This is the story of how I came to watch the whole series of Game of Thrones. I have told it to several people so it’s about time I shared it with you. It must have been before Series 1 was broadcast when my stepson gave me the first book as a Christmas present. I read until Ed Stark beheaded the lad who had come from the Wall with the warning about the return of the White Walkers. I didn’t read any further. The same fate awaited episode 1 – this time I managed to watch until Bran was pushed from window of the tower. Not for me, I thought. Eight years from then and I joined my local branch of the Embroiderer’s Guild and went to the Annual Scottish Gathering in Stirling. The main speaker happened to be Michelle Carragher, embroiderer for the costumes of the main characters of Game of Thrones! Her presentation was excellent covering how her embroidered motifs changed with the development of the characters. She worked by herself and had to have several copies of embroidered pieces because if blood was spilled on one (there’s a lot of blood spilling on GoT), and the scene needed re-shooting she had to be ready with another. It was a fascinating lecture and we joked that we would now watch GoT to spot the embroidery. Though Michelle said she would spend hours on an item only to discover that in the finished scene it was covered up!
Over the previous Christmas I had recorded a programme about the writer, George Martin. He is worth 64 million dollars now but lives in the same house as before he was rich. I liked him. He had been a screenwriter in Hollywood and written for ‘The Twilight Zone’ and ‘Beauty and the Beast’. I remember these. I liked him even more! The people in Santa Fe love him because he has spent money on the town. What an admirable man!
Series 1 to 7 of GoT was shown in blocks of three episodes a night over Christmas. I recorded it and tried to watch it again. But still it couldn’t hold my attention. Five months later, in May, my son told me, ‘Mum, you have to disregard the violence and the sex and concentrate on the story. It only really gets going in Series 3’. I tried again. So weird to see the Christmas adverts even though I was fast forwarding them. And I was hooked. Not just on the embroidery, though that was magnificent too.
Once I’d watched Series 8 (it was on national news because the fans were so hyped up about it, especially in the US), I found a programme about the making of it. The people in Belfast who had worked on it were pretty thankful for seven years of employment.
George Martin said that in Hollywood his stories were knocked back because ‘there are too many characters. Can’t you cut some out?’ He always said no and held on until the right offer came. Good for him.