Neighbours star Eliza Taylor pulled out of running for Game of Thrones role

It turned out to be one the most talked about shows of the small screen, but former Neighbours star Eliza Taylor knocked back the chance for a role in Game of Thrones. Read why.

Australian actor Eliza Taylor has revealed she pulled out of the running to play one of the biggest character roles of the small screen of the past decade.

The Los Angeles-based former Neighbours star said her management put her forward to play Queen Danaerys Targaryen, or Khaleesi, on hugely successful award-winning HBO television series Game of Thrones.

And wait until you hear her reason.

“I auditioned for Khaleesi in Game of Thrones and I got quite close,” Taylor told TMZs Charlie Cotton on his new Big Down Under podcast.

“I got a callback, I got down to the final whatever, 10 or something, and I thought the script was bad. I didn’t like it and I said, ‘I don’t think I want to go any further with this’.”

Former Neighbours actress Eliza Taylor is based in Los Angeles. Picture: Nigel Hallett

English actor Tamzin Merchant originally scored the role for the pilot episode.

It then, however, went to then relatively unknown British actor Emilia Clarke, who went on to become a key player in Hollywood with major movie roles in the likes of Me Before You, Last Christmas, Terminator: Genisys and Solo: A Star Wars Story.

Emilia Clarke went on to make the role of Daenerys Targaryen her own. Picture: Binge

Taylor, meanwhile, later scored a role in CW dystopian science fiction series The 100, playing Clarke Griffin.

It is on that show she worked with now husband, former Home and Away actor Bob Morley.

And so, it all worked out as it was meant to be.

“It doesn’t bother me too much,” Taylor said of her Game of Thrones mistake.

“I think it is more funny than anything. Like, how hilarious that I was like, ‘This isn’t very good’. I was like, ‘What is this?’”

Taylor, 35, and Morley, 40, are parents to a young son.

She played Janae Timmins on Neighbours from 2005 to 2008 while Morley was Drew Curtis on Home and Away from 2006 to 2008.

SOPHIE RETURNS HOME

Much-loved Home and Away actor Sophie Dillman has high hopes for a more permanent return to Summer Bay.

Dillman, who played Ziggy Astoni from 2017 until 2023, along with real-life actor partner, Patrick O’Connor, filmed a cameo storyline that will air over the next fortnight from Monday on the popular TV drama.

Sophie Dillman is back in Summer Bay. Picture: Nigel Hallett

“I would love to go back to the Bay but I suppose that is not just an easy, ‘Let’s do it’,” Dillman told Confidential.

“There are writers that are piecing together storylines that are years in the making and all of that sort of stuff.

“It is the writers’ and the producers’ decision, not mine.

“So there would be a lot of moving parts for that to happen. But I have always said I love the Bay and it is home.”

Dillman and O’Connor, who played Dean Thompson on the show, have spent the past few years living in London, travelling and working around Europe.

They filmed the storyline in October in the Whitsundays region of Queensland with fellow cast members Emily Weir (Mackenzie) and Tristan Gorey (Dr Levi Fowler).

Dillman is back now full-time while O’Connor is set to join her soon.

“I am back for good now, I am done with the cold and the dark,” she said.

“I am really glad we went and did heaps of travel, which was awesome, but I just don’t handle the cold and the dark very well so I needed to come back and get some sunshine.”

Despite her wish to return to the drama, Dillman enjoyed the time abroad to separate herself from the character.

“It was a really good time to reset I guess,” she said.

“I spent six years playing Ziggy and a lot of the time I was Ziggy more than I was Sophie so it was a really great opportunity to check back in with myself and who I was and also get to do some bucket list travel.”

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Originally published as Neighbours star Eliza Taylor pulled out of running for Game of Thrones role