You might not know the name Josephine Gillan, but if you watch the HBO fantasy series Game of Thrones, you probably remember her. There's a scene in Season 4 where Oberyn Martell and his lover Ellaria Sand are picking out a prostitute to bring to bed with them. When Martell asks one of the fully nude women if she's timid, she grabs her own foot and pulls it up to her head from behind. She's obviously not timid at all.
Here she is at a convention appearance demonstrating that move from her best-known scene.
Gillan, the actress who has played prostitute Marei since Season 2, says there's a reason she's extra comfortable with the near-constant nudity and the many, many sex scenes on the show. It's because before she was an actress on TV, she was, as she puts it herself to The Daily Mail, "working as a whore." In an article headlined "'Game of Thrones' rescued me from prostitution (By giving me the role of, yes, a prostitute!)," Gillan explains how landing the role changed her life.
Gillan had a really tough life. She told the Mail that as a young girl she was placed into foster care, where a family friend gave her weed and alcohol at age 12, then got her hooked on cocaine at 14 before pimping her out to his friends.
She credits getting the role on Game of Thrones with stopping her life from spiraling out of control, and it's led to more acting work in a couple of independent films. She also explained that her past has given her an advantage when it comes to all of the simulated sex that her role on the series requires.
There will be more of Marei to come. Gillan has reportedly already signed a deal to return for the show's seventh season.
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