Curtain Call: Kae Alexander

God bless Kae Alexander and the other actors who played the Children of the Forest on Game of Thrones Season 6: it can’t have been easy to sit still for hours and hours while makeup artists applied chunks of prosthetic to their faces*. Alexander described the process in one of HBO’s “Anatomy of a Scene” videos:

"If I were to do a full body prosthetic, I would get picked up at midnight and then I’ll be on set by 10 a.m. I didn’t realize it was gonna result to nine and-a-half hours of makeup!"

If for no other reason that that, Alexander and her colleagues deserve respect.

Kae Alexander, trooper.

As Leaf, the only Child of the Forest to receive any significant lines, Alexander was the frontman for the species, which presented challenges of its own. When prosthetics and costumes are very elaborate, they threaten to overshadow any actual acting, but Alexander knew her way around the front of a camera—she’d acted in several British TV series after graduating from London’s Guildhall School of Music and Drama in 2011—and kept the character grounded.

As Leaf, there was a slow, almost otherworldly grace to Alexander’s movements, which was appropriate for a member of what was essentially an alien race, one who had been on the planet for hundreds of years. Alexander also made great use of her expressive eyes—even covered in makeup, we could tell there was a person in there, and that she had seen a lot in her time. From an acting perspective, Alexander’s best moment was her last one, when Leaf’s eyes are curiously calm as she’s torn apart by wights, perhaps knowing that this moment had been on its way ever since Leaf and the other Children created the White Walkers ages ago.

Alexander didn’t get a lot of time to shine as Leaf, but she made the most of the time she had. If we meet any other Children of the Forest during the series, she’ll be the one we compare them to.

*Octavia Alexandru, who played Leaf when Bran first met her in Season 4, lucked out. While significant, her makeup didn’t look nearly as extensive as Alexander’s. I’m not sure why the producers chose to recast the role and revamp the look of the Children of the Forest for Season 6, although it might have something to do with the fact that, as an actual child, Alexandru may have had trouble pulling off highly physical scenes like the one at the end of “The Door.”