House of the Dragon‘s second season gave us three new dragonriders. During the Red Sowing Targaryen bastards Ulf the White claimed Silverwing and Hugh Hammer claimed Vermithor. Meanwhile, in a dragon/rider role reversal, Seasmoke claimed Velaryon bastard Addam of Hull. The three men are very different, yet all have something very important in common. They are all baseborn denizens of Westeros who became some of the most powerful people in the world.
What does that mean for the three of them—both their characters and them as actors—going into season three? We found out when Nerdist took part in a virtual media roundtable with stars Clinton Liberty, Kieran Bew, and Tom Bennett ahead of the show’s HBO return, which will see them spending a whole lot of time together.
Turns out these three have more in common than just playing bastards who became dragonriders. They’re also very silly.
On how their lowborn backgrounds clash with the highborn members of House Targaryen.
Kieran Bew: I’ve always known I am directly connected to the family. [Hugh’s] mom was Daemon’s aunt and I’ve been keeping that a secret. I’ve always known that I was an illegitimate and secret cast out member. And he’s denied it as well. So actually admitting it to his wife and using that as a reason to go and fulfill this task is a strange shift for him given that he’s rejected it for most of his life.
Unfortunately, that means that Targaryen madness is waking up in someone who’s really been suppressing it. So for me as an actor, that’s really exciting because there’s an unpredictability to it. It’s quite fertile ground. There’s a lot there because the book exists, the script exists, the characters exist, and the Targaryenss are really fun. They’re f***ing mad, but they’re really fun.
Tom Bennett: Ulf comes from nothing. He is the lowest of the low, and he has told this story for 30 odd years that he’s part Targaryen. We’ve discussed, “Does he believe it? Did he ever believe it?” Until it actually comes true and it’s, “Oh shit, I’ve got a dragon. All of this, it was all true. Oh, right. Now it’s true.” Now it all suddenly gets a bit scary, rocky ground and uneven footing. He comes from nothing and now is one of the most powerful people on the planet. It’s a real shift and a real dynamic, certainly for someone with a chip on their shoulder.
Clinton Liberty: All of us coming from being commoners and coming from a normal background, we all want different things. But there’s conflict there because Addam’s trying to prove himself to the Queen and his family, but Ulf is after something different. Addam knows that we all need each other in order to increase our likelihood of survival. And then [Hugh] is kind of cool, laid back. You don’t really know what he’s after. You can’t quite read him, but all want something coming from a common background. It’s kind of trying to get at the same mission of pleasing the Queen and the royalty, but also getting what we all want in to be cohesive.
Bennett: And we are the only three people in the world that have come from any of our positions.
Liberty: Exactly.
Bennett: The Targaryens as a clan have been raised to speak High Valyrian and ride dragons. We haven’t. So we’re the only three humans on the planet that have shared this experience. That shared experience does make us a little bit of a team or a dysfunctional family, all of whom are trying to work each other out and work out the lay of the land, which is brilliant. So much fun for us to play with.
On what a potential spinoff focusing only on their adventures would look like.
Liberty: Funny.
Bennett: I’ve discussed this with Ryan [Condal, the showrunner]. He tends to walk away when I try and discuss it, but I think there is a lot to be said in a lighter, half hour sitcom filmed in front of a live studio. We don’t do the dragons because they’re expensive. So actually we can make it quite cheaply and it’ll be lighthearted. It’d be a bit of fun. We visit a different town or village. We solve a problem or kill a monster in every town or village. Villain of the week stuff.
Bew: Exactly.
Bennett: Filmed in front of a live studio audience. But Ryan walks away when I mentioned that.
Liberty: And with a budget enough to only have one shot of Vermithor or Silverwing and then that was it.
Bew: We were talking about the dragon training about how funny that would be to watch us all mess up dragon training and mispronounce all the words and the dragons are doing different things. So dragon bootcamp would be fun. But also the idea that [the royals] treat us really badly and we all have to sleep in the same room on bunk beds.
Bennett: We should all be in a triple bunker.
Bew: Because [the Targaryens] treat us like sh*t.
Liberty: And also learning how to speak High Valyrian.
Bennett: Yeah, because my accent… I can’t speak High Valyrian.
Bew: But your thing about the detective, the sort of story of a week detective thing, that’s quite funny.
Bennett: Ryan doesn’t seem interested in it.
At this point the conversation moved on to bemoaning the fact the title How to Train Your Dragon is already claimed, but the trio landed on “How To Train Your Dragonriders” as a possible name for their spinoff.
On what it was like as performers to return to the show knowing they now have an elevated position within the story?
Bew: It’s really exciting.
Bennett: Exciting.
Bew: Except we’re still bound within the confines of whatever they want us to do, the aristocracy. But it’s incredibly exciting coming in knowing that there has been a time shift. We have learned to ride the dragons and we’ve done some skirmish as missions and whatnot and that time has moved on. We get new costumes for a start, which is amazing, always fun to come in with new threads. But yeah, it’s really,
Bennett: And coming back for a new season, there is less of a degree of it’s your first day at school. Like, “Oh yeah, we’ve been to school here for a year. We know the lay of the land a bit. We’ve been given a bit more power. We get to fly dragons.” It’s such a nice place to work and be and get to play and just knowing that we got to do it again and knowing that we get to do it again is, for me, magical.
Liberty: Also just in season two, feeling like because we were like the new kid on the block, having to kind of prove yourself because season one was already established and it was a massive hit and then you’re coming in. But then in season three, feeling more established and more part of the family, it’s just exciting and you just get to enjoy it a lot more.
For me, I was a lot more grounded this season because last season I was so nervous. I wanted to do as best a job I could, but this season it was really fun and it’s always, always a pleasure. And all jokes aside, Kieran and Tom, I learned so much from them. I talk to them all the time, especially when we’re in between takes or we’re just chilling in our trailers. They’re just absolute dreams to work with. So I’m extremely grateful that I get to come back to work with them specifically as well.
Bennett: Knowing we get to do it all together again as a threesome, it’s great because we all get on so well because we have to spend a lot of time with each other. Unlike the
Liberty: Unlike the characters, we really love each other.
Bew: It’s funny, though, because I think the frustrations of the characters within what they’re allowed to do and not do is the same for us because we would like to just go for a big ride on the dragons. When you get off the book, when we’ve done the work, you’re like, “Really? Can we not just keep going? Do it tomorrow?”
Liberty: Or just stealing the buggy and going to different sets that you’re not even a part of. It’s like you can’t even do that.
Bennett: Because they really tell you off. “Where’s your pass?”
Liberty: I’m a dragonrider!
Bennett: I’m dressed like an idiot. Why do I need a pass?