House of the Dragon's Tom Taylor: "If it wasn't for my mum I wouldn't be doing this"

Tom Taylor, who turned 23 last month, is embracing a new wave of popularity thanks to his role (albeit brief) in HBO's House of the Dragon. He appears in the first episode of season two as Cregan Stark, a fan favourite, and things have got a bit crazy since. His Instagram following went up (he's now at over 80,000 followers), naturally, and he - or his character - have become the talk of the corners of Game Of Thrones lore Twitter. "It's a really brief moment in the show, but the response has been quite mad," Taylor tells me over the phone from his family home in Surrey, where he's living out of a suitcase, having just got back from a two month filming stint for an undisclosed movie in South Africa. "You do expect a show of that size to result in some kind of reaction, but people are suddenly obsessed with whoever is in it, and you become a part of their life. It's quite crazy. I didn’t actually watch Game of Thrones, as I didn’t have Sky or HBO growing up."

Taylor is, in the grand scheme of things, a child actor. But he's not the kind that usually springs to mind when that term is raised. No headlines to be read in tabloid newspapers. No past endeavours that will raise eyebrows. He's been working since he was 12 years old, landing roles in The Dark Tower, Doctor Foster and The Kid Who Would Be King. "I sort of fell into this," he says. "I come from a big family. Altogether there are seven of us, and growing up five of us were under one roof. My mum had a big job on her hands, and we were lucky that she had enough money to send us to a drama club on Saturday mornings to keep us out of the way. It started off with just the girls and then I joined, and then my older brother joined later on. I did it from 4 or five until 11."

Courtesy of Nine Bourgois

But his time at the drama club, as much as he was into it, was cut short. By the time he was on the brink of becoming a teenager, Taylor had given into peer pressure and had quit. "I left because I sort of got bullied out of it," Taylor says, explaining that his own securities forced him out of it. "I persuaded myself it wasn’t cool. All my friends were sons of labourers and handymen, and no one around had creative jobs. My dad is from the navy."

After six months of Taylor leaving the stage school a casting agent visited the establishment looking for children to place in a role. Taylor's former dance teacher called his mum and told her he should do the audition. "My mum dragged me there, even though I was adamant I wasn’t doing it," Taylor laughs. "My brother and I got signed to the agency. They thought I was the perfect advertising kid with my blonde hair. I was 12 at this point."

Things happened quite quickly. While still at school, Taylor was working as an adult would. He was taking three months out of school at a time to film shows alongside the likes of Idris Elba and Surranne Jones. "I was doing my GCSEs while filming 2017's The Dark Tower, and Dr Foster," he says. "I was a bit chaotic at school, being silly, because it was so overwhelming being back with people my age, after going off and doing those shows. While I was focused on getting good grades, a bit of me was a bit like oh I’m earning money from that film, why would I bother with school. But a few serious conversations with my mum ensured I stayed focused there too."

Taylor is thankful that he was working from a young age. "I’ve been lucky learning this from 12 years old," he says. "I think coming into it straight out of acting school at 21 is different. You go onto a set, but you don’t necessarily know the ropes. I think I was privileged to have learnt the tools. Certain stuff you can only learn from a set, and not in school. That said, I probably don’t know nearly enough about acting as I didn’t go to drama school." He thinks this has put him in good stead to go forward with a career in acting, though he's still unsure if he can actually say that's what all of this is. "I'm sort of floating," he explains. "I'd love for this to be a career, but who knows. I think we put too much pressure on ourselves. If this ends, it ends. It's ok."

Now in his early 20s, Taylor is recognised as one of the most skilled up-and-coming actors thanks to the range and depth of his craft. The Bay, a crime drama, saw a gritty portrayal of reality, while Us, in which he starred alongside Tom Hollander, saw him play an angsty teen, and in Path to Ecstasy he embodied a drug dealer. "I want serious jobs," he says, citing Tom Hardy who tackles "seriousness with a certain charm", as an inspiration. "I want the work I do to affect people. I love real life stories. I struggle playing characters that are super happy. Now I’m getting older and I can be a bit more selective with jobs, I am glad I can say no because sometimes I’ve read a script and have known that deep in my soul I don’t connect with it. I've done a few jobs where I’ve known that if my character wasn’t in this it would make no difference. A story pawn. That’s when acting feels like a job, rather than a beautiful job."

But he's not strictly just about the serious roles. "I’d like to do a musical, Oliver Twist or something," he says. "I think that would be fun. I haven’t done stage and I think that’s on the cards. Stage is the foundations of acting, and I think it would be silly not to explore that."

While he's wrapped a film he can't tell me about, and more House of the Dragon air time is on the horizon, he is taking a mini break right now, focusing on finding the right roles for him. He also has plans to move to London, and away from the family home. "It’s time to move in London," he says. "I’m fortunate that I have had more than one job a year, but I want to be in a space where I’m collaborating with more people and not solely just waiting for jobs to come along," this commitment to the task at hand reminding me of his stark contrast to other child stars out there. "That’s where you lose your mind a bit, if you just sit waiting"

But while moving away from home is next, he still thanks his mum for the position he is in. "I’m absolutely glad she took me to the audition. I have to thank her. I don’t know what the direction of my life would be. Probably ended up going to uni and drinking loads of alcohol like everybody else."

Like this? Now read an interview with actor Sheyi Cole from our spring issue

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