‘Game of Thrones’ aims for Broadway
“Game of Thrones” ended in 2019 but George R.R. Martin still hasn’t finished the next novel in his Song of Ice and Fire series, the books that inspired the globally popular HBO drama.
Alas, no word on when that might happen. But impatient fans may have something else to look forward to: The return of favorite characters like Ned Stark and Jaime Lannister in a stage adaptation of “Game of Thrones” that is being developed in the hope of productions on Broadway, in London’s West End and in Australia, with a target debut of 2023.
“It ought to be spectacular,” Martin said in a statement announcing the play on Tuesday.
The author will write the story alongside the playwright Duncan Macmillan, who also adapted George Orwell’s “1984” for the stage and recently wrote “Lungs,” a play that streamed live from London’s Old Vic Theater last summer. Dominic Cooke, a former artistic director of the Royal Court Theater, will direct.
Martin said the play, which is not yet titled, will be set during a pivotal moment in the history of the series — The Great Tourney at Harrenhal, which took place 16 years before the events of “Game of Thrones” — and include many of the show’s “most iconic and well-known characters.” The production’s story, he said, will be “centered around love, vengeance, madness and the dangers of dealing in prophecy, in the process revealing secrets and lies that have only been hinted at until now.”
The Great Tourney featured jousting and archery competitions and was considered the biggest tournament in Westeros history. No specific characters have yet been confirmed to recur, but a few seem like safe bets — a young Ned Stark, his sister Lyanna, and a braggadocious teenage Jaime Lannister all attended the event in Martin’s books.
The play is the latest in a series of prequel projects that have been announced since the HBO fantasy epic concluded in 2019. Martin recently agreed to a fiveyear deal with HBO to create content for the network, and one “Game of Thrones” prequel, “House of the Dragon,” has already been greenlighted, with an expected premiere in 2022.