George R.R. Martin advised actor on portraying Tanselle in Knight of the Seven Kingdoms

According to Polygon, George R.R. Martin offered guidance to Tanzyn Crawford on playing Tanselle, the only female character in HBO’s A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms with meaningful plot significance.

Tanselle is introduced in episode 2 as the star of a traveling puppet show camped at Ashford Meadow and is shown to be an artist who later paints a new sigil for Dunk’s wooden shield. The character is sparsely described in Martin’s novella The Hedge Knight, so Martin told Crawford she was “exactly what he pictured” and shared his thoughts on how smallfolk carry themselves and how Tanselle might behave: not the most natural on stage, preferring behind-the-scenes work, but “quite self-assured” with a smaller personality, Crawford said.

Crawford said the novella’s limited description felt freeing and that she wanted to bring her own interpretation rather than reproduce the comics’ version, which she described as more fully realized. New episodes of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms air Sundays on HBO Max.

Key Topics

Culture, George R.r. Martin, Tanzyn Crawford, Tanselle, Ashford Meadow