Pedro Pascal: Game of Thrones was “one of the best experiences I’ve ever had”

Pedro Pascal is one of the biggest names in acting right now. It’s not every actor who gets to the face (metaphorically speaking) of a Star Wars TV show, face off with Woman Woman, and headline a huge new HBO show adapted from one of the celebrated video games of the past 10 years: The Last of Us.

But to Game of Thrones superfans, Pascal will always be Oberyn Martell, the Red Viper of Dorne who swept into King’s Landing in season 4, won our hearts, and then was brutally killed off by the Mountain in a trial by combat gone horribly, horribly wrong.

It was brutal to watch, but according to Pascal, it was wonderful to play. In fact, he sounds very high on his entire Game of Thrones experience. “It was a dream, you know,” he told GQ. “It was this great role, at the height of the show’s popularity, a perfectly written season, a perfectly written role — go in, shoot for 10 weeks, leave. Nobody got a chance to be sick of me. I had comfortable costumes, which is a miracle. I didn’t have a heavy wig. I might have been the luckiest human to have passed through that show. There were people in the snow, and doing night shoots, but for me, it was sun and chairs, you know? And then one big fight scene.”

Pedro Pascal returned to his old Game of Thrones locations for new movie

Pascal got a chance to reflect on all of this when he filmed scenes for his new movie, The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, in the same city he’d spent time in as Oberyn Martell. “We shot in Dubrovnik, which is where we shot this big fight scene between The Viper and The Mountain,” Pascal recalled. “I was walking distance from that actual arena — it was a sort of stage arena that belonged to a hotel, which had been bombed out during the war, that they had dressed for Game of Thrones.”

"It was an incredible reunion for me, personally, because that was one of the best experiences I’ve ever had, and one of the most beautiful places I’d ever been, on a show I loved, with an exciting ensemble of actors. It was just a dream. So it was an even deeper dream to return. And I walked over there by myself, and just kind of sat there, took it in, and decided it was like — this is where it all began."

Pascal was pretty far into his career by the time he landed the job on Thrones, but it definitely did raise his profile sky-high, and led to lots of other fantastic opportunities. And we’re all reaping the benefits.

The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, which also stars Nicolas Cage, is out in theaters now.

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