Game of Thrones: Thomas Brodie-Sangster admits he would like to play the show’s most-hated character

One of the young stars of Game of Thrones has said that he would like to play the character that everyone loves to hate on the show: Joffrey Baratheon.

Thomas Brodie-Sangster, who plays the reserved and stoic Jojen Reed, said that the spoilt, young king would be ‘fun’ to play.

Speaking at a press conference in London, the 23-year-old actor said “I think Joffrey would be quite fun, a nasty, nasty person. I like the way he’s young and a teenage t**t in power.”

Joffrey is well-known for his desire to inflict pain and suffering on others, and has riled many fans over the past three seasons with his sadism, most notably using a prostitute as target practice for his new crossbow.

The character is so loathed that countless YouTube videos and GIFs have been devoted to the moment that Joffrey is slapped by his uncle Tyrion for his insolence.

This year Joffrey’s spite is set to reach new levels as the young king gets older and his mother’s influence over him lessens.

Justin Bieber was even recently described as a modern-day version of Joffrey by Sophie Turner, who plays Sansa Stark on Game of Thrones, and is regularly abused by the teenage monarch.

Ironically, Jack Gleeson, who plays Joffrey, has been described by his co-stars as the polar opposite to his character.

While Joffrey may be the biggest villain on the HBO show, there are plenty of others in the running for top baddie, particularly after the fallout from The Red Wedding at the end of Season 3. The sequence was one of the most bloody to be shown on television and saw a number of well-loved characters get killed off.

Game of Thrones has hacked its way through many characters but not so many in one go, and the episode left many viewers shocked and outraged.

However, Brodie-Sangster champions the perilous nature of the show, saying, “I think it’s healthy for the show to chop their way through people’s favourite characters, it’s great and not done enough, I think, on film and TV. It’s brilliant.

He went on to say, “You have to be uncomfortable. You can’t think that everything will be okay and often it isn’t, and that’s what makes it exciting to read it and to watch, is that you don’t know what’s going to happen to your favourite characters.

“They get their heads chopped off or the bad guy might prevail and that’s brilliant because you literally don’t know what’s going to happen.”

While to many Game of Thrones fans, Brodie-Sangster is simply the mysterious boy from Greywater Watch, he rose to fame and won the hearts of audiences around the world after playing Liam Neeson's son in Love Actually. Since then the young star has had roles across film and television, including Doctor Who, Tristan and Isolde, and the John Lennon biopic Nowhere Boy, in which he had to learn to play the guitar left-handed for his turn as a young Paul McCartney.

Season 4 of Game of Thrones is set to begin next week, with many more spills and thrills promised. Several trailers have been released in the run up to the season premiere.

The show has now gained such mainstream appeal that the first episode will be simulcast both in the US and Britain, airing at 2am on 7 April in the UK.