Game of Thrones at 15: Secrets Behind Original Pilot That Creators Were Told Was “Massive Problem”
Game of Thrones infamously had a rocky start with its original pilot. SYFY Wire is breaking down all the behind-the-scenes details.
Game of Thrones is thanking the old and new gods for a second chance.
Afterall, HBO allowed D. B. Weiss and David Benioff to produce two separate pilots for their adaptation of George R. R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire book series.
"How many millions of dollars do you think they wasted on that first pilot?" the duo were asked on Jimmy Kimmel Live! in 2019 as the series wrapped up after eight seasons.
Weiss replied, "I don’t know exactly, but I think about 10.6."
With the TV phenomenon celebrating its 15th anniversary, SYFY Wire is looking back at the version of GoT’s series premiere, "Winter Is Coming," that fans didn’t see on April 17, 2011.
Hodor on for some wild fun facts!
The Infamous First Viewing
Between 2006 to 2010, Weiss and Benioff had developed their adaptation, written a pilot, cast their ensemble and filmed episode one.
Alas, the pilot’s eventual massive overhaul meant not much from original director Tom McCarthy (The Station Agent, Spotlight) found its way to the screen.
"It was like 92 percent," Benioiff revealed on the Scriptnotes podcast in 2016. "So much of it was re-shot that a different director got credit." (Timothy Van Patten, best known for helming episodes of The Sopranos and Boardwalk Empire, picked up the high-profile salvage job.)
Weiss and Benioff’s interview was a full-circle moment considering co-host and writer Craig Mazin (Chernobyl, The Last of Us) was among their inner-circle at the time—and chosen to provide feedback on pilot number one.
"'You guys have a massive problem,'" Mazin remembered telling his pals after screening their years-in-the-making, eight-figure costing episode.
"It took us almost four years to get the pilot made. And we finished it. We’d been overseas for about seven months," Weiss recalled. "We finally got it finished, and we show it to Craig, Ted Griffin and Scott Frank. Watching them watch that original pilot was one of the most painful experiences of my life."
While Game of Thrones wasn’t known for happy endings across the seven kingdoms, the creators found one anyway after Mazin went to a screening of the do-over we know today.
"I very specifically remember walking out in between and you were there. I said to you, 'That is the biggest rescue in Hollywood history,'" Mazin recalled. "It wasn’t just that you had saved something bad and turned it really good. You had saved a complete piece of s--t, and turned it into something brilliant. That never happens."
"The Things I Do for Love"
The rescue was possible due in part to Weiss and Benioff fixing, by their own admission, very basic and fundamental structural issues in the script.
For one: ensuring audiences—and not just Song of Ice and Fire readers—were aware Jaime Lannister (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) and Cersei Lannister (Lena Headey) were siblings.
The context was quite pivotal for the pilot’s shocking final moments, when Bran Stark (Isaac Hempstead Wright) catches the twins having sex, leading to Jaime’s iconic utterance of "The things I do for love" before pushing the young Stark child from a tower window.
"That last scene in the pilot, where Jaime and Cersei, brother and sister, are making love—they didn’t know that they were brother and sister," Benioff shared with Vanity Fair in 2014. "Which was completely our fault."
King’s Landing Is Not Sin City
Amid the pilot’s enormous makeover, Weiss and Benioff also re-evaluated the look of Westeros, deciding a gritty wardrobe was more true to Martin’s books than their initial flashy style being flaunted across the Middle Ages-inspired realm.
"We made the decision, all of us together, that the costumes needed to look lived-in," Benioff also explained. "This is a period where people weren’t taking their things to the dry cleaners. Aside from maybe the queen, everyone’s clothes look dirty and sweat-stained."
Speaking of queens, Headey found herself looking dressed more for The Mirage than The Red Keep.
"I looked like a Vegas showgirl in the pilot," Headey joked in the show’s oral history Fire Cannot Kill a Dragon: Game of Thrones and the Untold Story of the Epic Series. "Furs and massive hair, like a medieval Dolly Parton. Not that I'm complaining, I loved it."
A Callsheet Shakeup
It happens in Hollywood. And probably more frequently than anyone will ever know.
As Game of Thrones producers re-tooled the pilot—per that oral history—they made the "hardest phone call" of their careers to original Daenerys Targaryen actress Tamzin Merchant, telling her she was no longer the show’s Mother of Dragons.
Thankfully, years later, Merchant discovered it was for the best.
"I didn't have any training as an actor, I only have my instincts. And what excites me and what drives me is a compelling story and a compelling character. So for me, Game of Thrones was never that," The Tudors star detailed to EW in 2021. "I think it's a testament to Emilia Clarke for making that role iconic—she was obviously excited to tell that story, and she was epic and excellent. But for me, it wasn't in my heart to tell it."
Getting Martin’s Stamp of Approval
Before Weiss and Benioff could begin location scouting for Winterfell, they had to get the a-ok from the maker himself, Martin.
With his books having become bestsellers, movie studios were beating down the author’s door over potential big-screen adaptations, but he was willing to bet on the writing partners after a three-hour meal—if they could ace a Westeros pop quiz.
"At the very end of that lunch, he said, 'Who's Jon Snow’s real mother?'" Benioff revealed in their VF interview. "It was very much like a test question."
And they passed with flying colors.
In a full-circle moment, the only reason everyone can now answer that question is thanks to the series, since Martin has yet to wrap up A Song of Ice and Fire—which forced Game of Thrones to surpass the source material.
As fans learned in the season six finale, "The Winds of Winter," Jon’s mother is Ned Stark’s sister, Lyanna Stark, confirming the longheld "R+L=J" fan theory, with the "R" being Rhaegar Targaryen.
"We had already discussed it. We’d had like a two-hour conversation about it," Weiss said of their life-changing correct answer. “Luckily, it was pretty well-trammeled territory for us, at that point."
All eight seasons of Game of Thrones are streaming on HBO Max, along with its two spin-off series, House of the Dragon and A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms.
