‘House Of The Dragon’ FYC panel for HBO – Deadline

Please note, the House of the Dragon screening and panel took place on March 7, 2023.

It’s no secret by now that Ryan Condal knew the pressure he faced when launching House of the Dragon.

While speaking to fans recently for the recent Deadline FYC House + HBO Max Series, the creator of the much-anticipated sequel to Game of Thrones recalled how he became a huge fan of George R.R. Martin’s work after college and how the epic novel series A Song of Ice and Fire taught him how to write.

“Fast forward 20 years and be put in this position to be in charge of the successor to the biggest television show in the history of the universe was a lot to take on,” said Condal, who was joined on stage by Martin and several HOTD castmemembers at the DGA Theater in March.

“And one that won the most Emmys,” quipped the author.

“Thank you for reminding me,” Condal replied, to laughs from the crowd. “As a fan, I just set out to make the show that I wanted to see. I think we have done that and I’m very proud of it.”

The House of the Dragon panel was kicked off by moderator Josh Gad, who described the HBO drama as “a cautionary tale of childbirth without healthcare.” He was joined on stage by Matt Smith (Daemon Targaryen), Steve Toussaint (Lord Corlys), Eve Best (Rhaenys Targaryen), Rhys Ifans (Otto Hightower), Olivia Cooke (Alicent Hightower), Paddy Considine (Kind Viserys), Emily Carey (young Alicent) and Fabien Frankel (Ser Criston Cole), as well as Condal and Martin.

Martin admitted that adapting his Song of Ice and Fire series is no easy task.

“[They are] significantly different from the books that were the source for Game of Thrones,” he told the crowd. “Those are five, soon to be seven, I hope, novels that are fully developed with characters, the dialogue, the scenes, it’s all there. Fire and Blood is a imaginary history book that has a few scenes where I zero in and I give you a path page of a scene. I give you some actual dialogue, but mostly it’s history. It’s an outline and you can’t present an outline in television, so it has to be filled in. And that’s where I think Ryan and his staff of writers … have done a marvelous job. In Fire and Blood, for example, It is stated that Aemma Arryn dies in childbirth and her son dies the following day. There’s nothing about the most horrendous childbirth scene ever seen on television. [Looking at Condal] That was entirely the work of you and your writers. And it’s incredibly powerful scene that just my summary, one line would not have conveyed. There’s a lot of that in this show. It’s an adaptation, but it’s also a creation.”

And sometimes, those powerful scenes are simply improvised. Considine talked about the moment toward the end of the first season when his character — who is ravaged by disease — takes the long, arduous walk to the throne.

“The crowning moment was an accident,” recalls Considine. “I was climbing up the steps and the crown just fell off. Matt picked it up and put it on my head. It was just such a fantastic moment, you know, when I sat on the throne and Matt put it on the head that we went to the director of that episode and said, ‘listen, we’ve gotta keep that in. That’s got to be a part of it.’ So I made sure that it fell off in every take so they couldn’t cut around it.”

Condal wouldn’t share much about the second season that is now in production. But he did reveal there will be five new dragons in season 2. Martin even admitted that he wasn’t all that impressed with the dragons in Game of Thrones.

“They were like all the same,” he said.

But the fire breathers he saw in the House of the Dragon were truly next level. “They had personality,” he continued. “They came alive. It came as great satisfaction to me.”

To watch more videos from the Deadline FYC House + HBO Max event series, click here.