- - “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms” Star Peter Claffey Says Creator George R. R. Martin 'Left Me to My Own Devices’ (Exclusive)

Julia MooreJanuary 22, 2026 at 1:25 AM

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Steffan Hill/HBO; Tristar Media/WireImage

Peter Claffey in "A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms" (left); George R. R. Martin attends the Berlin premiere of "A Knight Of The Seven Kingdoms" on January 13, 2026 (right) -

A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms is the latest HBO series adapted from one of George R. R. Martin's best-selling books

The show follows a naïve knight, played by Peter Claffey, who tells PEOPLE how he bonded with the "super down-to-earth" author

Martin has said that he's "very happy" with how the show turned out and called the casting a "home run"

Having George R. R. Martin on set was not as daunting as Peter Claffey would've expected.

The Irish actor, 29, leads A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, a new Game of Thrones spinoff series based on a series of novellas by Martin, 77, that follows naïve knight Ser Duncan the Tall (Claffey) and his squire, Egg (Dexter Sol Ansell).

Claffey tells PEOPLE that the famed author is a "really, really sweet, really lovely guy" whose "grounded" nature helped him play the beloved knight that readers first met in 1998's The Hedge Knight.

"He's a super down-to-earth, normal guy. I got to have dinner with him in New York, and we had dinner in Belfast there recently, and he's just a really, really sweet guy," Claffey says.

Game of Thrones/Facebook

'A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms' co-creator George R. R. Martin (left), showrunner Ira Parker (right) and Peter Claffey (center)

When it comes to bringing one of Martin's characters to life onscreen for the series, Claffey says the author "kind of left me to my own devices."

He's been asked frequently if there was any "advice" Martin gave him about playing Dunk, but Claffey says he "didn't really want to" bother him with those questions.

"I think he was quite involved in the casting process himself, so I'm sure he probably saw the way that I wanted to do things, or the way that I was trying to do things, and he seemed to be pretty happy."

As a massive Game of Thrones fan, the Irish actor says he "just loved talking to him about the original show" and they "spent hours" discussing it.

"We spent a lot of time, the last time we had dinner, talking about different scenes that I loved [in the show] and stuff like that. I'm just a ginormous nerd when it comes to superheroes and fantasy," Claffey says. "He likes talking about his creation, and I love talking about his creation."

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Steffan Hill/HBO

Peter Claffey (left) and Dexter Sol Ansell in 'A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms'

Martin served as co-creator and executive producer on A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, and he told The Hollywood Reporter that the show "turned out very well, and I’m very happy with season 1."

"The casting was a home run," he said, praising showrunner Ira Parker as "terrific," and noting that he "seems to have the same priorities I do — he’s trying to do something that’s very true to the characters."

The show was renewed for a season 2 before season 1 premiered, and Claffey is already in production on the next installment, which will be based on The Sworn Sword.

Martin told THR, though, that the "big issue" he's facing for Dunk and Egg is he's "only written three novellas, and I have a lot more stories about Dunk and Egg in my f---ing head. I’ve got to get them down on paper."

New episodes of A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms premiere Sundays at 10 p.m. ET on HBO.

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Source: “AOL Entertainment”