Matt Smith is 'House of the Dragon's' 'agent of chaos.' And he's loving every minute
NEW YORK — Matt Smith is tired — very tired — but you wouldn't know it from speaking to him.
In a dimly lit hotel lounge in Tribeca, the actor, who turns 40 later this month, bounds enthusiastically from one topic to the next. A curious, sharp-witted performer who likes to ask as many questions as he answers, Smith is ostensibly here to promote his current project, "House of the Dragon."
But he happily digresses into myriad subjects, like his favorite shows to rewatch ("I'm Alan Partridge" and the American version of "The Office") and his admiration for Keanu Reeves ("The last time I was here, I saw him in the lobby and I really wanted to go, 'I love you, Keanu Reeves'"), freely quoting T.S. Eliot's poem "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" along the way.
It's only when he points to a baby in the courtyard outside and whispers conspiratorially, "That baby was crying all night, poor thing," that he betrays any hint of fatigue.
One can imagine his character, the impetuous Prince Daemon Targaryen, behaving quite differently under similar circumstances. In the "Game of Thrones" prequel, which opens about two centuries before the events of the original series, Smith plays the dragon-riding brother — and eventual son-in-law — of King Viserys
