Keisha Castle-Hughes talks Obara Sand and Game of Thrones

Keisha Castle-Hughes is one of the nine new faces we’ll be meeting when Season 5 debuts this April. Her character, Obara Sand, is the eldest (and reportedly deadliest) of the Sand Snakes, bastard daughters of the late, much-loved Oberyn Martell. (Well, beloved by fans. Not so much by Lannisters.)

Recently, Castle-Hughes sat down with Stuff.co.nz to talk about her new role. Her take on the character?

“Obara Sand likes to think of herself as a warrior monk, some of her favorite pastimes are murdering people with her spear and meditating and picking on her younger sister, oh, and riding her horses ,” she says.

Details below, including the weapon Obara wields, whether or not she’s read the books, and how just she knew she might have a chance for the part….

“It’s been very intensive, my character wields a 7-foot spear, the same as her father, so I’ve had lots of martial art training in the martial art of Wushu which has been really interesting and different for me, I’m more of a dramatic actress and I’ve never really done a lot physical or stunt-based roles before . It’s been a massive challenge but it’s been so much fun.”

We’ve got pictures of that training here.

“I actually found out I had the part of [Oberyn’s] daughter on the night that episode [The Mountain and The Viper] aired, so I had a very intense emotional reaction to that scene,” Castle-Hughes says. “I’m so excited, it’s one of my favorite shows and so it feels very surreal to be a part of it.”

Considering how popular her father turned out to be last season, with his death rivaling that of much longer term characters when it came, the more the show can tie her to her father, the better she’ll go over. But Castle-Hughes isn’t worried.

“I think people are going to be really blown away by the Sand Snakes, there’s three of us and we’re Oberyn’s daughters,” Castle-Hughes says. “There’s eight of us in total but they’re showcasing three characters, Obara, Nymeria, and Tyene.

“It will be very exciting to see women in Game of Thrones who work together because we haven’t seen that yet, we’ve seen strong women but they’re always either lone wolves like Arya Stark or Brienne of Tarth, or they’re political leaders like Cersei Lannister or Daenerys Targaryen, so we meet these three women who are warriors, who work together and who have nothing to lose which is very dangerous.”

As for if she’d read the series prior to being cast:

“I am a massive fan of the books and I’d read them and I knew about Dorne, so I knew at some point there would be a call for ‘ethnically ambiguous actors’ they like to call us. So I just kept pestering and pestering my manager in LA.”

After sending in an audition tape, Castle-Hughes took the call to meet the show’s producers when she was at Los Angeles airport about to fly back to New Zealand.

“There’s this running joke that the best way to get a job is to book a non-refundable flight. It was exactly that.

For more, including a great video of Castle-Hughes’ sit down interview, check out the article here.

According to the website, Game of Thrones fever is reaching a pitch in the island country, and SKY TV (which airs the series overseas in countries like New Zealand, Australia and the UK) is planning a “pop up channel” devoted solely to the series that will air nothing but the first four seasons and behind the scenes specials round the clock for the month of February.

• Published on 01/19/2015 at 10:00 AM CDT
• Last updated on 10/21/2016 at 1:07 PM CDT