Maisie Williams

Interview

Maisie Williams: ‘I was covered in blood and gnawing on pizza’

The Game of Thrones star talks to Sophie Heawood about living her teens as Arya Stark, why she’s everyone’s favourite assassin – and her new role as a start-up whizz

Sophie Heawood
Sunday 14 april 2019

W

hen Maisie Williams and Sophie Turner, who play Arya Stark and her sister Sansa in Game of Thrones, were filming the final series of the epic TV drama in Northern Ireland, they would head to their hotel after work armed with a Tesco meal deal and get cosy in the same bed, like best friends on a sleepover, every single night. Sometimes they’d ring Philip on reception and send him back to the shop for chocolate, “and then he’d come upstairs and we’d all have Cadbury’s Buttons together,” recalls Williams, 21, smiling so sweetly at the memory I wonder if she realises how much it sounds like the start of a soft-porn film. She probably does, given the past decade has effectively trained her in the shadows that can lurk beneath innocent exterior; her character progressing from cute little sister to ruthless serial killer (of 64 victims). Although, as Williams puts it cheerily, because Arya only kills the baddies who really deserve it, “She’s the serial killer everyone’s rooting for.”