Game of Thrones: Stunt performer suing show over injury sustained in Battle of Winterfell

Performer suffered a ‘serious fracture disclocation to her left ankle’ while filming the eighth season of the fantasy series

Stunt performer Casey Michaels is suing Game of Thrones series makers after she sustained injuries during the eighth season.

While filming the final season of the hit show in February 2018, the stunt performer suffered a “serious fraction dislocation to her left ankle”.

The case, worth nearly $5m (£4m) and initially filed in January 2021 against Fire & Blood Production, a UK-based company owned by HBO, is likely to be presented in front of a judge sometime next summer if neither party decides to settle.

According to the filings, obtained by Variety, Michaels was shooting a scene in the third episode, dressed as a Wight – zombies controlled by White Walkers.

The group of 28 stunt performers were directed to walk off a 12 feet high roof “as if unaware of the drop, in keeping with the zombie-like nature of the Wights”, landing on a box rig below.

“By their nature, however, the cardboard boxes are not durable and become damaged as each stunt performer lands on the box rig and also as each stunt performer climbs off of the box rig after landing,” Michaels alleged in her claim.

Fire & Blood Productions has denied this claim, saying that the box rig was “durable and not compressed when a stunt performer stepped off onto the mattress and rolled away”.

Emilia Clarke as Daenerys Targaryen in Game of Thrones (Rex)

Michaels was the last stunt performer to land on the rig, which she claims has resulted in multiple surgeries on her foot to insert a plate and screws and “lengthy, intensive” physiotherapy, and has left her unable to return to work since the incident.

Further in their defence, the company says Michaels didn’t correctly walk off the roof as instructed, instead her form was “like a pencil, in a rigid or vertical manner”.

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They claim her injury was “caused either by the Claimant’s failure to execute the pleaded stunt properly and/or with the skill and care of a reasonably competent stunt performer or by pure accident”.