The onetime ‘Game of Thrones’ star — who isn’t quite caught up on ‘House of the Dragon’ — is embracing his dark side to portray a ruthless arms dealer in the upcoming Rod Blackhurst film: “It’s fun playing a baddie.”
Kit Harington is ready to get out of his comfort zone.
After spending eight years as fan-favorite character Jon Snow on cultural phenomenon Game of Thrones, Harington is taking on a new type of role in director Rod Blackhurst’s Blood for Dust. In the action-thriller, the Eternals actor will play the film’s antagonist Ricky, an illegal weapons dealer with violent tendencies.
“I’m playing a pretty gnarly dude,” Harington tells The Hollywood Reporter about his character. “It’s not necessarily a part that I would generally get offered, and that’s quite interesting to me.”
Set to begin production in late-November, Blood for Dust follows former friends Cliff (Scoot McNairy) and Ricky, who reconnect one fateful day. In an attempt to make some quick cash, Cliff gets wrapped up in one of Ricky’s dangerous business schemes, including cross-state drug and weapons deliveries for John (Josh Lucas), a mid-level American cartel boss. When Ricky turns a simple exchange into a bloodbath to eliminate the competition, Cliff realizes his harsh new reality, in which he must fight just to stay alive.
“At the moment, and for the last couple of years, I’m trying to — and that’s another reason why I wanted to play this role — take roles that I’m a bit scared about doing,” says Harington. “It’s fun playing a baddie, I think. I spent a long time playing the epitome of a good, honest human, trying to do the right thing that everyone’s rooting for. And maybe this is a reaction to the length of time I was doing that.”
After living at the center of the Thrones zeitgeist for the show’s eight season-run, Harington says he’s drawn to the nature of independent films these days.
“It is a medium that more and more fits my life at the moment,” he says. “Having a young son, having done a TV show for a long time, the opportunity to go and play interesting, odd characters for a couple of months, here and there, is appealing to me.”
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