Maisie Williams Reflects on ‘Discomfort’ of ‘Game of Thrones’ Fame

Maisie Williams is getting candid in regards to the turmoil she confronted as a baby actor on Game of Thrones.

Williams, now 26, rose to stardom as Arya Stark on the HBO fantasy collection from 2011 to 2019. She advised The Sunday Times in an interview revealed on Saturday, February 17, that she felt “so lost for so long” whereas embodying the character, whom she started to play at age 12.

“I knew that I was [lost], and when I couldn’t pin down what I felt my identity was within that, it brought me a lot of discomfort,” Williams stated.

Williams confessed that “it’s hard to even put myself back there and talk about how tough it was” now that she’s on the opposite aspect of her struggles. She defined that whereas “playing characters has been so enthralling,” it was tough to seek out the steadiness at “a really formative time in my life.”

“It was at its absolute worst when I also was the most out of touch with myself — not knowing your identity and that kind of thing — I think rejection at that point felt so personal, so painful,” she continued. “I’d solely compare myself to other actresses, and the way people looked, and all of the most destructive ways that you can compare yourself.”

Williams has change into “a lot more comfortable in my own skin” since her Game of Thrones days. She’s even inspired fellow little one stars to “text me or call me” in the event that they ever want steerage from a peer.

“I really dig within myself to try and bring out something that I feel would be really useful,” she stated.

Since leaving Arya Stark behind, Williams continued to problem herself on each the small and massive screens. She now performs Catherine Dior on the Apple TV+ collection The New Look, which debuted this month, and he or she underwent an intense transformation to step into the position.

“It was hard work, but it was such an honor to do this part, and it became all-consuming,” she advised Harper’s Bazaar UK in a February 6 interview. “This was a role that required an extraordinary amount of research and care — and it really hit me, bringing that wartime period back to the streets of Paris; like I would acknowledge the weight of it in a way that I hadn’t before.”

Based on the e-book Miss Dior, the collection tells the story of Christian Dior’s youthful sister Catherine, who was a French resistance fighter throughout the Nazi occupation of Paris and served as inspiration for the long-lasting designer.

Catherine narrowly escaped demise on the Ravensbrück focus camp and returned to Paris emaciated. As half of her preparation, Williams dehydrated herself to lose water weight earlier than filming. She shed practically 26 kilos in whole.

“I was eating very little, meditating all the time, burning candles and incense in my apartment,” Williams advised the outlet. “I had to be up at 4 a.m. to start sweating. The night before, at about 7 or 8 p.m. I was allowed to have something salty and dehydrating — some smoked salmon and a tiny glass of wine. Then I had a boiling-hot bath with lots of salts in it. And I sort of levitated to bed and slept for maybe three hours, and woke up and had a handful of nuts. I wouldn’t be able to sleep through the night at this point.”

Williams beforehand opened up about struggling together with her physique picture whereas filming Game of Thrones.

“Around season 2 or 3, my body started to mature and I started to become a woman,” she advised Vogue in October 2019, a number of months after the present’s conclusion. “But Arya was still very much, like, trying to be disguised as a boy.”

Williams continued: “I had really short hair and they’d constantly cover me in dirt and shade my nose so it looked really broad and I looked really manly. They’d also put this strap across my chest to flatten any growth that had started. I don’t know, that just felt horrible for six months of the year, and I felt kind of ashamed for a while.”

The collection finale helped usher in a “new phase” in Williams’ life. “Like, it’s nice to look more feminine and, like, have a real waistline and just, you know, embrace the body that I have,” she famous.