Game Of Thrones’ writer George R R Martin loved Natalia Tena’s vision of Osha he wildling so much he might rethink the character when she returns to the story in his books.
But she is sworn to secrecy on whether her character will make an appearance in the blockbuster’s fourth series, which airs from Monday.
“I can’t say anything or my ovaries will get cut,” giggles the 29-year-old Londoner, who lived off Western Road in Brighton for a year in her late teens.
She’s appeared in more than half of the show’s 30 episodes so far as a “younger and plumper”
version than Martin imagined in his epic fantasy series, A Song Of Ice And Fire.
Yet she says the actors have little to do with shaping the characters.
“You just do it. It’s written so well and the script is fantastic. So it’s not like, ‘I wouldn’t say that’.
You do have a freedom in how you act it. That is why they’ve picked you. But you are a part of team trying to make it happen. You can’t say, ‘No, no, I think this.’ You are working together.”
Her take on Osha differs from Martin’s novels but she’s read them all and is full of admiration for the 65-year-old writer, who has one more edition in the series to write.
“He is f***ing awesome,” she declares, bold as brass. “He is absolutely amazing and so is his wife, Paris. They are full of life and chat. He is always smiling, a big f***ing smile, in fact.
“He should have a massive smile on his face,”
she roars. “Some people who are successful don’t. And he does.”
The books are bestsellers and the HBO adaptation is among the most garlanded TV series ever.
But Tena won’t even reveal how far ahead the writers have written.
“You find out each time you get a script where they are. You don’t know. I can’t wait till he brings out the next book. That is what I am most excited about.”
She says the trickiest part was filming for long periods outdoors in Belfast.
“It is a challenge because of her northern accent and because of being outside. And like all filmmaking you do it so many times and you have got to keep it fresh every time.”
Sympathy for the actors’ lot is difficult finding. But being dressed in a few rags can’t have been easy. Still, she lives on a canal boat moored in London’s Little Venice and comes across as resilient. In fact, she moves every two weeks. Saturday, she’s sailing for King’s Cross.
“It the best way to live in London without a shadow of a doubt and I am a captain.”
Sounds like a hippie at heart.
“Well, depends what you mean,” she argues, the husky RP cracking into laughter. “I’m definitely not spiritual. I’m an atheist feminist. I think I’m more of a pirate. Or a gypsy.”
Her seven-piece band Molotov Jukebox channels the gypsy influence (fans call it Gypstep). She’s a ragga and salsa fan and leads the group whose aim is “to make people dance”.
Her first performances were busking in underground stations aged 15. She busked around Europe until she was 19, then travelled with a toolbox doing face-painting and entertaining with boyfriend and Molotov colleague, Sam Apley, when she was 23.
“I would face paint myself to advertise but I painted myself as this scary clown and wondered why I didn’t get many commissions. The kids were obviously terrified of this girl with an accordion and scary clown face running around in a tutu.”
She taught herself the accordion.
“I picked up a baby accordion when I did a play when I was 21 and I vaguely knew some notes because I’d learnt piano. I’d forgotten it until a few years later when my mate Matt Jenkins asked me if I wanted to be a backing singer. But I didn’t fancy just being a backing singer so I bought this crap accordion for £100 and taught myself.”
Her Thrones co-star and pal Oona Chaplin (granddaughter of Charlie Chaplin, no less) starred in the video for Molotov’s Neon Lights video. The Spaniard plays Tena’s Cuban wife in the tale about London’s multiculturalism.
“We met on set and I was like, this woman is amazing. Since then she has been one of my best friends. I needed her to be in this video because it is about London.
“Oona represents so many cultures and women. Her look could be from so many different places. She has a strength and vulnerability I find amazing.”
Thrones fans, too, have helped Molotov Jukebox on the way since Tena decided to front her own group. They’ve donated to the band’s Pledge campaign to record an album.
But Tena, who played Nymphadora Tonks in the Harry Potter film series, says Potter fans are wilder.
“When my character had a baby one fan sent me a babygrow. I was like, ‘What do I do with these?’ “I think in the end I gave them to a friend who’d just had a baby.”
- Molotov Jukebox play The Old Market, in Upper Market Street, Hove, on Sunday, April 6. Starts 7.30pm, tickets £10. Call 01273 201801
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