"I took off the costume, and it felt like my skin was being peeled away," he recalled of the final day of filming. "I was very emotional. It felt like someone was shedding me of something."
We all felt like we needed therapy after Jon Snow's death — Kit Harington literally so.
The Game Of Thrones star opened up to Variety for their latest cover story, detailing his darkest hours playing "Ned Stark's bastard".
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View StoryHarington, who has played the brooding Snow since the very first episode, said the last day of filming was difficult. "I took off the costume, and it felt like my skin was being peeled away," he said. "I was very emotional. It felt like someone was shedding me of something."
As the millions of fans of the popular drama series know, Snow slowly became more of an integral character as the story unfolded. People around the world were shaken when he was stabbed to death during the Season 5 finale. Although his character was brought back to life in the Season 6 premiere, there was a period of time when Harington himself became a living cliffhanger.
The 32-year-old actor told Variety that the increase of popularity brought him to a dark place. "My darkest period was when the show seemed to become so much about Jon, when he died and came back," Harington said. "I really didn't like the focus of the whole show coming onto Jon -- even though it was invalidating my problem about being the weak link because things were about Jon."
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View Story"When you become the cliffhanger of a TV show, and a TV show probably at the height of its power, the focus on you is f--king terrifying," he continued. "You get people shouting at you on the street, 'Are you dead?' At the same time you have to have this appearance. All of your neuroses -- and I'm as neurotic as any actor -- get heightened with that level of focus."
The public attention even prompted Harington to start therapy. "It wasn't a very good time in my life," he said. "I felt I had to feel that I was the most fortunate person in the world, when actually, I felt very vulnerable. I had a shaky time in my life around there -- like I think a lot of people do in their 20s. That was a time when I started therapy, and started talking to people. I had felt very unsafe, and I wasn't talking to anyone. I had to feel very grateful for what I have, but I felt incredibly concerned about whether I could even f--king act."
Fortunately, Harington has been wildly successful for his role on "Thrones" and was even nominated for an Emmy for Season 6, in which Jon faced off against Ramsey Bolton in the brutal "Battle of the Bastards." However, the actor said he swore off reading reviews after the show's third season because people criticized Jon's personality.
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View Story"My memory is always 'the boring Jon Snow,'" he recalled of the show's early coverage. "And that got to me after a while, because I was like, 'I love him. He's mine and I love playing him.' Some of those words that were said about it stuck in my craw about him being less entertaining, less showy."
"I now look back and I go, well, I was a f--kng integral part of that whole thing," he said. "Jon was, and I am, and I'm proud of it. It took me a long time to not think, I'm the worst thing in this."
The 32-year-old, who was 24 when the series first debuted, said the eighth and final season represented something of a "breakthrough." "Looking back at the entirety of 'Thrones,' there'll be 70% of the scenes that I'll just never be happy with," he said. "I've come to terms with that...I know who this is now, and I'm at peace with who this is. I just got a feeling that it's the most satisfied I will be with my work as Jon Snow."
As for the upcoming final season, the actor insisted says that HBO is holding nothing back.
"They went balls out, I think is the term," he claimed. "They could have easily set the same budget as they did for Season 7, but they went bigger."
"Game of Thrones" premieres April 14.