Game of Thrones and Bush Head, Result of Low Budget ? (VIDEO)
The directors of "Game of Thrones" have apologized after coming under attack for using the head of former President George Bush during a gory scene.
During season one of "Games of Thrones," the head of former President Bush can be seen hoisted onto a wooden stake, depicted as a traitor. No one appeared to notice the head originally, perhaps due to the long hair that adorned it, but when the DVD set was released the directors revealed the dirty details during commentary as a fun trivia fact.
"People may not have noticed this but back up ... the last head on the left is George Bush," creators David Benioff and D.B. Weiss revealed during the DVD commentary. "George Bush's head appears in a couple of beheading scenes."
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Not so funny, said some.
"Whether you like him or dislike him, whether you're of the same political persuasion or not, we still have to respect the office of the presidency and all of those who hold that presidency," Craig Eaton, chairman of the Brooklyn Republican Party said on E! News.
The creators later explained, however, that the Bush head wasn't so much of a joke as it was a fluke accident.
"We use a lot of prosthetic body parts on the show: heads, arms, etc. We can't afford to have these all made from scratch, especially in scenes where we need a lot of them, so we rent them in bulk. After the scene was already shot, someone pointed out that one of the heads looked like George W. Bush," the creators said later in a public statement regarding the issue. They also apologized for pointing out the flop, which in turn may have given the wrong impression.
"In the DVD commentary, we mentioned this, though we should not have. We meant no disrespect to the former president and apologize if anything we said or did suggested otherwise," the statement added.
Just what is the budget for the high-action series? An estimated $50-60 million for the first season; the second season received a 15 percent increase.
