Jerome Flynn was going to quit acting before landing role of Ser Bronn on Game of Thrones

Ser Bronn has proven to be a shrewd survivor with some of the best lines on Games of Thrones. And despite being ready to quit the business pre-GoT, Jerome Flynn is now making the most of every door the hit drama has opened.

Jerome Flynn admits there is no way in hell his role in the new John Wick movie would have come his way ten years ago.

In fact, after hitting the big time in the 1990s thanks to Soldier Soldier, the UK actor was on the brink of giving up acting before he landed the role of amoral mercenary Bronn on Game Of Thones.

Ever since, he says, “doors open in all sorts of areas that just weren’t there before”.

So when he got a very late call-up for a five-day gig playing a flamboyant mafia heavy in the third chapter of the hit Keanu Reeves action franchise, he leapt at the chance.

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Jerome Flynn says that working with Keanu Reeves and Halle Berry on John Wick: Chapter 3 — Parabellum was a delight. Picture: AP

“I had a lot of fun with it,” he says over the phone from Croatia, where he’s about to start shooting a new TV adaptation of Stephen King’s The Dark Tower.

“I’m worried it might be a little over the top but you take your chances. I think with that style that John Wick has, everything is slightly larger than life and very entertaining. I had a great few days there and Keanu and Halle (Berry) proved to be just wonderful and it was a joy to be part of that.”

It’s not hard to see why the producers of John Wick: Chapter 3 — Parabellum wanted Flynn for the small, but memorable role of Berrada, which has shades of his Thrones character.

“He’s a guy who gets things through not abiding by the law and isn’t afraid to do away with people in the process of bettering his life, so there are similarities,” Flynn admits with a chuckle.

Ever since Bronn made his debut in GoT in season one, as Tyrion Lannister’s hired muscle, audiences have loved his shameless greed, foul mouth, sly sense of humour and relentless pursuit of his castle.

And with one episode to go on a show that has featured so many shocking deaths, the fact that the character is still alive is testament to his survivor’s instinct and a certain moral flexibility.

“That’s exactly what I like about him,” Flynn says.

“I love his sense of humour and I think to be honest that’s what has kept him alive. The wonderful writers that we have, Dan (Weiss) and Dave (Benioff), and the crew channelled all their mischievous sense of humour into Bronn and gave him a bit more of a storyline than he has got in the books.

Nikolaj Coster-Waldau as Jaime Lannister and Jerome Flynn as Bronn in a scene from Game Of Thrones.

“And I think that’s valuable in the Game Of Thrones world in all the darkness to have that lightness as a bit of relief. But the fact that he knows what he wants and he is very truthful in that way and I think people do love him for that.”

Looking back on the phenomenal success of the fantasy drama, Flynn can scarcely believe the impact of the show and the journey he has been on, all the more so for the fact that he was a little sceptical at the beginning.

At the same time that acting roles were drying up for him, he was also becoming more engaged in activism for animal rights and other environmental causes, having bought a farm in Wales, and had decided he really only wanted to return to the screen for the right role.

The secrecy that surrounded the early episodes made him fear the worst, but once he got on set and discovered the calibre of the writing and his fellow cast, he knew he was on to something special.

“After my first day’s work and I realised the quality around me and really started to appreciate the writing, I realised I was in something classy,” he says.

“But I still couldn’t have dreamt what was going to happen with it. Nobody could. Nothing has happened like that with a TV show in terms of how deep it has gone into people’s consciousness and the breadth of the global popularity, it’s kind of unprecedented.”

Flynn has to stop and think before he can come up with his favourite memory from a show that has given him so many.

He says he particularly cherished his time with Peter Dinklage and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, who played Tyrion and Jaime Lannister, and recalls the season seven episode where he faced down a dragon as being a boys’ own adventure of the very best kind.

“It was a bit like a boy’s fantasy come true, getting to spend four or five weeks in this beautiful Spanish park with thousands of extras and people who had been training for it for months,” he says.

“It was like an orchestra and the whole battle was created and for me to have that all going on around me and riding through the flames, for an actor is was like living the dream really, and tapping into that primal part of myself, the warrior part of myself was a lot of fun and a real joy.”

Having been so close to giving acting away, Flynn says he’s now determined to make the most of whatever celebrity and profile Game Of Thrones has give him.

He’s patron of the Vegetarian Society, an advocate for the vegan lifestyle and a vocal critic of the meat industry. He’s also passionate about the rights and culture of first nation indigenous people and recently lent his name to a crowd-funding program for an Australian documentary called Morning Star.

“It helps me to make sense of the fame thing, which can often be so vacuous and meaningless,” he says of his celebrity endorsements.

“So if I can help by being part of a campaign like this — and I am putting my name to quite a few at the moment, environmental, animal, children — it helps me to be able to engage my heart and to do something and give me a balance of what can be a very crazy, disconnected business.”

WATCH John Wick: Chapter 3 — Parabellum opens Wednesday.

The final episode of Game Of Thrones is on Foxtel Showcase on Monday at 11am and 8.30pm. Seasons 1-8 are available to stream on Foxtel On Demand.