The international cast of Game of Thrones is one of the highlights of the series. One example is Sibel Kekilli, who plays Shae on the popular HBO series, who is an acclaimed actress in her native Germany. In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter she spoke about the language barrier she faced, and also talked about working with one of the series’ stars, Peter Dinklage.
Kekilli has high praise for Dinklage, whose acting leaves her mesmerized during filming. She confesses, “I really love him and his acting. His acting is overwhelming, and I love to watch him. When we act together, I really forget to act. I’m just watching him and I think ‘oh my gosh it’s my turn.'” When she manages to compose herself, she finds that Dinklage is a wonderful actor to work with, explaining, “Acting for me is like a ping-pong game. That’s the secret of acting. When you have a really good actor, I always want to be as good as he is or she is. Peter gives me the ball and I just want to return it to him.”
Besides acting with Dinklage, Kekilli’s biggest challenge on the set of Game of Thrones is acting in English — and being around so many different variations of the language! She explains, “I had to get used to it. Because it was my first time acting in English, everyone on set was difficult to understand. It was a mix of Scottish, Irish, British and American English. To understand a Scottish accent or an Irish accent was so hard. I didn’t understand anything. In the first season, they translated lines to German for me. In the second season, Peter said ‘oh your English is getting better, so now I can’t make any jokes in front of you.'”
