In the first series of House of the Dragon, we watched Phia Saban’s Helaena Targaryen ascend from princess to queen as her husband (and brother) Aegon, portrayed by Tom Glynn-Carney, usurped the throne of the Seven Kingdoms. As a young, rising actor, Helaena’s sudden ascension to power was Saban’s chance to prove that she was an on-screen force to be reckoned with.

Barry Pierce: When did you first become interested in acting?
Phia Saban: It’s one of those annoying answers but I can’t remember not being into it. When I was younger the high point of my year was the school play. Doing the play made everything about my life fun. And then that just carried on. I did a lot of Shakespeare in the summer, which is the most Oxford thing in the world, obviously. My dad was an actor before I was born and I think, in a way, I felt very proud of that similarity with him. I wanted to have that in common with him.

BP: Do you remember any of those early school play roles?
PS: What’s so incredible about school plays is, I was able to play all the parts I will probably never be cast as ever again. I was Mercutio in Romeo and Juliet, which was my favourite. I did Hecuba in The Trojan Women, which is obviously a part for a very established 50-year-old woman. I did Bottom in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Wendy in Peter Pan, and then loads of modern plays because my drama teacher was really into new plays. You don’t really get that again, that thing of like, you can be everything.

BP: So is the stage where you’d like to be?
PS: Massively, that’s where it started. It’s been so exciting that my only professional jobs have been screen jobs because it is so different. It’s been really cool finding that feeling I got from doing theatre when I was fourteen on screen. Especially on Season two of House of the Dragon, I was looking for a way to find that magic. On stage, it’s different because it’s not about the finished project, it’s all in the moment and then it doesn’t exist anymore. That’s something I really had to wrap my head around, “I’m going to do this and then it’s going to exist.” It’s been a bit of an existential crisis.

BP: What was drama school like?
PS: It was a bit of a fantasy because it was like, here are some really intense relationships and you also get to rehearse plays every day for three years. [laughs] But it also sets up a zone where you get to do some really, really bad acting, where you abandon trying to get everything right. It’s great because you’re rarely afforded that opportunity once you step into something professionally. But that’s also when all the really fun, interesting stuff happens.

BP: You went from drama school straight into The Last Kingdom [Saban played Lady Aelfwynn], which was in its fifth series. What was that like, going straight into a big Netflix show that had already been running for many years?
PS: It was actually pretty insane. It was filmed in Budapest and we were shooting during Covid. We all went out there and lived in an apartment building together for eight months in a bubble. And, at the time, Budapest had a curfew at night on the streets so it literally felt like we spent eight months in a block of flats. Obviously, at the time, I was thinking of it like an infinite sleepover, but I definitely had Stockholm Syndrome by the end of it because as soon as I got back I was like: that was really intense. [laughs] But it was a really amazing first experience of how collaborative and loving work can be.

BP: It’s crazy that your very first role was a major Netflix series. It used to be the case where you’d graduate drama school, you’d get to be in the background of a scene in Midsomer Murders, you’d maybe get a line of dialogue on Casualty, and then you’d slowly work your way up. More and more it feels young actors are graduating straight into major roles.
PS: Yeah, totally. I guess the streaming services are just making so much work. Is it easier now? It’s something I’ve thought about. I think especially with something like House of the Dragon, it can feel quite exposing because all of the language around it reminds you that this is a big show and everybody watches it. I definitely felt like I was learning on a job that was inevitably going to be very exposing, which can sometimes mean that I held myself to quite unfair standards. But I feel like whatever job is your first, they all equal out because everyone is learning, whether it’s an ad or you’re on the Olivier Stage at the National Theatre, you’re trying to give your best performance.

“It’s been really cool finding that feeling I got from doing theatre when I was fourteen on screen.”

BP: House of the Dragon is literally the biggest show right now.
PS: When you’re making it, you really can’t think of it in terms of scale at all. Subconsciously, you’re aware of it but thinking about it can’t be good for your acting, you need to be fearless. But also, it’s very easy to not think about it because the reality of making it is like, you’re in Watford with your friends in an itchy wig in the lunch queue. [laughs] I think there was a moment when we were filming season one, during Aegon’s [Tom Glynn-Carney] coronation, Ewan [Mitchell] asked the director if he could play the Game of Thrones theme while he walked down to get everyone hyped up. There’s moments like that where you’re like, “Oh yeah, it’s Game of Thrones.”

BP: The two major projects you’ve done have been a historical drama series and a high fantasy series. Do you ever dream of roles where you don’t have to wear a wig?
PS: [laughs] Yeah, for sure. I’ve done so much skulking around damp castles in my career so far. Obviously, you think about the jobs you’d like to do all the time, but I think I’m superstitious about it. But then again, literally the other day I wrote something where I was like, “Yeah, I want to be eaten by a shark, I want to do motion capture, I want to be an alien.” I want to do all the types of film and theatre that I enjoy, but I don’t know if I’m jinxing it by saying it.