Part of Game of Thrones featuring Emilia Clarke, Peter Dinklage, Lena Headey, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, and Sophie Turner.
Rise to Fame
His first TV job was Jon Snow. He auditioned straight out of Central School of Speech and Drama, having made his professional debut in the National Theatre's War Horse while still a student. The show made him one of TV's biggest stars; by the final seasons he was reportedly earning £2 million per episode. The problem with being Jon Snow is that you're only Jon Snow.
In the Spotlight
He checked into a Connecticut rehab facility in 2019 for stress and alcohol; he's said the end of Game of Thrones was part of what broke him. He's been refreshingly honest about his post-GoT choices: a Marvel cameo in Eternals he took purely because Marvel called, a Jon Snow spinoff he personally pitched that got cancelled. But Industry Season 3 gave him the best reviews of his career in 2024, playing an aristocratic green energy CEO. The Guardian called it a 'career-best.' He's got more range than eight seasons of brooding ever suggested.
Side Notes
His full name is Christopher Catesby Harington, named after Christopher Marlowe, and he didn't find out until he was 11. The 'Catesby' connects to something bigger: his ancestor was Robert Catesby, the ringleader of the Gunpowder Plot. He developed, wrote, and starred in Gunpowder (BBC, 2017) playing that ancestor. While in rehab in 2019, he got an ADHD diagnosis too. He's said it reframed a lot of his struggles. That's a lot of history for someone who just wanted to be a journalist.