Uh-oh! Matthew Macfadyen is doing a show with the Game Of Thrones guys

David Benioff and D.B. Weiss have approximately one show—Netflix's upcoming 3 Body Problem—to earn back the public's trust

By Emma Keates  |  February 1, 2024 | 7:27pm
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Uh-oh! Matthew Macfadyen is doing a show with the Game Of Thrones guys
David Benioff and D.B. Weiss; Matthew Madfadyen Photo: Dia Dipasupil; Amy Sussman

Succession’s Matthew Macfadyen is a very good actor who was lucky enough to star in a very good show created by very good writers, and now gets to treat Hollywood like his own personal buffet of potential roles now that it’s all said and done. Other very good actors haven’t been quite so fortunate, like, say, the cast of Game Of Thrones, who have largely failed to rise to the level of prestige that one might have expected of them before the show went off the rails. (Emilia Clarke starred in a Christmas movie no one watched! Kit Harrington is still peddling his Jon Snow spinoff!)

In light of all of that, we have one burning question for Matthew Macfadyen: why the hell are you doing a show with those guys? Did you “kind of forget” that they suck? Maybe playing Logan Roy’s dutiful lapdog for so many seasons inured the actor to the perils of what could be a difficult workplace, but we still just have to say: protect yourself, Matthew! Be careful!

Macfadyen will trade the halls of Waystar Royco for the hall of the White House in the new series from David Benioff, D.B. Weiss and Bernie Caulfield, titled Death By Lightning. Based on Candice Millard’s novel Destiny Of The Republic, the project is a dramatic retelling of the “epic and stranger-than-fiction true story” of President James Garfield and his eventual assassination by one-time admirer Charles Guiteau. Macfadyen will play Guiteau while Michael Shannon has signed on to play Garfield (via The Hollywood Reporter).

Benioff and Weiss’ last few attempts to clear their name didn’t go very well. Not only were they exiled from a planned Star Wars trilogy in 2019, but they also attempted a speculative series about slavery in the modern era that was, thankfully, axed by HBO right about when people were starting to wonder why it hadn’t immediately been axed by HBO. The pair does have one major chance to win back some iota of public opinion with their upcoming sci-fi epic 3 Body Problem, which premieres March 21 on Netflix. Jury’s still out on that, but in the meantime, man, that finale still hurts.

 
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