could identify with was really hard, and that can affect someone’s self-esteem hugely."

Elsewhere, Maisie Williams (Arya) continues to add to her resume, this time securing a role in the film Departures, per the Poughkeepsie Journal.

The movie, directed by Peter Hutchings, is said to revolve around a “spunky” teenager named Skye. That’s Williams’ role. Skye, who has a terminal illness, will befriend “Calvin, a 19-year old hypochondriac who is afraid of his own shadow.” The film will focus on the pair’s attempt to complete Skye’s “eccentric bucket list.” No release date is yet scheduled, but it sounds like fun.

Finally, Richard Dormer (Beric Dondarrion) also has a new project. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Dormer will play the detective Gabriel Markham in the joint BBC Cinemax project Relik. Relik, a six part mini-series, “will tell the story of a serial killer in reverse, with the drama moving backwards in time to the very beginning.” Dormer will play the lead detective assigned to capturing the as-yet-uncast serial killer. Hopefully Dormer makes it out alive in this one.

h/t Evening Standard