Who was the first choice?
It was very challengaing to convert the rich material of George R.R. Martin's novel series A Song of Ice and Fire into an engaging dramatic tale.
In addition to the challenges of making the rules of Westeros understandable to the general public and executing a number of significant action scenes, the first season of Game of Thrones had to establish compelling, engaging characters that viewers would be willing to follow for an extended amount of time.
Lena Headey's Game of Thrones portrayal is among the most instantly recognizable, despite the possibility that the show's writers let her down in the end.
Headey's portrayal continued to be among the most complex on the program. Nevertheless, despite Headey's outstanding performance, Gillian Anderson was nearly chosen to play Cersei Lannister.
Cersei is arguably the most complex character on Game of Thrones, despite the fact that the show has a good number of unpleasant and unlikeable antagonists.
In contrast to her son, Jack Gleeson's Prince Joffrey, Cersei's ruthlessness manifests itself in numerous ways. She lets her husband, King Robert Baratheon (Mark Addy), take center stage in public and let his incompetence speak for itself.
The majority of Cersei's labor is done in secret, when she forms strange alliances to deal grave harm to those who oppose her.
The only person who may possibly match Cersei's intelligence is her younger brother Tyrion (Peter Dinklage), who is incapable of being as horrible as she is.
One of the most crucial choices made during the development of Games of Thrones was the casting of Cersei, given the significance of her actions in establishing the framework for The War of Five Kings in the first several seasons. Even though Cersei was undoubtedly one of the most dangerous characters in the Westeros struggle, there are times when the viewer is forced to feel sorry for her.
Robert, her husband, and Jaime (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau), her brother, mistreat her. In addition, she must cope with the deaths of many children, a public humiliation at the hands of Jonathan Pryce's character, the High Sparrow, and the dissolution of her family.
Since Cersei was a major character in Game of Thrones right up to the very end, the actresses in the cast had to be totally immersed in Martin's original novel's plot and setting.
HBO would have been better off casting a more well-known actress like Gillian Anderson because the series posed a significant risk to the network. The network had never before tried a fantasy show on the same magnitude as Game of Thrones.
Whether the series would succeed beyond the primary readership of books remained to be seen. Although some X-Files fans might have been intrigued by Anderson's casting and wanted to see her in a different genre series, Headey proved to be the ideal actor for the role.
Game of Thrones became a cultural touchstone and made Headey a household celebrity once the show made it through the challenging pilot production.
Her performance was highly praised on the show and resulted in five nominations for the Primetime Emmy Award in the category of Best Supporting Actress in a Drama Series.
Why Gillian Andeson Turned down ‘Game of Thrones'
Anderson declined the chance to be in Game of Thrones because she was worried about how all-consuming the production would be, even though the role would have undoubtedly helped her career.
Spending that much time filming a long-running television show, especially one with a fast turnaround like Game of Thrones, would have limited Anderson's family time.
Although Anderson accepted that the part would have been exciting, she also that she wouldn't be able to "justify spending that kind of time away from home" unless she was able to collaborate with a director of the caliber of Martin Scorsese.
For similar reasons, she affirmed that she declined a lead role on Downton Abbey.
It is understandable that Anderson was hesitant to commit to another significant television series given her career situation at the time Game of Thrones was first started.
In an attempt to obtain her fame to the big screen, Anderson pursued a number of film ideas following the end of the first season of The X-Files in 2002.
Anderson got the chance to play the lead in lesser-known works such as Gilles Paquet-Brenner'sadaptationof Agatha Christie's Crooked House and James Marsh's political thriller Shadow Dancer.
She probably wouldn't have been able to take advantage of these chances given how hard the Game of Thrones shoot was.
Even though the choice was ultimately the right one, it's still intriguing to think of Gillian Anderson as Cersei. Since Anderson is typically associated with playing more heroic roles, it would have been against type for her to be portrayed as a villain.
Given that Cersei's maternal impulses are one of her most defining traits, it is ironic that Anderson declined the role out of a sense of duty to her kids.
Cersei claims to be working on behalf of her children even as she carries out some of the most heinous acts of brutality in the entire series.
It would have been intriguing to see Anderson focus on this aspect of Cersei's personality, especially considering her skill in portraying strong female characters.
Even though she was not present for the two extremely popular, Emmy-winning series, Game of Thrones and Downton Abbey, Anderson eventually made a successful comeback to television with a number of well-received performances.
Fans of the show were less enthusiastic with the 2016 X-Files revival, although Anderson was highly praised for her compelling roles in the British crime drama The Fall and the Thomas Harris adaption Hannibal.
She won a Primetime Emmy Award for Best Supporting Actress in a Drama Series for her outstanding portrayal of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in the fourth season of The Crown.
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