Sophie Turner: The Life Story Behind Sansa's Star

A thirteen-year-old girl walks into an audition in London in 2009, reads for a part in a television series that does not exist yet, and is told she has won it. The series is Game of Thrones, the part is Sansa Stark, and the girl is Sophie Turner, a schoolgirl from Warwickshire who has never acted on screen. What happens next is not a normal childhood. For the next ten years, the whole world watches her grow up, on camera, in a character who is abused, betrayed, and finally crowned a queen. Turner grows from a child into a woman inside a costume, with red hair that is not her own, speaking lines written by other people, in front of an audience of tens of millions. When the series ends in 2019, she is 23, she has an Emmy nomination, and she has to figure out who she is when she is not Sansa Stark. That question — who are you when the role that raised you is over — is the real subject of her story, and it is a harder question than anything Sansa ever faced.

Sansa Stark: Eight Seasons, One Transformation

Sansa Stark begins Game of Thrones as a naive thirteen-year-old who dreams of marrying a prince and living in a castle, and she ends it as the Queen in the North, a ruler who has survived Ramsay Bolton, Littlefinger, and the Battle of Winterfell. Turner played that transformation across eight seasons, from the first episode in 2011 to the last in 2019, and the performance is remarkable partly because the actress was growing up at the same time as the character. In the early seasons, Sansa is a victim: she is betrothed to Joffrey Baratheon, who torments her, and she is held hostage in King’s Landing, where she learns to hide what she thinks. In the later seasons, she learns to use what she has learned: she manipulates Littlefinger, she outwits Ramsay, and she becomes a political actor in her own right. Turner’s performance tracks that change without ever making it feel sudden. The girl who believed in songs becomes a woman who understands power, and the audience watches it happen in real time, because the actress is visibly older in every season. In 2019, for the final season, Turner was nominated for an Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series, a recognition that the industry took her seriously as an actress, not only as a former child star. She dyed her hair red for the part, although she is naturally blonde, and she has said the red hair became part of who she was, to the point where seeing herself blonde again after eight years felt strange.

Chesterton, Playbox Theatre, and a Twin Who Did Not Survive

Northampton gives 21 February 1996 as Sophie Turner’s birth date, and Chesterton, a village in Warwickshire, is where she spent her childhood. Her father worked for a pallet distribution company, and her mother was a nursery school teacher, so the household was ordinary, practical, and far from the world of film and television. She was the youngest of three children, and she has spoken about a loss that shaped her early life: she had a twin who died before birth, a fact she has discussed in interviews with a sadness that is still visible, and that she has said she thinks about often. She joined the Playbox Theatre Company in Warwick when she was three years old, and she performed in plays there throughout her childhood, learning the discipline of rehearsing and the pleasure of being on stage. She attended Warwick Prep School and then the King’s High School for Girls in Warwick, and she was, by her own account, a normal schoolgirl with friends and homework until the audition that changed everything. The theatre company mattered, because it meant she was not a child who had never acted; she had been performing since she was a toddler, and the audition for Game of Thrones was not her first time in front of an audience. It was, however, the first time the audience was the whole world.

The Audition at Thirteen and a Decade on Camera

Turner was thirteen when she auditioned for Game of Thrones in 2009, and the casting process was long and competitive, with thousands of young actresses seen for the Stark children. She won the part of Sansa, and filming began when she was fourteen, which meant that her adolescence happened on a set in Northern Ireland, in front of cameras, with tutors instead of a normal school. She has spoken about how strange that was: the whole world watched her go through puberty, and the character she played was often a victim, a young woman who was abused and who had to learn to be strong. The experience was not only strange, it was difficult, and Turner has been honest about the effect it had on her mental health. She has spoken about depression, about an eating disorder, and about the pressure of growing up in public, and she has said that therapy helped her. That honesty is unusual among former child stars, who are often encouraged to pretend that everything was fine, and it is one reason her fans respect her. She did not pretend. She said it was hard, and she said what helped, and that candour has become part of her public identity. The eight years on Game of Thrones gave her fame, money, and an Emmy nomination, but they also cost her a normal adolescence, and she has been clear about both sides of that bargain.

Jean Grey and the X-Men Films

While Game of Thrones was still running, Turner began a second franchise career, playing Jean Grey in the X-Men films. She first appeared as the character in X-Men: Apocalypse in 2016, directed by Bryan Singer, playing a young Jean Grey who is learning to control her telepathic and telekinetic powers. She returned in Dark Phoenix in 2019, directed by Simon Kinberg, a film that focused on Jean’s transformation into the Phoenix, a cosmic force that threatens to destroy everything she loves. The films were not as successful as the Game of Thrones series, and Dark Phoenix in particular was a commercial disappointment, but the parts showed a different side of Turner: Jean Grey is powerful, dangerous, and emotionally volatile, which is almost the opposite of Sansa, who survives by being careful. Playing Jean required Turner to be loud and physical in a way Sansa never was, and the contrast was deliberate. She has said she enjoyed playing a character who could let go, after years of playing a character who had to hold everything in. Her film debut, before the X-Men films, was in Another Me in 2013, a psychological thriller in which she played a teenager whose life is disrupted by a double, and she also appeared in Barely Lethal in 2015, a comedy about a teenage assassin, and in Time Freak in 2018, a romantic comedy about time travel. None of these films was a major success, but they showed she was working to build a film career alongside the television one.

Survive, The Staircase, and Joan: Life After Thrones

The years after Game of Thrones ended in 2019 have been about proving that Turner can carry work that has nothing to do with Westeros. In 2020 she starred in Survive, a series for the short-lived streaming service Quibi, playing Jane, a young woman who survives a plane crash in the mountains and must find her way to safety. The series was unusual in format — episodes of ten minutes, designed to be watched on a phone — and it did not find a large audience, but Turner’s performance was praised for its physical commitment and its emotional honesty. In 2022 she appeared in The Staircase, the HBO Max drama about the trial of Michael Peterson, playing Margaret Ratliff, one of Peterson’s adopted daughters. The part was small but it put her in a prestigious, adult drama alongside Colin Firth and Toni Collette, and it showed she could hold her own in an ensemble of experienced actors. In 2024 she starred in Joan, an ITV series about Joan Hannington, a real woman who became one of Britain’s most notorious jewel thieves in the 1980s. Joan is a leading role, and Turner carries the series, playing a woman who is charming, reckless, and determined to give her daughter a better life. The series was well received, and it is the clearest evidence yet that her post-Thrones career is working: she is playing leading roles, in serious dramas, and she is being judged on her acting rather than on her past.

Marriage, Motherhood, and a Public Divorce

Turner’s personal life has been public in a way that her professional life has not, and the contrast is worth noting. She married the singer Joe Jonas in 2019, first in a ceremony in Las Vegas and then in a larger wedding in France, and the couple had two daughters together. The marriage made her a tabloid figure in a way that Game of Thrones never had, because Jonas was a pop star with a large following, and the couple’s life together was followed closely. The marriage ended in divorce in 2024, and the proceedings were public and, at times, difficult, with disagreements about where the children would live. Turner has spoken little about the details, and she has asked for privacy for her daughters, which is a reasonable request that the press has not always honoured. She has also worked with Louis Vuitton, appearing in the fashion house’s campaigns, and she appeared in the Jonas Brothers’ music video for Sucker in 2019, a reminder that her personal and professional lives were, for a time, closely connected. The divorce is now behind her, and her recent work, including Joan, suggests she is focused on her career and on her children. She is still in her late twenties, and the career that began at thirteen is now, for the first time, entirely hers to shape.

What Growing Up on Camera Costs, and What It Gives

There is a particular cost to growing up on camera, and Turner has been more honest about it than most. She has spoken about the pressure of being judged on her appearance as a teenager, about the eating disorder that developed during her time on Game of Thrones, and about the depression that followed. She has said that therapy helped, and that having people around her who understood the problem helped more. That honesty matters, because it gives other young people permission to talk about the same things, and because it corrects the idea that fame is only a blessing. At the same time, growing up on camera gave her something that few actors get: a decade of experience, a global audience, and a financial security that lets her choose her roles. She does not have to take a bad job to pay the rent, and that freedom is the direct result of the eight years she spent as Sansa Stark. The bargain is complicated, and Turner has been clear about both sides of it: the fame cost her a normal adolescence, and it gave her a career. She is now in the process of deciding what that career will be, and the early evidence — The Staircase, Joan, and the producing work she has begun — suggests it will be a serious one, built on acting rather than on celebrity. The girl who walked into an audition at thirteen has become a woman who knows what she wants, and the next decade will show whether the industry lets her have it.

The Red Hair, the Fashion Campaigns, and Being a Public Figure

Turner’s appearance has been part of her public story since the beginning, and the red hair is the most visible example. She is naturally blonde, and she dyed her hair red for Sansa Stark, a change that became so associated with her that audiences were surprised to see her blonde again after the series ended. She has said the red hair became part of her identity, and that it was strange to look in the mirror and see a blonde after eight years as a redhead. The fashion world noticed her early: she worked with Louis Vuitton, appearing in the house’s campaigns and attending its shows, a relationship that put her in a different kind of spotlight from the one Game of Thrones provided. Fashion campaigns are a normal part of a famous actress’s career, but they also mean that the actress’s image is being used to sell something, and Turner has been thoughtful about that, choosing collaborations that fit her rather than accepting every offer. She has also used her public profile to talk about mental health, which is a different kind of visibility: not selling a product, but telling the truth about a difficult subject. The combination — fashion campaigns and honest interviews about depression — is unusual, and it shows a person who is aware of how she is seen and who is trying to control that image rather than letting it control her.

Producing, Choosing Scripts, and the Next Chapter

Turner has begun to move into producing, which is a significant step for an actress who spent her first decade being directed by other people. Producing means choosing the material, finding the director, and shaping the project from the beginning, rather than waiting for a script to arrive. She has spoken about wanting to tell stories about women, and about wanting to work on projects that she believes in, which is a common ambition among actors who have reached a point where they can afford to be selective. The next chapter of her career is still being written, and the most important question is whether the industry will give her the leading roles that her talent deserves. Joan suggests it will, and The Staircase suggests that prestige drama is open to her, but the film world has been slower, and the X-Men films did not lead to the film career that might have been expected. She is 29, she has an Emmy nomination, she has carried a television series, and she has the experience of a decade on the largest show in the world. That is a strong foundation, and the next ten years will show what she builds on it. The girl who grew up on camera is now a woman who chooses her own work, and the choices she makes next will define her far more than the choices that were made for her at thirteen.

Belfast, Maisie Williams, and the Friendships of the Set

The friendships Turner made on Game of Thrones are part of her story, and the most famous of them is the one with Maisie Williams, who played Arya Stark. Turner and Williams were cast on the same day, 7 August 2009, and they got matching tattoos of the date, 07.08.09, a reminder of the day their lives changed. They grew up together on the show, and they have spoken about the friendship as one of the most important things to come out of the experience. Williams was the younger of the two, and Turner has said she felt protective of her, and that the two of them relied on each other during the long filming schedules. The show was filmed largely in Northern Ireland, in Belfast and on the Antrim coast, and the cast spent months at a time there, living in hotels and working long days. Turner has said the cast became a family, and that the tutors who taught the young actors on set were part of that family too, because the children on the show were still in school, and their education had to continue between takes. She has also said that Kit Harington, who played Jon Snow, was like an older brother to her, and that the older actors on the show looked out for the younger ones. The friendships matter because they are the human side of a show that was, for its young cast, also a workplace, and because they show that Turner was not alone in the experience of growing up on camera. She had people around her who understood it, because they were living it too.

The final season of Game of Thrones was controversial, and Turner has defended it in interviews, saying that the ending was the one the show’s creators had planned, and that the criticism was, in her view, unfair to the people who had worked on it for a decade. Whether the ending was good or bad is a matter of opinion, and the debate continues, but Turner’s defence of it is worth noting, because it shows loyalty to the people she worked with, and a willingness to stand by a piece of work even when it is unpopular. She has also spoken about the experience of filming the final season, which was long and difficult, and about the sadness of saying goodbye to a character she had played for ten years. The show ended in 2019, and the cast went their separate ways, but the friendships have lasted, and Turner and Williams still speak about each other in interviews with affection. The girl who walked into an audition at thirteen, and who grew up on a set in Belfast, left the show with an Emmy nomination, a global audience, and a group of friends who had shared the strangest childhood imaginable. That is not a bad outcome, for a decade of work that began with a single audition.

The Awards: the Emmy Nomination and the Ensemble

The cast of Game of Thrones was also nominated several times for the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series, a recognition that the show’s success was a collective achievement, and that Turner’s performance was part of a company rather than a solo act. Ensemble nominations are a different kind of honour from an individual one: they say that the work was good because the people did it together, and for a show like Game of Thrones, that is the truer statement.

Joan is based on the life of Joan Hannington and on her memoir, and the series was made by ITV in 2024, in six episodes, directed by Richard Laxton. The story follows Joan from the 1980s, when she was a young mother in London, through her transformation into one of Britain’s most notorious jewel thieves, and the series is as much about motherhood as it is about crime: Joan steals because she wants to give her daughter a better life, and the tension between those two motives is what drives the story. Turner carried the series, appearing in almost every scene, and the performance was praised as one of the best of her career. The series was well received, and it is the clearest evidence yet that her post-Thrones career is working: she is playing leading roles, in serious dramas, and she is being judged on her acting rather than on her past.

My Take:

The first thing I want to say about Sophie Turner is that she survived something that destroys most child actors, and she did it while being honest about how hard it was. Growing up on camera is a strange and damaging experience: the whole world watches you go through puberty, judges your appearance, and expects you to be grateful for the attention. Most child stars either break under that pressure or spend years pretending it never happened. Turner did neither. She said it was hard, she said she had depression and an eating disorder, she said therapy helped, and then she went back to work. That honesty is rare, and it is brave, because it means she will always be described as the actress who talked about her mental health, and that is a label she chose for herself rather than one that was put on her. I respect that enormously, and I think it is the most important thing about her public life.

Sansa Stark is a great role, and Turner’s performance in it is better than it is usually given credit for, because the character’s transformation is so gradual that it is easy to miss how much work went into it. In the first season, Sansa is a naive girl who believes in songs and princes, and Turner plays her with a sweetness that makes the later suffering hurt more. By the final season, Sansa is a queen, and Turner plays her with a stillness and a calculation that would have been impossible for the actress who started the series. The performance works because the actress grew up at the same time as the character, and the growth is visible on screen. That is not something you can fake, and it is not something you can learn in drama school. It is something that happens when a real person spends ten years inside a character, and it is the reason Sansa’s arc is the most satisfying in the whole series. Turner was nominated for an Emmy for the final season, and the nomination was deserved, even if she did not win.

The X-Men films are the part of her career I have the most mixed feelings about, and I want to be fair about them. Jean Grey is a good character, and Turner was a good choice for her, because Jean is powerful and volatile in a way Sansa never was. But the films themselves were not good enough, and Dark Phoenix in particular was a disappointment that had nothing to do with Turner’s performance. The film was rushed, the script was weak, and the studio’s interference was obvious. Turner did what she could with the material, and there are moments in Dark Phoenix where her performance is genuinely strong, but the film around her did not support it. That is a frustrating experience for an actor, and it is one that Turner has now had twice: a great television role in a great series, and a film franchise that did not live up to its promise. The lesson, I think, is that film franchises are a gamble, and the gamble does not always pay off, even when the actor is good.

Joan is the work that makes me most optimistic about her future, because it is a leading role in a serious drama, and Turner carries it. Joan Hannington is a real person, a jewel thief who became notorious in Britain in the 1980s, and the series asks Turner to be charming, reckless, and maternal all at once. She does it, and the performance is the most complete thing she has done since Game of Thrones. It shows that she can carry a series on her own, without a famous ensemble around her, and that she can play an adult woman with a complicated moral life. That is exactly what she needed to prove after Thrones, and she proved it. The Staircase was also important, because it put her in a prestige drama with Colin Firth and Toni Collette, and she held her own. Those two roles, taken together, suggest that her post-Thrones career is not a decline but a redirection, toward serious drama and leading roles.

Her honesty about mental health deserves to be repeated, because it is easy to praise it once and then move on. She talked about depression and an eating disorder at a time when she was still a young woman in the public eye, and she did it in a way that was practical rather than dramatic: this is what happened, this is what helped, this is what I wish I had known. That kind of honesty helps real people, and it costs the person who tells the story, because once you have said it, it becomes part of how you are described. Turner accepted that cost, and I think it tells you more about her character than any performance could. She is not an actress who pretends that fame is only a blessing. She is an actress who tells the truth about it, and the truth is that it is complicated.

The divorce from Joe Jonas is a subject I want to handle carefully, because it involves two young children, and because the details were public in a way that was painful for everyone involved. What I will say is this: Turner asked for privacy for her daughters, and that request should have been honoured more fully than it was. The press coverage of the divorce was, at times, intrusive, and it is a reminder that famous people, even famous people who chose their careers, are entitled to a private life. Turner has handled the situation with dignity, and she has focused on her work and on her children, which is the right response. I do not think the divorce defines her, and I do not think it should be the first thing people mention when they talk about her. The work defines her, and the work is getting better.

Looking at the whole picture, I think Sophie Turner is at the beginning of her real career, and that is an exciting thing to say about someone who has already been famous for fifteen years. She is 29, she has an Emmy nomination, she has carried a television series, and she has the experience of a decade on the largest show in the world. She also has the freedom to choose, because she does not need to take a bad job to pay the rent. The question is what she will choose, and the early evidence is encouraging: serious drama, leading roles, and producing work that she believes in. If she keeps choosing like that, the next decade could be more interesting than the last one, because the choices will be hers, not the choices that were made for her when she was thirteen. The girl who walked into an audition in London has become a woman who knows what she wants, and the industry would be wise to give it to her.

For anyone who only knows her as Sansa, my advice is to watch Joan first, because it is the role that shows who she is now, and then watch the final season of Game of Thrones again, paying attention to how still and controlled her performance has become. Those two pieces of work, taken together, give you the full arc: the girl who believed in songs, and the woman who learned to rule. After that, watch The Staircase, which shows her holding her own in a cast of veterans. If you watch all three, you will understand why she lasted, and why the next decade is the one to watch.

The matching tattoos deserve one more word, because they are a small detail that says a great deal. Turner and Maisie Williams were cast on the same day, 7 August 2009, and they got the date tattooed on their arms, 07.08.09, as a reminder of the day their lives changed. That is not something you do with a colleague; it is something you do with a friend, and the fact that they did it when they were thirteen and fifteen, before either of them knew what the show would become, shows how close they were from the beginning. They grew up together on the show, they relied on each other during the long filming schedules, and they have spoken about the friendship as one of the most important things to come out of the experience. Williams was the younger of the two, and Turner has said she felt protective of her, and that the two of them understood each other in a way that nobody else could, because they were the only two people living the same strange life. That friendship is the human side of a show that was, for its young cast, also a workplace, and it is the reason Turner was not alone in the experience of growing up on camera. She had someone beside her who understood it, because she was living it too.

The final season deserves an honest word, because the debate about it continues, and Turner has defended it in interviews. She has said the ending was the one the show’s creators had planned, and that the criticism was unfair to the people who had worked on it for a decade. Whether the ending was good or bad is a matter of opinion, and I do not want to pretend otherwise, but Turner’s defence of it is worth noting, because it shows loyalty to the people she worked with, and a willingness to stand by a piece of work even when it is unpopular. That is a rare quality in an industry where people are quick to distance themselves from a failure, and it tells you something about her character: she does not abandon her friends, and she does not abandon her work. The show ended in 2019, and the cast went their separate ways, but the friendships have lasted, and Turner and Williams still speak about each other with affection. The girl who walked into an audition at thirteen left the show with an Emmy nomination, a global audience, and a group of friends who had shared the strangest childhood imaginable, and that is not a bad outcome for a decade of work.

The tutors on set are the last thing I want to mention, because they are easy to forget and because they matter. The children on Game of Thrones were still in school, and their education had to continue between takes, which meant that tutors were part of the production, teaching lessons in trailers and in hotel rooms. Turner has spoken about that experience, and about how strange it was to do homework on a set in Belfast, in a costume, with a sword beside her. That strangeness is the reality of growing up on camera: the normal and the extraordinary happen at the same time, and the child has to learn to live with both. Turner learned, and she did it while also learning to act, and the fact that she came out of it as a functioning adult, with a clear sense of what she wants, is the most impressive part of her story. Most child stars do not manage it. She did, and the tutors, the friends, and the family she built on set are part of why.

The ensemble nominations deserve one final word, because they say something about the show that an individual nomination cannot. The cast of Game of Thrones was nominated several times for the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble, and that is a recognition that the show’s success was a collective achievement. Turner was part of a company, not a solo act, and the company included actors who had been working for decades and children who had never acted before. That mixture is part of what made the show work, and it is part of why Turner survived it: she was not alone, she was surrounded by people who understood the work, and who looked out for each other. The girl who walked into an audition at thirteen left the show with friends, with an Emmy nomination, and with a career that is now entirely her own. That is not a bad outcome for a decade of work that began with a single audition.

Frequently Asked Questions

How old was Sophie Turner when she was cast as Sansa Stark?

She was thirteen when she auditioned in 2009, and filming began when she was fourteen. She played Sansa across eight seasons of Game of Thrones, from 2011 to 2019, growing up on camera in front of a global audience.

Was Sophie Turner nominated for an Emmy for Game of Thrones?

Yes, she was nominated for an Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series in 2019, for the final season of Game of Thrones. It was recognition of her performance as Sansa’s transformation into Queen in the North.

What is the ITV series Joan, and who did Sophie Turner play?

Joan is a 2024 ITV series about Joan Hannington, a real woman who became one of Britain’s most notorious jewel thieves in the 1980s. Turner played the title role, carrying the series as a charming, reckless woman determined to give her daughter a better life.

Did Sophie Turner play Jean Grey in the X-Men films?

Yes, she played Jean Grey in X-Men: Apocalypse in 2016 and in Dark Phoenix in 2019. Jean Grey is a powerful mutant whose transformation into the Phoenix threatens everything she loves, a very different character from Sansa Stark.

What has Sophie Turner said about her mental health?

She has spoken openly about depression and an eating disorder during her time on Game of Thrones, and about how therapy helped her. She has said she discussed it publicly because she wanted to be honest about the difficulty of growing up in the public eye.

Who was Sophie Turner married to, and when did the marriage end?

She married the singer Joe Jonas in 2019, and the couple had two daughters together. The marriage ended in divorce in 2024, and Turner has asked for privacy for her children.