Baldur's Gate 3 Minthara Interview

December 31, 2023 at 4:34pm
By Jason Stettner

Interview with Emma Gregory, Actress for (Minthara) in Baldur's Gate 3

For call based interviews we try to present the conversation replies as close to verbatim as possible, for context.

A staple I do in all interviews in order to start things off is to ask that you elaborate a bit about your work, and this particular role for those not familiar with it?

Emma: My name is Emma Gregory and I play Minthara in Baldur’s Gate 3. I've been an actor for a long time. I come from very much a theatre background I've done a lot of theatre and bit telly and a lot of voice work. I do lots of audio books for example and games and lots of things.

I've done a lot of big theatre like Shakespeare for the Royal Shakespeare Company and West End theatre and all that sort of thing. I absolutely love it and I love playing Minthara too, she was a great challenge.

In Baldur’s Gate III, you provide the performance for Minthara. Could you tell us a bit about the character and the situation she finds herself in?

Emma: Well, it depends which path you go down. There are millions of paths in Baldur’s Gate 3, but Minthara is a Drow from Menzoberranzan. Comes from the sort of leading family of house Baenre in Menzoberranzan but she finds herself in a situation in Baldur’s Gate 3 where she has been lured into the cult of “The Absolute” by Orin who she has quite a back story with. She has been brainwashed and in the game you can choose to recruit her and rescue her from the cult of The Absolute.

She is a very paranoid character, very set in her ways. She finds it extremely difficult to trust people but in through the course of the game she comes from sort of quite a chaotic background of not knowing what she was doing because she was brainwashed into then being; hopefully if you guys recruit her, being part of the party and companions.

She learns to discover, she needs in many ways because she is an exile from Menzoberranzan and having given up the worship of the Lolth who is the god of where she comes from or goddess so she finds herself an outcast really. Once she's not part of that, not part of The Absolute she finds that she needs the companions in many respects, but of course what she would like them to do is to take over the world.

Have her rule it in many respects possibly. I don't want to spoil it for people who haven't played yet, but I guess she's one of those characters as well that that people might come to a little later. She has a sort of reputation of being quite brutal and she is a brutal character but one of the amazing things about her is that if you rescue her she sort of, once she's in the party sort of says well you know why would you do that? Why would you leave your enemy alive?

Why would you not kill them, because for her things are very linear you know, you get rid of enemies and that's it. So she's quite interested in the fact that they've done so and challenges them to say, well you kill. When I kill it's for a purpose, why are you killing? I know why I kill and I have a very clear purpose about it and I kill my enemies and that's it, they're eradicated. But why are you doing it? So she questions the party and makes them think, which I think is rather good and then also I'm giving you a very long- winded answer Jason but this is her.

This is the complexity of Minthara which is wonderful to play and I hope that people really enjoy discovering her. That she's not just a killing machine, she is that but there is much more to her. Many more layers, I think and reasons for why she is who she is considering where she comes from and her upbringing which any D&D fans can read around her background is quite brutal. So yeah so in the course of the party or the game she it's interesting to see how she learns to trust people always for a purpose and what she wants of course but there is a an arc, a journey for her.

When preparing to perform as Minthara, were you given any initial direction in regards to the character? Just in terms of an example of prep work to get into the mind set of this particular performance?

Emma: No. I mean obviously I was given a little bit of background about the story but not too much. I was told of the sort of qualities of the character I suppose by the studio and the sort of type of voice and thing that they were looking for and then the rest of it I pretty much got from the lines I was given.

I mean; I'm guided by a director obviously, I've been living with Minthara for four years so that's a long time to make her grow and create her. I also had the benefit of having the most wonderful writer in Adam Smith who's the lead writer at Larian.

We'd never met and it was quite interesting over the four years we'd never met at all but we did this sort of sort of dance where you know I would give him an interpretation of his lines and he would take that and go oh wow, okay let's go down this path with her. So between us we developed someone who we feel is very complex and layered which is great.

We were given wonderful free reign with them as well as keeping within the storyline and what needed to be achieved, but we were very much given as actors, which Larian is so wonderful at doing. They trust their actors and you know you're given the role for a reason which is your ability to play it and they trust you and that means as an actor you're very free because you can you can bring ideas to the table as well and for the character and that's a beautiful thing.

Your character goes through a bit of a positional shift as the narrative progresses. Did that adjustment in your character’s role impact how you approached the voice performance?

Emma: Yes, very much so and because it was also all motion capture where you're literally in a bodysuit and you got sensors all over you and you're able to really fully physically explore the character as well. Which I believe you should do anyway in all voice work because it's not just you know acting from the throat upwards. It's like any acting, you get into the character that you're playing and you feel that physically because then that determines your breath and how you live and breathe the character and that's got to come from your whole body, your whole soul.

With Minthara I very much felt there was a journey with her vocally. I made a decision I suppose which I guess everyone backed because nobody told me not to do it but she's quite staccato you know in her delivery, in her vocal delivery and I think that very much emphasizes and shows her lack of emotional centeredness.

She's not someone who delves into emotions very often and yet she's a very emotional character but she keeps it like a pressure cooker I guess but I discovered as well that along with that staccato kind of delivery there was a sort of shift we found in movement and voice between when she's under the influence of The Absolute and when she's then freed from that. I think it's interesting for her to explore how that frees her up vocally a little bit so maybe not quite so tight in the throat once she was freed you know.

Learning to relax a little bit as much as Minthara can. So yeah there was a nice shifting slightly of Minthara, just slightly. I hesitate to use the word softening but yes softening a little bit. Softening the edges a little bit vocally and physically once she's gone through that journey of being not brainwashed and discovering who she is again. Yeah I thought that was actually really interesting in the game because she comes off as very you know dark intense and then immediately once that's gone I was kind of like okay there's a lot more under the surface.

Yeah I mean she'll always be dark and intense. She is in inverted commas an evil character you know, she's not to sit and you know talk about fluffy kittens but actually she might as she quite likes animals. She does definitely does go on a journey of finding out that she needs allies because certainly by the end of the game I think she's got quite a soft spot for many of the companions as much as she can have. She admires quite a few of them you know like Lae’zel for example, Shadowheart and Jaheira.

Yeah, so that was interesting to explore physically how she can soften and in intimate scenes or romance scenes with her. She can play the part of being soft and intimate whether she's really feeling that inside is another matter. Depends who it's with I guess but yeah that was interesting to explore vocally from being less sort of rigid and staccato like during The Absolute brainwashing and then finding she's always staccato but whether there's more sort of range and color in how she speaks once she's freed of the tadpole.

When performing the role, were there any particular lines or moments that really stuck out to you? Whether that’s a behind the scenes moment or from the dialogue?

Emma: I love all our lines. Well I love the obvious jokes that lots of people love, like that it was a beautiful webbing. That sort of thing I love, the lines that she's given when she's explaining when she's grateful to having been rescued and explaining that you know no one would know about her.

All the vulnerable moments that she has, more vulnerable moments when she's talking about how she feels. I think she's quite shocked you know having had the brainwashing happen to her, having been so deceived and so the dialogue that happens once she's rescued and she's sort of discussing that with the player are beautiful lines.

Of sort of realizing; my god you know, I trusted this person and I can't believe that's happened to me. She misses her home you know I think she really loves Menzoberranzan and her upbringing too but also is recognizing how brutal that was too and so all of that sort of dialogue. Cutscene dialogues I think are beautiful, really lovely and I love it when she challenges if the player decisions.

I think there's one scene where the player decides to go with on without Minthara I think it is and then Minthara challenges that. Yeah lots of different lines that I love, be hard to pick one but that sort of thing and actually oh I don't want to do any spoilers but if Minthara is romancing Karlach there's some beautiful dialogue in that which was really moving to play and particularly around Karlach possibly dying. That's all I'll say for anybody who's not played it yet.

There’s certainly a deeper level of role playing and choice behind Baldur’s Gate III. What are your thoughts on the many layers to what choices players could pick and the response you would be performing in reaction to player driven decisions?

Emma: I love the huge range of options and diversity in the game. I think that's what people are really responding to. You can be anything, do anything you want to do in the game and I believe that's quite revolutionary in this game.

Quite unique and I think that's why everybody's getting such a kick out of the game because there's so many options. You know just Minthara for example, I know I'm very aware that people are going to very often not choose her to begin with and then they can go back you know.

My nephew for examples played the game three times and each time he's chosen many different paths including Minthara now and so I think yeah, I think that's fantastic for people to have that option. That it's not rigid it's really fluid in terms of you know race; color, creed, gender options, dark, light or whatever path you want to go down. There's a million options for you to choose.

So, Minthara has a rather, enchanting romance option with her character. What was it like to bring that connection to the player to life?

Emma: Beautiful really. Amazing certainly for Minthara who because that's part of her journey of discovering who she is and what she needs and how she feels about people and discovering relationships. I don't think she's someone who's had partnerships before but I don't think she's someone.

That she's always used them for a purpose and I think exploring being hurt if the player makes a decision to go with someone else or the player rejects her you know is really interesting to play. Those sorts of vulnerabilities and colors really. Yeah I enjoyed that because that was part of exploring her softer side or brutal side depending on what the reaction is from the player because she can be quite you know she can dump you.

She can challenge you as well; I like the fact that the characters challenge the player, Minthara does. Minthara says, well you've rescued me why did you do that? Surely it would be better for you not to have an enemy in your party you and so I think that's one of the great things about the game. The game makes the player think and that's rather than just shoot it up or kill if you kill for no reason you have characters like Minthara asking you why and I think that's really interesting.

Some other performers from the game have been playing it, and attempting to romance themselves. Have you given the game a whirl, and have you, or would you try to romance yourself?

Emma: I've seen some of the others doing that it's really interesting it's very funny I've watched some of their live streams. I haven't yet played it. I'm very much excited to do so which I will be doing in this New Year. I've been asked whether I'll do it live, quite a lot of people want me to do that.

I don't know yet, don't know whether I've got the confidence to do that but because everyone just seems so brilliant at it and I probably really wouldn't be. I've looked at a lot of the game obviously and I just think it looks so incredible so I'm very excited to play it. I think I would play myself, yeah I don't know if I'd romance myself.

That would be weird but I've seen a lot of the romance scenes anyway so I'm not sure about that . I would love; yeah I'd definitely play, I definitely recruit Minthara yeah for sure and that would probably be my first playthrough actually going down the bad route in inverted commas so yeah I'm definitely going to play it and I will play me but I don't know if I would romance myself.

What’s it like to see your voice and movement attached to a game character?

Emma: Oh it's amazing. It's just amazing because obviously we don't look anything like our characters. I remember being so bold over when I first saw what Minthara looked like and in any of characters I've played in other games but that's the wonderful thing about voice acting. You can do it forever, there's no time set on it.

It's a real Freedom as an actor you can play a million parts that you'd never play maybe on TV or film or theatre and yeah seeing your voice attached to something very otherworldly is amazing. Yeah I love how my voice works with Minthara and also our movement and our expressions and what Larian have taken and the animators have taken, the visual artists have taken from.

How they've seen us because when you're in the studio they can see what you're doing. Obviously your mocap suit and it's funny to see some of our expressions or you know obviously as well as the mocap come into the character and how that affects the voice and how they've put that onto the game. Yeah it's lovely; it's amazing to see, it's very exciting.


Is this a character you’d like to return to down the road if possible?

Emma: Oh my gosh yeah definitely very much so, I adore her and I adore her because I've been allowed with Adam and Sven and Larian to explore so many different layers of her as well as keeping within her aim.

Her goal which is ambition and revenge and all those things but I think her story and the Menzoberranzan story; the Under Dark, all of that is extremely interesting so it would be. Yeah god it be amazing wouldn't it Jason, yeah let's have Baldur’s gate 4 where we explore the Under Dark.

Yeah I'd live with her forever if I could. Be very interesting to see what happens to her after Baldur’s Gate 3. Where she ends up, does she survive or you know who does she ally with and does she go back to Menzoberranzan and take over because there's a lot of stuff there that's unresolved.

Where do you stand on the whole, evil element of Minthara?

Emma: Well she is an evil character. I mean there's no redemption there. I don't think, although there is in the long run it's going to always be for her about ambition and drive and getting what she wants. Power, being in control in her way whatever that is eventually but along the way with that there are people that she will gather and trust I think and learn to trust more.

In terms of Baldur’s Gate 3 the game there are lots of other characters who do lots of really nasty horrible things so I feel sometimes since the game was released and I've been sort of in all of this and watching everybody's response I also feel that you know the Tiefling bit is not the only bad bit in the game.

There's lots of other stuff going down and a lot of other people making big decisions about stuff. So I think she's not the only bad character in it you know. I sometimes find it hard to sort of understand the difference in the game between good killing and bad killing. She's very much in the bad killing bit, it's like well killing is bad so you know you got to have a bloody good reason for doing it. Oh sorry I swore Jason.

I don't know, it's hard for me Jason because I'm inside her as it were as the actor so I don't see her as evil necessarily but I understand that she is labelled that yes because obviously what she does is brutal and her background is brutal and she's not going to change so yeah she is evil. But one of the great things about the game is that it's not just black and white. There are layers; there are gray areas, there are reasons for things and you're allowed to explore that in the game and that's what makes the game so interesting.

What are your thoughts on D&D and or role playing type games in general?

Emma: A long time ago I used to sit around with friends on a weekend if we had nothing else to do and we would spend an entire weekend playing Call of Cthulu. I really loved Call of Cthulu very much and I loved that whole experience because for me as an actor obviously allowed me to just sit with some characters and get into taking them anywhere I wanted to take them. Obviously with whatever the the games master would allow but it just fires up your imagination.

You could see the worlds blah blah blah what they're wearing where they're going how they look. So I really love role playing. I don't do enough of it and I should do more. Dungeons and Dragons is an extraordinary world and I see that too in other worlds I do a lot for Warhammer and the Warhammer worlds watching when I go to do recordings for them at their base in Nottingham for Games Workshop and I pass by the area where people are going to play the actual games on tables and stuff.

The kingdoms and the characters and the and the models and the things that people are creating and the love and devotion for that is just beautiful because it's escapism isn't it. Allows you to leave your own troubles behind for a bit and get into a world where you can do anything you want and be anything you want and do things that you wouldn't do in this world you know and that's really interesting to me. Be a god or be a wizard or be a saint or Minthara.

It's beautiful; I love it, I love the imaginative escapism of it and the confidence that it gives people actually Jason because we've had a lot of us actors have had a lot of fabulous response from people who've got so much out of Baldur’s Gate 3. Where it's allowed them to express who they are to maybe in this world express who they are. It's given them a confidence to do so you know be who they really are in real life and be okay with it and that's beautiful that they identify with our characters to give them confidence.




What are other characters that viewers might know you from? With that, I understand you’re fairly well known Warhammer wise, care to give us a taste of that in action?

Emma: A taste of it in action? What do you mean? You mean perform a bit of it? No, no there's enough out there for people to go and explore. No I love all of those characters, all of those worlds and I love all the characters I've played.

I appreciate the fact that I've been involved with Larian before in Divinity Original Sin One and Two. I've played everything for them from Minthara to talking chickens to bears to wizards to all sorts of different to princesses or whatever to you know.

So yeah that's great and Harry Potter and Star Wars and all those wonderful games that I've been involved in. I really love it. I just love the imaginative creativity of it and yeah Warhammer very fortunate to be a Battle Sister or Celestine the Living Saint. Yes all of those big characters that I've played which people can go and explore in their own time don't need me to do any of that.

Would you mind giving the audience a brief line or taste of the Minthara in action?

Emma: (In Minthara Character) Jason why are you asking me to do lines? There is enough in the game Jason. You don't need me to sit here and recite more. (Out of Character) There you go that took you by surprise perfect. Yeah, you got me there you really did.

Lastly I would like to leave a spot for you to say something or go over anything I might have missed during the interview?

Emma: Don't need to pitch anything, working on a lot of things but can't say what they are. This is often the way with things but I'd just like to thank everybody again for the amazing response to this game and to Minthara and to ask personally as actors it's been extraordinary the support has been extraordinary and I'm really grateful and also everybody supporting all of our other work that we've done in the past.

You know before Baldur’s Gate 3 and obviously in the future and yeah keep listening, keep playing. Also all the people I've met at conventions and stuff like that just fantastic really beautiful the love that people are showing so yeah let's keep on doing that been really great.

View our Interviews Hub
View our Game Hubs
Read our Cyberpunk 2077 Review