The Game Of Thrones Star Who Almost Played Jon Snow Before Kit Harington

It's no secret, at this point, that "Game of Thrones" went through some major casting changes after it filmed its original doomed, unaired pilot; Tamsin Merchant was replaced by Emilia Clarke as the dragon princess Daenerys Targaryen, and Michelle Fairley took over as Catelyn Stark after Jennifer Ehle left the project, just to name a few examples. Still, I bet you didn't know that Iwan Rheon, who ended up playing Ramsay Bolton on the award-winning HBO series, auditioned for two other roles ... and nearly snagged the starring part of Jon Snow, which ultimately went to Kit Harington.

As Rheon told Interview Magazine back in April of 2016, he did what he described as a "general audition" but also specified that he read for Viserys Targaryen, the role of Daenerys' brother — which eventually went to Harry Lloyd. The show's creatives then asked him to read for the role of Jon Snow, the assumed bastard of House Stark. "At the time I didn't know much about it," Rheon recalled. "So, I auditioned for Jon Snow, but so did a lot of other people probably."

After saying that he thinks it was between him and Harington (and, because Jon was "dead" at the time, laughing about how he'd be dead anyway), Rheon continued. "I think they made the right choice; it would've been a very different Jon Snow if I'd played him. I don't think there's much point in dwelling on these kind of things," he mused. "You're inevitably going to know other actors going up for parts, and you have to be open about it. The majority of the time it's a specific thing they're looking for, which could easily come down to how you look, and there's not an awful lot you can do about that."

As all "Game of Thrones" fans know, Iwan Rheon did end up on the show as the deeply sadistic Ramsay Bolton, another one of the series' famous bastards who is eventually accepted by his legitimate father, Roose Bolton (Michael McElhatton), and named as his heir. Still, to say that Rheon's journey to playing Ramsay was easy wouldn't be true. As he told Interview, the show's producers said they "remembered him" when he returned to read for Ramsay, but he still had his doubts:

"Not really. I thought they'd forgotten all about me. I actually auditioned for Ramsay. I was working on a film in Spain, and I had to send in a tape. I don't really know what the initial reaction was. Luckily, I was back in London for a week in the middle of shooting, and the guys happened to be there so I could go in and meet them for an audition. I was going in for two roles even then, Daario Naharis was the other one, I think."

Daario Naharis, a warrior who pledges his fealty and love to Daenerys, wound up being played by two people (Ed Skrein, who left "Game of Thrones" after one season and handed the role to Michiel Huisman), while Rheon finally booked a huge role on the series after trying for, apparently, a number of years. It's genuinely hard to imagine Rheon, who was perfect as the snarling, cruel Ramsay, playing the often naïve and generally wholesome Jon Snow, so I think it's safe to say that both he and Kit Harington ended up in the correct roles, especially when it came to their characters' big confrontation in season 6.

In the season 6 showstopper episode titled "The Battle of the Bastards," Jon Snow and Ramsay Bolton have a huge showdown — so, what's the context, in case you forgot? Well, by the time season 6 rolls around on "Game of Thrones," Jon is alive again (thanks to the Red Priestess Melisandre, played by Carice van Houten) and searching for the girl he believes is his half-sister but is really his niece, Sansa Stark, portrayed by Sophie Turner. (Jon isn't a bastard at all but the legitimate son of Daenerys' defeated brother Rhaegar, unbeknownst to everybody at this point — including him.) As Jon returns to the world of the living, Sansa — who, alongside Alfie Allen's Theon Greyjoy, is a captive of Ramsay's — returns to his side, and the two prepare to take back their home of Winterfell from Ramsay, who's holding the castle with his forces.

The Battle of the Bastards is one of the most gruesome and most incredible battle scenes from all of "Game of Thrones," especially when you consider that it kicks off with Ramsay shooting Sansa's youngest brother Rickon (Art Parkinson) in the back with an arrow. Thankfully, Jon and Sansa's forces narrowly prevail, and even though Jon gets some final blows in against Ramsay, it's Sansa who gets to deliver the parting shot as she allows Ramsay's starving hounds to eat him. Iwan Rheon is genuinely and astonishingly great as Ramsay — even when you hate Ramsay — and it's almost impossible to imagine anyone but Kit Harington as Jon Snow. As for "Game of Thrones" as a whole, you can stream it on HBO Max and watch both performances.