Peter Dinklage crushes Hot Ones, recalls Charles Dance's "paternal" kindness on Game of Thrones set

Peter Dinklage is a veteran actor who's appeared in numerous television shows and movies, but around these parts we'll always know him best as Tyrion Lannister, the sarcastic youngest son of Tywin Lannister on Game of Thrones. Dinklage's career has remained in a constant boom since Thrones; the guy's always got something new coming out, which is great for fans who loved him as Tyrion and want to see him in more projects.

For example, just this week the YouTube interview channel First We Feast released an interview with Dinklage on their show Hot Ones, where celebrities eat very spicy wings and try not to have meltdowns as they answer questions. When I saw Dinklage was on Hot Ones, I assumed he was out promoting his Western movie The Thicket, which came out in early September. But no! Dinklage already has another movie out, Brothers, which just hit Prime Video on October 17 and which he was on Hot Ones to discuss.

He didn't only talk about Brothers, though it sounds like a pretty good time — especially considering it has a star-studded cast which includes Josh Brolin, Marisa Tomei, Glenn Close, and Brendan Fraser. Dinklage discussed the highs and lows of his very long acting career, including one fun anecdote from Game of Thrones. Watch the full interview below, or scroll on for a few highlights:

Charles Dance used to give Peter Dinklage "paternal" encouragement on Game of Thrones

Dinklage touched on a bunch of interesting topics, from his early days as an actor, to what draws him to a project to the importance of working with directors you trust. Since Hot Ones host Sean Evans is a master interviewer, he also got Dinklage to open up about some seldom-discussed things from his past, like the fact that he has a scar in his temple from hitting his head during a show with his punk band Wizzy at the legendary venue CBGBs in New York City during the early 1990s.

"It's true. I mean, just try to define me man, back in the day," Dinklage joked. "I was like, 'I don't wanna be an actor, I'm not gonna do any silly commercials or any of that. I'm gonna do plays downtown for no money in which I throw up on the audience and I'm gonna be in a punk band. We were Beastie Boys rip-offs, and yeah, we had fun. It was a lot of fun, and yeah it was a couple years doing it, and I got a cool scar on my temple."

That bit about throwing up on the audience is a reference to another story Dinklage told earlier in the interview, about one of the weirdest stage performances he ever did where he was playing the chorus (narrator, essentially), and was getting sick to his stomach while sitting in a chair that was bolted up onto the wall next to the stage over the audience. He's had an eclectic life, that Peter Dinklage.

As for what draws Dinklage to projects, he had a quick and solid answer: "Dialogue."

"You can have the greatest idea for a film…but as an actor, what am I saying, you know what’s our dialogue? What’s the ease or tension in the wordplay that you’re putting on the page. I always like to rattle the cage of genres because people in comedies don’t know they’re being funny. So I like my comedies like really straight…Alan Arkin…he was my favorite. He was so funny because he just played it as like somebody who doesn’t think anything is funny…so anything that sort of points the finger at ‘this is funny’, writing wise…like a punchline in a movie doesn’t really work cause it doesn’t really work in life…"

That bridges nicely over to Game of Thrones. Dinklage praised showrunners David Benioff and Dan Weiss' ability to write "lived in" dialogue that felt natural to say. It's here that we got an interesting anecdote: while he was on the set of Game of Thrones, Dinklage's on-screen father Charles Dance (Tywin Lannister) used to give him little bits of consolation between takes, since Tywin was always ridiculously awful to Tyrion.

"I love Charlie Dance, he's one of my favorite human beings and he played my father on the show and all my father…did on the show was humiliate me and sentence me to death…so he made a habit, ’cause we would get really invested in those things…talk about great dialogue, Dan Weiss and David Benioff gave us the greatest dialogue, so it really felt really lived in and fun and scary at times…so he would just like, between every take, he would come over and just gently touch me on the shoulder. We wouldn’t hug it out ’cause we had no time, but he would always make a point to give me a little [pats table]. And it felt very paternal too...he played a horrible human being, but he’s one of my favorite human beings and it was a shame how that one ended, on the toilet. Kind of like how this is gonna end. But yeah, that's one of the more classic death scenes in a TV show I think."

Tywin's death was indeed one of the most iconic from Game of Thrones; both in the books by George R.R. Martin and the television show, it stands out. Given how consistently horrible Tywin was to Tyrion, it is nice to imagine Charles Dance giving those little bits of encouragement to Peter Dinklage between takes. His character may have been sentencing Dinklage's to death, but really he just wanted to give him a little pat-pat on the shoulder to let him know it'd be alright!

Now I'm itching for a rewatch. But if you want to see Dinklage in something new, his latest movie Brothers is streaming now on Prime Video. And do make sure to watch the Hot Ones interview if you want to watch him breathe fire as he devours wings and brings us on a fun journey through his career!

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h/t Just Jared