As for Momoa, he was recently asked by The New York Times about the depiction of sexual assault in “Thrones.” The reporter asked the actor if he thinks “differently today about those scenes” and if he has “any regrets.” “Well, it was important to depict Drogo and his style,” Momoa first responded. “You’re playing someone that’s like Genghis Khan. It was a really, really, really hard thing to do. But my job was to play something like that, and it’s not a nice thing, and it’s what that character was. It’s not my job to go, ‘Would I not do it?’ I’ve never really been questioned about ‘Do you regret playing a role?’ We’ll put it this way: I already did it. Not doing it again.”
After the interview with The New York Times was completed, Momoa circled back to the “Thrones” question and told the reporter that it “left a bad feeling in my stomach.” “When you brought up ‘Game of Thrones,’ you brought up stuff about what’s happening with my character and would I do it again. I was bummed when you asked me that,” Momoa said. “It just feels icky — putting it upon me to remove something. As if an actor even had the choice to do that. We’re not really allowed to do anything. There are producers, there are writers, there are directors, and you don’t get to come in and be like, ‘I’m not going do that because this isn’t kosher right now and not right in the political climate.’ That never happens. So it’s a question that feels icky. I just wanted you to know that.” “Thrones” series regular Nikolaj Coster-Waldau told The Times of London last October that it was “really tough and degrading” for Emilia Clarke to act in the pilot’s sexual assault scene. Sign Up: Stay on top of the latest breaking film and TV news! Sign up for our Email Newsletters here.
