Westeros Blog: Catelyn Recast: Ehle Out, Fairley In

[Eve]

Am I the only one who prefers Fairley? I finally got down to watching the clips, and I think she'll be fantastic. I disagree with the notion that they need glamor shots of her. How many fans are we, in the end? A thousand? a bit more? At most I would think around ten thousand. How many of us live in the US? How many of us get HBO? I don't think they should have made it a priority to get glamor shots so that fans would stop complaining about something that's going to become irrelevant once the show starts.

I still wonder what caused the casting change.

I prefer Fairley as well. I think she is attractive and more age appropriate. Ehle, although I do love her work, doesn't have that harder edge that Fairley has that is necessary to pull off a good Catelyn.

[Brude]

Question: Have the actors/actresses signed on for the whole season or not?

I guess maybe Ehle had signed the contract but was just unable to do shoot in summer for whatever reason, but this got me thinking anyway. Are we in much risk for other castmembers beeing recast simply because they might have changed their mind?

When one signs on for a pilot, one is committing to the whole series should it get picked up, probably for a few seasons - should it go that long. After that, if a show is still on the air, contracts get renegotiated depending on how well the show is doing, how big a star the actors have become, etc.

It's not unheard of for people to drop out of a project early, like after the pilot or some such. Genevieve Bujold dropped out of the Capt. Janeway role on "Star Trek: Voyager" after just a day or two of shooting because TV was done it at too breakneck a pace for her. She wasn't used to working like that (that's the story that was put out, anyway). Of course, that is why Katie Mulgrew got that role, instead. At the time, Bujold was a much more well known actress, having starred in quite a few feature films by then.

[Werthead]

From WiC, Michelle Fairley is in this clip from Misfits at the 10.30 mark. This is a very recent series (aired in October-November 2009) and shows that Fairley did have to have a lot of make-up applied for the Best role. She looks much closer to Ehle's age here, and now I think it's quite likely that people were excited over Ehle because they had Lizzie Bennett from Pride and Prejudice in their minds, forgetting that was 15 years ago. I'm seeing the same logic over Sean Bean and Lord of the Rings, even though that was ten years ago (and, based on his recent interview footage from Black Death, Bean does look ten years older, though still young for a 50-year-old).

Anyway, from that (admittedly brief) clip Fairley nails the wounded strength vibe that Catelyn has going on. Put her in period costuming and lighten her hair a few notches, and you have a good Cat, IMO.

[Ran]

Alas, Channel 4 Youtube videos appear to be blocked in Sweden.

I note one website reporting on the news, Airlock Alpha, seems to have either slipped some speculation into things, or are reporting a bit more than THR was willing to report. They claim that the "casting tweak" is because they've decided to go "in a different direction" in regards to the depiction of Catelyn.

Anyone spot any other sites with this information?

[Mierin]

The whole discussion kinda baffles me.

Am I the only one who doesn't give a damn how "beautiful" the actress playing Catelyn is? I'm very tired of all those good-looking people in Hollywood productions. I'm not saying she should be ugly, but reasonably good-looking. Normal.

The thing is: I've always felt that people in ASoIaF look a lot more "normal" than the people in other Fantasy series like the Wheel of Time where everybody's basically described as good-looking, handsome, beautiful, whatever. ASoIaF felt more realistic than that.

I felt that Catelyn is a good-looking woman, yes. But good-looking on a normal beauty scale. Not on Hollywood's scale.

That's the bloody middle ages (with a Fantasy twist, I'll give you that). People didn't have plastic surgery in the middle ages. An average modern person probably is way more good-looking than your average medieval person cause we don't suffer from malnutrition and medieval medicine. So even though Catelyn is noble and rather good-looking for their standards it doesn't mean she's Michelle Pfeiffer.

[Padraig]

Am I the only one who doesn't give a damn how "beautiful" the actress playing Catelyn is? I'm very tired of all those good-looking people in Hollywood productions. I'm not saying she should be ugly, but reasonably good-looking. Normal.

Its a fair point. Even if Catelyn, Cersei, Dany, Margarey and Lyanna were supposed to be the five most beautiful women in the world, ever, it would be pointless expecting that in the TV series. All we need are decent actors and actresses. (And Fairley is almost certainly a decent actress). GRRM purposely made everything a bit more dramatic than things would be in the real world. (Why we also have lots of very tall men running around). So it makes sense for the TV show to bring things back to earth a little.

[Lady Blackfish]

They claim that the "casting tweak" is because they've decided to go "in a different direction" in regards to the depiction of Catelyn.

Hrmm, this does concern me. I think Catelyn is a very difficult character to understand, I think I can say that much without controversy. I wonder what vision they had of her before, and what now?

Part of me wonders if it's do to with prominence. Catelyn's the most prominent female character in AGOT, yet even with the more well-known Ehle around she wasn't being touted as much as Headey. It's not like I have any kind of inside information, but well, could it be that they're thinking that she doesn't really need to be a big part of the show? After all, if they were to base their impressions off the fanbase, it's not like she's the most popular character.

Personally I think if they were basing things off the potential new viewership, they'd see that adult women are a really good demo to appeal to these days. There's a reason things like The Good Wife and Damages and, hell, Cougar Town are popping up.

I'm not trying to jump to conclusions about what they're thinking here, just musing aloud. Again, I'm no insider.

[fitheach]

If I had a choice of prominent female characters, I would choose Catelyn over Cersei anytime. And I'm not even a fan of Catelyn, but she's more important, I think.

I hope HBO understands this, I'm sure GRRM would let them know who's POV is essential. Unless there's something we don't know yet about Cersei's POV... :stunned:

[Ser_not_appearing_yet]

I have no idea which one I prefer, since I've seen neither in the role.

Big fuss over nothing.

[Ran]

If Airlock Alpha's report is actually based on something of substance from the HBO source, then my own guess is that HBO executives felt that Ehle played Catelyn very well in the pilot (hence, "not a performance issue") but they were concerned about how she'd handle Catelyn in her grief, especially later on.

Alternatively, and maybe this is a bit out there, but I'll just toss it out:

I have seen complaints here and there that no Northern Irish actors were cast in leading roles. Could the Northern Irish governmenthave expressed a bit of disappointment about this, especially if they received letters from constituents on the subject (being an American, I'm used to the idea of all sorts of constituents taking interest in all sorts of picayune matter)?

After all, it's supposed to create jobs, and obviously it'll create a lot of below-the-line jobs ... but having a Northern Irish actor in a leading role would heighten the impression of it being a "Northern Irish" production.

[ithanos]

I must admit to paying only a passing interest in the show's casting in order not to get too caught up in the build up. But somehow I had the notion that Catelyn was to be played by Lena Headey up until now. Oh well.

I'm unfamiliar with Ehle's past work and reputation so I don't have any sense of what her loss means however Fairley seems quite competent from the snippets I've seen. The role of Catelyn is a meaty one and I'm sure any self respecting actress would relish the challenge. I expect Fairley to do the role justice.

Cheer up folks, it's not quite the same but think of it as Harrison Ford stepping in to play Indiana Jones after Tom Selleck opts out of the role.

Edited to spell Lena Headey correctly.

[Brude]

The political angle had crossed my mind. It's the kind of thing where I could see all sorts of weird pressure being put on the production from government types. On the other hand, I'm not sure they would bother so long as a whole bunch of money was gonna get spent there. Mostly it's all about money with these things, but maybe some MP from the area got a bug up his ass about it and decided to cause trouble to get a local girl in the mix. Still, I think that's pretty unlikely but crazier things have happened.

One thing I've considered is that maybe it's some very personal matter for Ehle, which is why everyone is being so quiet about it out of respect for her privacy. Maybe there's a health issue, either for her or a close family member, or some other very personal issue that really isn't for public discussion.

It's all just speculation.

[nightwisp1956]

The whole discussion kinda baffles me. 

Am I the only one who doesn't give a damn how "beautiful" the actress playing Catelyn is?

:agree: Over at WIC it has gotten pretty nasty. People can be so hateful, and over an issue like this. What counts is whether she can do the role justice, and do it well. IMHO, I think MF can! In any case, how is being criticizing and spiteful toward the cast helping anything?

[Silverstar]

I think, until and unless we find out why the role was recast, all this speculation isn't going to get us anywhere. My only hope is that the reason for the recast wasn't because the powers-that-be decided that the role was to be minimised, and so they let go the well-known actress they had in the role in order to cast a lesser known actress who would be less concerned at the role being cut. Hopefully that is not the case, and it's not anything to do with the role being made more one dimensional either. I don't want Cat to end up just being Robb's overprotective mother/Jon's wicked stepmother/Eddard's nagging wife, because she's far, far more interesting than that.

I can't comment on Fairley as I've never seen her act. I'll try to do some research into her past roles to see what I think about them. I've always been a big advocate of not judging the actors until we've actually seen them in the role, and I'm not going to let it be any different just because it's my favourite character. I'm disappointed about Ehle because I was looking forward to seeing what she would do in the role, but I guess life throws disappointments at you every so often!

It's a hard role to cast. I still can't figure out my ideal Catelyn. The closest I've come is an actress who I think could have been great fifteen/twenty years ago, but is too old now, unfortunately. I can't think of anyone who would actually be able to play the role who I could see as 'perfect'. So fingers crossed Fairley will blow my socks off with her portrayal, and I'll be happy :)

[Jonias Snow]

:agree: Over at WIC it has gotten pretty nasty. People can be so hateful, and over an issue like this. What counts is whether she can do the role justice, and do it well. IMHO, I think MF can! In any case, how is being criticizing and spiteful toward the cast helping anything?

I agree it has gotten nasty over at WiC, and that is what concerns me, apparently Ms. Fairley is very media shy and if she learns of some of this hate online, she may opt. out. The problem is HBO, the production company and her agent, they should have posted information online with an excellent bio and portfolio of her work, her nominations, the rave reviews for her stage and television work, some really good pics of her (that is one problem), there is shit online and what is online really gives noone an impression of what she really looks like. I have seen what she looks like by watching that Hideous Kinky clip and let me tell you she looks way different in Kinky than all the pics online of her. HBO could silence all this BS and mainly for Ms. Fairley's sake if they would just fucking post really great photos of her plus an excellent bio, is that so hard to do. I mean just about all actors out there who have been in the business for 20 years have hundreds of pics online and really good bios of there work, we have found what like a dozen pics of her from two roles where her makeup job is intended to deglamour her like Ms. Theron in Monster. Please HBO, get the production company or her agent to post really cool photo's of her along with the rave reviews of her work and her nominations. That is all I am asking (cough) should have been done already by now (cough).

[Ran]

You know, the mutterings of a couple hundred people are not that important in the grand scheme of things. I don't think HBO needs to have gone out of its way with a press release and publicity blitz about her. The show hasn't even started filming its second episode. Plenty of time to let people see for themselves when they're good and ready, and have some publicity stills and costumed photos featuring the actors.

[WightMeWorry]

In the photoshop thread mary posted a couple images of Michelle as Catelyn. I believe this link will take you to the post. I admit I'm a bit shallow when it comes to appearances and thought Ehle captured the strength and (yes) beauty of Lady Catelyn Tully-Stark as written in the books, but with the photoshop mockups I can picture Fairley in the role.

[fitheach]

You know, the mutterings of a couple hundred people are not that important in the grand scheme of things. I don't think HBO needs to have gone out of its way with a press release and publicity blitz about her. The show hasn't even started filming its second episode. Plenty of time to let people see for themselves when they're good and ready, and have some publicity stills and costumed photos featuring the actors.

:agree:

This is really not a big deal... Not green-lighting the production would've been a big deal.

Personally I only wanted a still pic so our excellent board photoshoppers could put her face in costume :P ... I now see they did. I'm fine with HBO's choice as long as they're not diminishing Catelyn's role, and hope all is well personally for Ehle. As Brude said upthread, Ehle may have personal reasons for having to opt out. As for lack of info on Fairley, I respect in her need for privacy. Who cares if we don't know enough about her? The casting director for this series is pretty prestigious, so I'm thinking HBO knows enough to know who to cast.

[Angalin]

It's a hard role to cast. I still can't figure out my ideal Catelyn. The closest I've come is an actress who I think could have been great fifteen/twenty years ago, but is too old now, unfortunately.

Lovely post. :) Of course, now I want to know who you had in mind.

[daimonion]

As usual, after all the "WTF!!?"-comments on WiC, people have calmed down somewhat, and the discussion is a little more constructive now.

In addition to Fairley looking a little old, we had the problem this time around that she replaced an actress most seemed to be happy with. So the relative shitstorm is almost forgivable, i think. Also - it's the internet - you usually can't really expect much more. Have you ever been to youtube?

I too think Fairley looks a little too old. I have seen several pictures, so i don't think theres any way around that. But i don't really care much either way. She is quite attractive for her age, and looks about right for Catelyn. And more importantly, she seems to be a very good actress. So i'm pretty confident she'll work.