Rhaenyra Targaryen (Emma D’Arcy) has faced many opponents while trying to conquer her goal of occupying the Iron Throne, the position inherited from her father. When it finally seems she has reached that end, at the beginning of the third season of House of the Dragon, new obstacles have emerged that have made her task difficult. The main one? Ormund Hightower (James Norton), the current head of House Hightower and cousin of Alicent (Olivia Cooke).
His first move, at the start of the third episode, well outlined the character’s appetite and skill: he pretended to surrender to Daemon Targaryen (Matt Smith) and hand over his nephew, Prince Daeron, but that move soon revealed itself as a ruse to buy time and take over Tumbleton, a town near King’s Landing that is loyal to Rhaenyra. From that small market, full of innocent women, men, and children, he has orchestrated and executed his strategy to defeat the leader of the Blacks.
“If you watch that moment again, I would expect part of the audience to notice a small hint of the lie, but Daemon does not. I suppose the challenge is to find that very, very subtle and very small space you are inviting the audience into, but you are not obvious enough for your scene partner to notice the lie. Ormund is very aware that he is going to take Tumbleton. He will not go back to Oldtown. He will not abandon the fight. But obviously, he is lying to Daemon and promising loyalty and fidelity to Rhaenyra,” Norton says in conversation with Culto.
As the season has progressed (it ends this Sunday, with the airing of the eighth and final episode, at 9:00 PM on HBO and HBO Max) it has become clear that Ormund is a villain to be feared. Although he has no dragons – he despises them and everything surrounding the Targaryens – he has exploited the flanks of the Blacks and dealt several blows. One of the hardest was seen at the end of the seventh episode, when Ulf (Tom Bennett), one of the riders recruited by Rhaenyra, was seduced to switch sides. Now the monarch’s army is near Tumbleton, but are they prepared to overcome Ormund’s cunning?
“Ormund fights for what he believes in. He fights for the cause of the Hightowers. He fights to overthrow the Targaryens, this subculture, these people he considers an inferior class and sincerely believes should not be in power. For him, he is the hero. Ormund Hightower is the protagonist of his life and, if you interpret it that way, I think the audience identifies with the character. They see there is authenticity in his story,” says the actor who has been part of series like Happy Valley and The Guinness House.
-Outside of what the script proposed, did you look at any historical figure to portray your character?
There wasn’t much in the books about Ormund. It was a blank canvas, which made it fun. Ryan (Condal, showrunner) talked a lot about Charles Dance in Game of Thrones. And I think that was an inspiration for him in terms of writing: an English gentleman, but with a kind of dark and twisted edge. In terms of inspirations, I generally don’t rely on other performances. If I do that, sometimes I start to imitate. And actually, the really wonderful thing about Ormund was something very neutral. In the books, he is described very lightly and, as a result, we were given permission to fill many of the gaps. And what was really wonderful is that Ryan Condal and the other creators gave me permission to be bold. We decided that early on: let’s go big with this, let’s be bold.
-Ormund has an issue with smells. How did you work on that particularity of the character?
Sometimes it’s a bit difficult to find these characters and it feels forced. And other times it happens very organically. Ormund came about very organically. I think the matter of smells was a real hook for me and something I could really lean on. It was a small thing that we used sparingly, but it gave me something to think about all the time. If someone is so sensitive to smells, and so terrified by the power of scent, they are on edge. There is tension, there is paranoia, and there is a fear that undermines everything. It was as if every tendon in my body was slightly tense all the time, which was really helpful to play as an actor.
-How did you approach the most intense sequences of the series, like the scene in the fourth episode where Ormund, furious, hits the table with a sword?
That scene was intense. It was very important to me because it shows that Ormund is internally dealing with this fire, with this rage. It was very interesting to talk about where that rage came from, how much of it was innate, how much was a product of his upbringing, and how much was circumstantial because he was reacting to the stress of that moment (…) It shows what happens when he loses control and what exists beneath the surface and, therefore, also how dangerous he is, because inside he carries that rage, that animal. So, in my head, I thought: okay, I have to give it my all in this scene. And although I haven’t said it yet, when I was smashing the table, I almost fainted, because I had imagined it so much in my head and was so full of adrenaline. At one point I had to ask them to cut.
“I had to take a break, drink a cup of tea, take a couple of paracetamol pills because my head hurt a lot at the end. I know sometimes actors need a lot of time to disconnect, but I am quite strict with myself. When I get home, I like to leave work at work and move on with my life. I usually have a beer in a pub.”
The actor understands what his role in House of the Dragon has generated, but at the same time is categorical in explaining that there is a clear separation between the public’s perception and the personal work he had to undertake to succeed.
“At the end of a job, it’s very fun to talk about characters in terms of heroes or villains. It’s also fun to think about your career and see how many villains and how many heroes you have played. But when you are playing them, that is irrelevant. You just have to portray the human story. You have to be very clear about their incentives, their desires, their fears, who they love, who they hate, and I think if you stay true to authenticity and truth, then everyone around them can fear them, can hate them,” he concludes.
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