Jet lag can do strange things to a person. Some of us fall asleep and end up face down in our dinners. Others fall into a kind of manic existentialism. And this is the state in which I find Nikolaj Coster-Waldau. We are ostensibly meeting to talk about his role as William of Normandy in the BBC’s epic historical drama King & Conqueror, and of course Game of Thrones, the show that propelled him to international heartthrob status. But instead, Coster-Waldau seems to be in the mood for heftier topics. Social media, AI, robots, wars, weapons, intimacy coordinators, the inevitability of ageing – all are on the table. “OK, this is not about William the Conqueror,” he admits at one point. “F***. Give me a question. Get me back on track!”
The 55-year-old Danish actor is speaking from a hotel room in New Jersey, his slate-grey shirt unbuttoned at the top and his arm slung over the sofa. His accent is a heady mix of Danish and American, with the odd lengthy British vowel thrown in. The hair is sandy; the jaw could cut steel. The man may be knackered, but he looks sharp as ever.
