SPOILER ALERT! This post contains details from the Season 4 finale of Industry.
Since Kit Harington ended his run as the upstanding Jon Snow on Game of Thrones, he’s been looking for “all the kind of messed up people” to play instead. Sir Henry Muck, the wealthy aristocrat with plenty of baggage who entered HBO‘s Industry last season, certainly fit that bill.
In the Season 4 finale of the financial drama series, which aired Sunday night, Henry is once again hitting a rock bottom of sorts. This time, rather than a mental breakdown, his professional life is collapsing around him as Tender’s fraudulent schemes unravel and CFO Whitney Halberstram (Max Minghella) is getting out of dodge ASAP.
“I think he probably fails as a CEO, where he failed as an MP, that he’s so wrapped up in self that he’s not seeing the full picture,” Harington mused about the character’s downfall this season. He adds that Henry’s lack of perspective is exactly the thing that continues to make him an easy target for manipulation and exploitation — which is levied toward him this season not only by Whitney but also by his wife Yasmin (Marisa Abela).
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“I think some of the conversations we’ve had around how certainly Henry feels about Whitney anyway is that he’s slightly hypnotized by him; he’s entranced by and also sees him as the person he kind of wants to be, business-wise — like he wants to be more like Whitney,” Harington continued.
Until he doesn’t. While Henry does nearly go on the lamb with Whitney, he comes to his senses aboard the small passenger plane before it leaves the runway, headed to drop the two fugitives aboard in Lithuania. He lashes out at Whitney before storming off the plane and, in some ways, facing the consequences of his participation in the Tender scheme. If someone of his stature can ever truly face any meaningful consequence for white collar crime.
In the interview below, Harington unpacks the episode and weighs whether he believes this is the end of Henry’s story on Industry.
DEADLINE: Toward the beginning of the episode, Yasmin tells Henry she doesn’t love him anymore and that she’s going to leave him, and he is obviously blindsided. You really just see the truth of them both so plainly — what was it like to film that scene with Marisa? What’s your read on how Henry is processing that moment?
KIT HARINGTON: God, yes, that scene. I mean, it’s such combustious relationship. They yell at each other. They’re pretty close to throwing things at each other. It’s a toxic relationship. It was always going to be that. With that scene, there was an option, I think — it was always written sort of sensitively, but you always have an option. How heated are they going to get? We’ve seen Henry be thrown under the bus by Yasmin and his uncle. He might come into that room raging, screaming and doing what they’ve done before. The more interesting choice was: What if the dregs of what love they did have for each other are still there? The thing that was really important to me and Marisa all the way through was to try and find the moments where you see these people are actually in love. It might be an unhealthy type of love, but there is love there.I think that that’s what we wanted to capture with that final sort of breakup, was that there’s tenderness for each other.
DEADLINE: I also feel like these moments also kind of get to the humanity underneath the facade. These are very powerful people who have made many careless decisions that have harmed so many people. Yet, you see this brokenness in them in this moment. Can you talk about that in regard to Henry, particularly since he is really at rock bottom mentally this season?
HARINGTON: I think in that scene there was a moment where he talked about kids, and that seemed like the very clear point in the scene for me where he breaks, and she sort of says, ‘I never wanted that. What made you think that I wanted kids?’ It’s so heartbreaking because you realize he’s not been listening to her. He’s not been seeing her for who she is. He’s been totally wrapped up in himself, and of course, at some point, they were going to have kids, and she was going to support him and be this doting, supportive wife to his genius. It’s that blinkered thing that we have with Henry, where he says, ‘But we were going to have kids.’ And she goes, ‘What are you talking about?’ And he says, ‘But, we’re Catholic, for fuck sake.’ He’s not listened to her. He’s not seen her, and he’s not understood who she is on basic level.
DEADLINE: While many of Henry’s shortcomings may be obvious to the audience, they certainly don’t seem to always be obvious to him. He’s really being confronted with them in this episode, but even then, do you think he really accepts that? When we leave him in that final scene, fishing with his uncle and Lord Mostyn, has he realized anything about himself?
HARINGTON: Mickey and Konrad are wonderful when they direct, especially because they completely hear you with ideas that you have. One of the ideas I had with that scene was, like, on the original idea was he’s left with the lithium pills, and he’s depressed, and he’s got a tag around his ankle, and that’s it. And I said to the boys, ‘I think we need to end him on an up. I think he needs to catch a fish, and you see the addict in him come out again, and you know that this guy is gonna be fine doing what he does like. He’s always gonna get another chance. There’s always going to be another fish. That addict in him is always going to go again if he lets it. So that was that, that was our idea for that, and I was really happy we did that. In answer to your question more widely, I think, does Henry ever learn? I don’t know. I think it’s that awful thing of, like, our personalities are formed when we’re seven, right? It’s a terrifying thing about being a dad with my two. There’s some statistic. Your personality is formed when you’re seven. I can’t feel that about Henry, [that] he’s always going to fall in the same trap. Actually, I do believe this in all the people in this show, outwardly, if you look at what he’s trying to do, he is trying to do good. He says, ‘I want to be a better person. I want to do good. Isn’t that what this is about?’ It’s just that his personality flaws are so fundamental and so entrenched that he will always do bad by trying to do good.
DEADLINE: There is something very child-like about that scene, and it’s not the first time that we see that with Henry. I think it helps illustrate the point that he’s going to be fine.
HARINGTON: He is and he isn’t, isn’t he? I mean, he’s never going to be fine as a human being. He’s always going to be damaged, but it’s how much he, given the opportunity, is allowed to spread that damage. He needs to step back and realize that he’s got everything he needs, and more of it than he needs. Go and be a quiet, good person rather than try and change the world. That’s how it gets everyone into trouble. I think he will always be protected. I think that the child-like thing was something we really did investigate quite a lot this season. We spoke a lot — me, Max and Marisa — about Marisa being mummy and Max being daddy and to this child-like being. I think there’s moments where we implanted him, sort of nuzzling up to [Yasmin] like she’s his mom, yelling at [Whitney] like he’s his dad, looking up to him like he’s his dad, being manipulated by [them]. I think that all played into that child-like quality.
DEADLINE: Speaking of Whitney, I was hoping you could talk about the devolution of that relationship this season to lead them to the point where Henry refuses to go on the run with Whitney. Where is Henry’s perspective on that decision coming from?
HARINGTON: It’s, again, one of those odd things to be proud of him for. There’s no part of me that should be proud of Henry yelling in someone’s face. He calls him a peasant…but there’s something about him in that moment that owns who he is again, that says, ‘Yes, I’m a fucking top. I’m not this guy in this passport. I’m not gonna run with you. I’m not Lithuanian. I’m Henry Muck, and from here, this is who I am,’ and owns it in a really unashamed way…The best thing that happens to him this season is being able to shout that at Whitney, and then he crashes and burns again. What’s coming out of his mouth is absolutely appalling. But in some ways, I was like, ‘At least he’s owning who he is.’ He’s not trying to pretend he’s a man of the people, or being a Tory politician, where he’s going around council estates telling them he knows how they feel. He’s saying, ‘I’m this. This is a way out.’
DEADLINE: What do you think triggers him to get to that point? When he looks at that passport, is it just the thought of being a civilian that sends him over the edge?
HARINGTON: I think it’s as simple as that, yeah. That was always one of those lines that I love, where he goes, ‘What the fuck is this?’ And it’s this moment of clarity where he’s, like, ‘Do you know what? I’ll go to jail. I’ll face up to all this. I’ll die in jail, [rather] than be this person on the run with you.’ I guess he has been a fake so much, but this is a moment where I think he kind of goes, ‘No, I’m not going to run from this. Yeah, I’m an English gentleman, and I’m going to stand up.’ That’s kind of how he feels in that moment. That’s not me.
DEADLINE: Do you think this is the end for Henry on Industry?
HARINGTON: I don’t know. I just saw they got another season, final season, which is brilliant. My personal feeling is, I think that’s right. I think they’ve got another season to tell. I think it would be amazing, whether he’s in it or not. I don’t know yet.
DEADLINE: Over the course of these two seasons, how do you feel like you settled into this character? What were the most difficult parts of playing him?
HARINGTON: I know him on a number of levels, and he was always very clear to me who he was. There’s a lot of things we share, like not least addictive cycles in my past and in his present. His certain kind of chaotic way of living his life that combats this maudlin side of him, I related to. I would say that it wasn’t difficult playing him, but it was actually just a joy. Every time you get to step on as him, there’s always the opportunity for something farcical and ridiculous that is fun to experiment, and then you give them all the options and they can play with it. I also don’t think I’ve played quite such a tragic [character]. I think there’s strangely great joy there when you’ve got the opportunity.
DEADLINE: There is so much range with Henry.
HARINGTON: I hope there’s something to say about men there. I’m not quite sure what it is. There’s something about pride and being male and not knowing how to deal with one’s inner world, stuck in some strange, archaic template of what a man should be, which is interesting.
DEADLINE: You’ve really branched out since Thrones. You also had The Dreadful come out recently, and of course we all saw the stories about you and Sophie [Turner] not particularly enjoying kissing one another…but what can you tell me about what attracted you to that role? How does that translate to kind of the overall direction you want to take your career?
HARINGTON: Yeah, I love that role. When Sophie sent me that project, it was a role that spoke to me, because he was this greedy guy, and I was quite interested in that greedy thing, that he wanted her as an object. Also the time that was set in…So getting a chance to kind of investigate what our people felt then like then, detached and all over the place, I think. It was [another] kind of medieval thing with Sophie, but totally different characters and shapes of the characters. I think Jon Snow is the most difficult role I’ve ever played. It’s very difficult to be that good and that sort of humble and honest and retain something interesting about the character. So I’m looking for all the kind of messed up people.