James Norton has revealed the ‘painful’ injury he suffered which threatened to halt filming for King and Conqueror.
The new BBC drama, which is set to launch on August 24, tells the tale of King Harold (Norton) and William the Conqueror’s (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) fight for England in 1066.
The 40-year-old star, who has been linked to the role of James Bond this year, was in rehearsals just days before a scheduled break when he broke his collarbone after falling off a horse.
‘In some of the battle scenes in the latter half of the shoot, I’m yelping very loudly and the yelps are pretty authentic,’ he told The Times.
‘I fell off a horse and I landed on my shoulder. Actually it was a remarkably quick recovery and it didn’t affect shooting. Luckily we dealt with it. The collarbone recovers very quickly. It was just quite painful.’
It means some of the Battle of Hastings scenes include some very realistic sound effects as James was shouting out in agony.
However, the scariest part of the whole ordeal was knowing he’d have to let Kitty Kaletsky, the drama’s executive producer, about his accident.
He recalled: ‘I was doing all my own stunts but I had an amazing stunt double who I was in the hospital with. There was like a moment where we said, “We’re f***ed. Are you going to call Kitty, or am I?” ‘
The cast really went for it on set during filming last year, and one poor extra needed his nose bandaged up after James went a bit too far during on shoot in Iceland.
At one point, director Baltasar Kormakur told the actor to attack the soldier being played by an extra in the face, and he took things to a whole other level.
He said: ‘I literally bit his nose. The poor guy. I went through his skin. It was terrible. The following day the guy came into rehearsals with a huge bandage.’
The Happy Valley actor insisted he was ‘just getting really into it’, but the aftermath was ‘like some kind of comedy’.
The nose biting was actually the director’s idea, which James described as a ‘stroke of genius’ befitting of a battlefield in England in the 11th century.
After the bloody incident, there were some serious talks about whether the scene would make the final cut – and fans will be able to see it in all its glory in the opening episode.
‘I’m so happy for the extra that we kept it in there,’ director Baltasar admitted.
King and Conqueror launches on BBC One on Sunday, August 24.
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