‘Game of Thrones’ Star Kit Harington Cried Twice During Final Season Table Read

During the final table read for Game of Thrones, Kit Harington was so overwhelmed with emotion that he cried twice.

The Game of Thrones actors sat together to read the scripts for the final six episodes in October 2017, reports Entertainment Weekly. They read each script before they arrived, putting in plenty of passwords to get to their emailed documents. Sophie Turner, who plays Sansa Stark, said she flew through them and sent messages to showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss.

“It was completely overwhelming,” Turner told EW. “Afterwards I felt numb, and I had to take a walk for hours.”

Emilia Clarke, who stars as Daenerys Targaryen, had to rush home so she could read them in private.

“I turned to my best mate and was like, ‘Oh my God! I gotta go! I gotta go!’” she explained. “And I completely flipped out.”

She then grabbed a cup of tea and could not stop reading.

“Genuinely the effect it had on me was profound,” Clarke told the magazine. “That sounds insanely pretentious, but I’m an actor, so I’m allowed one pretentious adjective per season.”

Peter Dinklage, who has won a Golden Globe and three Emmys for playing Tyrion Lannister, said it was “the first time ever that I didn’t skip to the end” to see if his character survives.

After they all read the scripts, they flew to Belfast to meet in the production office for the table read. Surprisingly, Harington refused to read the scripts before the table read.

“I walked in saying, ‘Don’t tell me, I don’t want to know,’” Harington told EW. “What’s the point of reading it to myself in my own head when I can listen to people do it and find out with my friends?”

During the reading, Harington cried. After they finished, there were more tears to be shed from Jon Snow. And after filming wrapped, Harington finally explained why he cried.

“Every season, you read at the end of the last script ‘End of Season 1,’ or ‘End of Season 2,’” he said. “This read ‘End of Game of Thrones.’”

As is typical for Game of Thrones, very little is known about the eighth and final season before it airs. EW reported that the season eight premiere will include some references to the show’s very first episode. But instead of King Robert arriving with an army, it is Daenerys’ turn. Everyone is meeting to get ready for the Army of the Dead, which will make the Battle of the Bastards look like a walk in the park.

“It’s about all of these disparate characters coming together to face a common enemy, dealing with their own past, and defining the person they want to be in the face of certain death,” co-executive producer Bryan Cogman told EW. “It’s an incredibly emotional, haunting, bittersweet final season, and I think it honors very much what [author George R.R. Martin] set out to do — which is flipping this kind of story on its head.”

Game of Thrones‘ final season will air next year. HBO is also developing a prequel series, The Long Night, starring Naomi Watts.

Photo credit: HBO