Kit Harington talks Game of Thrones Season 5, his hair, and the show ending

In advance of the rapidly approaching Season 5 premiere of Game of Thrones, Kit Harington sat down with The Irish Examiner to discuss a range of important topics, starting first and foremost with his hair. “I get slightly annoyed, being asked about my hair and the beard,” Harington said after the Examiner asked him about his hair and beard. “I like to think of myself as more than a head of hair. Maybe I’m not. Maybe I am just a hair cut.”

We’ll just let that one lie there, because the actor shortly got into meatier topics, like Jon Snow’s relationship with Stannis Baratheon, who showed up at The Wall at the end of last season to rout Mance Rayder’s wildling army.

“What’s interesting about Jon this season, is that he has yet another older male figure come in his life — Stannis Baratheon [Stephen Dillane]. I thought it would tell me I was special and he could see something in me, because that’s what he’s had the whole time. But what’s interesting is this season is that he refuses to listen to him, becomes his own person and makes his own decisions.”

As if we didn’t already know, this indicates that the show will get into the simmering tension between Stannis and Jon Snow that runs throughout A Dance with Dragons. This tracks with what Liam Cunningham (Davos Seaworth) told Access Hollywood about “worlds colliding” during the upcoming season.  “It could be termed, ‘slightly dark,’ some of this stuff,” Cunningham said, since the show up until now had been so bright and cheery. “Some of the stuff is very dark this year,” he continued.

“The worlds colliding thing is very interesting. I mean, ours already did at the end of [Season] 4 with getting up to Castle Black and bumping into Jon Snow and all that… but, at the same time, on a positive note, Team Stannis is in probably the best position we’ve been in since we showed up on the show. We’ve got an army, we’ve had a bit of success and I think it’s time we made a play for King’s Landing.”

Harington also weighted in on the topic of the show ending, which has been roiling around the fan community for a couple of weeks now. Basically, he’s putting himself into the hands executive producers David Benioff and Dan Weiss. “I have no doubt that George RR Martin has a very clear plan of how this thing ends, and I have no doubt that David and Dan know that plan, and they’ve worked it out together,” Harington said. “I’ve always felt in safe hands with this series, and I’ve never doubted the genius of those three men and their ability with narrative to conclude it in a way which is going to be satisfying. I genuinely believe that. I think it’s going to be a really interesting ending and I can’t wait to see it.”

Finally, the actor talked a little about his non-Game of Thrones projects, which should become increasingly important now that the end of Game of Thrones is coming into focus. Harington has been trying to break into films for a while now—he nabbed the leading role in the poorly reviewed Pompeii and will shortly be starring in Spooks: The Greater Good—but as for the immediate future, he’s looking forward to some downtime. “I have nothing lined up,” he said. “I’ve said ‘no’ to lots. I need that time and space in my head for my own creativity, for my own sanity, and I’m going to go travelling again.”

Now that he’s famous, does he think it’s possible to travel without being recognized? “I can if I shave this off,” Harington said, rubbing his beard. “Honestly, if I got rid of this, I’m quite unrecognisable.” It always comes back to the hair with him, doesn’t it?

• Published on 03/30/2015 at 12:19 PM CDT
• Last updated on 10/21/2016 at 1:05 PM CDT