Game of Thrones | Special Award 2018

Game of Thrones received the Special Award at the 2018 British Academy Television Craft Awards. The Award recognises the craft behind the making of the critically acclaimed series and their outstanding contribution to revolutionising and pushing the boundaries within the various crafts involved.

View the full list of winners at the 2018 British Academy Television Craft Awards 

The following is an extract from the official 2018 British Academy Television Craft Awards brochure. Our press release announcing the news can be found here.

For such an epic saga as HBO’s Game of Thrones, it’s fitting that the series as a whole received special recognition from BAFTA at the Television Craft Awards with the presentation of a Special Award. The show’s most fundamental legacy has been the boost it’s given to the UK television industry, and Northern Ireland in particular. The country has served as the production’s home base since the very beginning, and it’s estimated that Game of Thrones has benefitted the Northern Irish economy by more than £65 million, including a boost to tourism akin to ‘Middle-earth’ in New Zealand. Not to mention the 700-strong crew, 250-plus cast, many of whom are British, and gainful employment at Belfast’s Titanic Studios and various UK VFX houses.

“This award makes us extremely happy on behalf of the people who actually earned it – all our brilliant, talented, hard-working department heads and crew,” said executive producers David Benioff and DB Weiss. “From the beginning, everyone involved understood that the show was meant to exist as a 70-plus hour whole, a single coherent story with a beginning, a middle and an end. This was reflected in all aspects of the production, and nowhere more than in the craft component. Costumes, sets, props, weapons, hair and make up… all were designed and built with both the past and future of the story in mind.”

Read the full feature on p.25 of the brochure >

Words by Rich Matthews | Image courtesy of HBO