STACK #182 Dec 2019

TV FEATURE

visit stack.com.au

Almost a decade after making her entrance as Arya Stark in the pilot episode of Game of Thrones , MaisieWilliams has finally said goodbye to the show that has defined her young life.

– I can see the life that I had that year.” Filming her final scenes was, she admits, a very emotional time. “It’s so weird because my last day was the last day of principle

and I’m very grateful to the writers for making Arya into more of a leading role as I grew up, because as an actor it’s rare that you get to do that.” Saying goodbye to her second family – the cast and crew of Game of Thrones – was understandably a time to reflect on the extraordinary journey that she had embarked upon all those years ago. “There was so much of myself and so much of my life that I played through Arya,” she says. “I think, and when I look back to

M aisie Williams was 12 years old when she joined Game of Thrones and has grown up on screen as Arya Stark, transforming from a feisty young girl into a ruthless killer seeking revenge on those who have wronged her northern clan, the Starks. “I think for all of us a decade is a long time but changing from 12 to 22, that’s like a very, very big change that anyone undergoes, and to do that in the public eye I think was just a lot of really strange lessons in a really strange way,” muses Williams. “But I think I’ve been so lucky that I managed to grow with a character who also grew into a young woman in her own right,

other seasons, my fury and my anger when I was 13, 14 – the things that made me furious and angry then are very different to the things that make me furious and angry now. I can just see it all in my eyes really