Iwan Rheon and Sara Martins, the stars of Those About To Die, have opened up to about the harrowing moments they faced while filming their grisly TV series.
The new Prime Video drama, which also stars Sir Anthony Hopkins, is set in the epic and bloodthirsty era of ancient Rome, where the merciless relished in their power and gladiator fights were the height of entertainment.
Iwan, best-known for playing the hateful villain Ramsay Bolton in Game of Thrones, stars as gambling kingpin Tenax opposite Death in Paradise actress Sara, who plays a woman called Cala who learns how to play the game of the city to save her children.
During a recent conversation with, the co-stars opened up about facing especially horrific scenes, including the brutal death of a child in the Colosseum.
What made the gore involving children even more emotional for the actors was the fact that both Iwan, 39, and Sara, 46, are parents themselves in real life.
At first, we brought up one scene that left us shaken, when a young boy is shown hanged as other characters, including Tenax and Cala, react with horror.
In that particular instance, Sara explained that it wasn’t too difficult to cope with as an actor, as the child was ‘joking in between takes’.
However, the boy’s fictional funeral was more disturbing for her, when his ‘little body’ was wrapped in white.
Iwan, who has one child, added that it was ‘hard not to get caught up in the emotion of it’, recalling when the ‘reality of the situation’ would ‘hit him all of a sudden’.
He then referred to the final episode of the series when a young boy is killed in the story, stating: ‘And then there’s stuff in the Colosseum, remember? After the last fight and the little boy there, I just looked at him and was like, “This is the worst thing in the world.”’
Sara continued, explaining that her co-star was referring to the moment that a child was mercilessly murdered by sword.
‘And he had the most adorable face,’ she added, outlining how there were ‘so many things happening’ when they filmed the Colosseum sequences.
In another gruesome moment in the series, Iwan’s character Tenax suffers a bone-breaking injury – literally – with Cala forced to jump into action to help treat his leg.
Sara admitted that the prosthetics were so realistic that even when she was up close, pretending to push Tenax’s bone back into his leg, it didn’t look as though it was fake.
While initially the Misfits star thought it would be ‘relaxing’ to film for a week with Tenax suffering from an injured leg in bed, he actually found the experience quite ‘uncomfortable’.
‘I had to put back the bone inside. Obviously it was a prosthetic, but even me having an eye on it, it was so well done. That was… oh my god,’ Sara remarked about her Cala’s role in that sequence, emphasising how ‘interesting’ it was to learn about how surgery would have been carried out at that time.
Following the release of Those About To Die on Prime Video, viewers who have tuned in to watch the series have been sharing what they think of the drama on social media.
‘18 minutes into episode 1 so far and this show seems soooo good !! How come it’s not being hyped?! The visuals alone are absolutely amazing!’
‘This is brilliant,’ Anna added, while Gemma added that the story had her ‘engrossed’.
Hot Property Picks from Metro
We bought our £298,000 Nottingham new-build using a little-known loophole
You can buy this seven-bed home for £80k — but you’ll be the only person for miles around
The price of this ‘dystopian’ flat shows London’s rental market is truly unhinged
Half the homes in this commuter hotspot just 28 minutes from London have dropped in price
What I Rent: At 23 years old, I live in a £2,450pcm London flat in Zone 1