Kit Harington checked himself into a rehabilitation facility the same week Game of Thrones’ final season began airing in 2019 — and stayed six weeks, isolated from his phone and absent from the press tour that accompanies a television event of that magnitude.
The British actor made the disclosure Thursday in Variety’s Actors on Actors series, speaking alongside his former castmate Peter Dinklage as part of the Emmy-focused franchise’s 24th season. “The first thing I did while the show was airing was go to rehab,” Harington told Dinklage. “I needed to go get sober. I needed to get my head on straight.”
Harington described the timing as coincidence, saying the pull toward staying put was real: press obligations loomed, and he was expected front and center for one of television’s biggest finales. He made the call anyway. Missing the press cycle, he later admitted, turned out to be “a real relief.”
It was not his first attempt at getting sober. Speaking on a wellness podcast in early 2024, Harington said he had entered his initial rehab facility drunk, sobered up, decided it wasn’t for him, and walked out — telling himself he could manage it alone. That approach failed over the following four years. He eventually sought help at an American clinic, where he was also diagnosed with ADHD.
The six-week stay in 2019 — reported at the time to be at a luxury Connecticut facility where Harington underwent cognitive behavioral therapy and mindfulness treatment — coincided with the airing of a season that drew both record ratings and fierce backlash. While he was in treatment, 1.8 million viewers signed a petition demanding HBO reshoot the final season with different writers. He learned about it afterwards.
Following his discharge, Harington took a full year away from acting to, as he put it, “get sorted,” only for the COVID-19 pandemic to arrive just as he prepared to re-engage with work. The disruption made for an unusually long stretch between his tenure as Jon Snow and the roles that followed, including his current work on the BBC drama Industry.
Reflecting on that period Thursday, Harington said it ultimately served him well, giving him time to ask hard questions about his identity and whether he still loved acting at all. He told Dinklage that playing Jon Snow had drawn heavily from a place of pain, and that finding joy in the craft again had been the work of the years since.
Dinklage appeared in the interview as promotion for his upcoming project The Lowdown, while Harington represented Industry. The conversation aired on the 15th anniversary year of Game of Thrones’ premiere.
