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Baldur’s Gate 3
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Right before Samantha Béart and I spoke, I noticed they had shared a picture with Jason Isaacs on social media.
“I immediately straggled him,” Béart laughs. “Karlach waited ten years, I waited two years.”
In Baldur’s Gate 3, Béart plays the ever-fiery Karlach Cliffgate, a tiefling who was forced to survive in the hells of Avernus for a decade before the events of the game. She was sent there by Gortash, who sold her to the archdevil Zariel, and put a ticking time bomb in her chest
Gortash, as you might have guessed, was played by Isaacs. There’s a particular scene in the game where Karlach’s pure and utter hatred of Gortash comes to the surface, delivered so viscerally by Béart that I had to wonder what they had in mind when they recorded it. Turns out, it wasn’t Isaacs.
“I didn’t know he was doing it,” Béart recalls, sharing that they had no idea that their worst enemy was Isaacs.
Got him! 😈 #Karlach #Gortash #BG3 #BaldursGate3 #SamanthaBeart #JasonIsaacs @funko.bsky.social @gunghobookings.bsky.social — Samantha Béart is cooking… (@samanthabeart.bsky.social) 2025-06-28T22:45:22.042Z
“I thanked him for the BAFTA nomination,” they continue. “He was very nice. I had to brief him because he hasn’t played it or watched it. And I don’t think he remembers what he did from years ago.
“He said, ‘There’s quite a lot of different outcomes, do I always sell you to hell?’ I was like, ‘Yes, you did, you s**t.’ So then we did our pictures.”
Incidentally, Isaacs’ performance as General Zhukov in The Death of Stalin initially inspired Karlach. As Béart puts it, Karlach used to be more of an “edge lord”.
Bringing Karlach To Life
As we speak, Béart effortlessly recounts moments from every version of Karlach’s story as if they were in the mocap suit yesterday. Even those evil endings you can get if you play as her, which almost none of us will see.
As we speak, Béart effortlessly recounts moments from every version of Karlach’s story as if they were in the mocap suit yesterday. Even those evil endings you can get if you play as her, which almost none of us will see.
They had less time to come to grips with their character than most of the cast. Béart and Theo Solomon (Wyll) were the last to start recording, so they had to cram in the same amount of work as everyone else into a much smaller timeframe. And yet, they don’t regret this.
“I think it’s more unusual to have an actor on a game for years, which is what the others did,” they tell me. Though there is a misconception to clear up: “It wasn’t rushed at all. People love to say it was rushed as a way to explain the endings they don’t like. But no, it was ready to go.”
While the rest of the gang was going back to re-record lines from the start of early access, the final two actors got to plough ahead. “I really enjoyed having that momentum. It really afforded me a privilege that most of the others didn’t get in the main roles, I think me and Theo had an easier time of it in a way.”
There is one way in which the cast are all equally unique, however: they’ve played their own game. This means having an insight into the character as both a player and the actor who recorded it all — and sometimes, that insight differs from Karlach’s many loyal fans. To that end, there is another matter to clear up, so I ask Béart what the biggest misconception is when it comes to Karlach.
“That she is a really sweet, nice, happy-go-lucky person,” they say with no hesitation. “I think she was a very different person in hell.”
This belief comes from how Béart got into the head of Karlach, making sense of the years of suffering she was put through. “I imagined being locked in a supermax prison, with no hope of getting out and doing all sorts of horrible gang stuff to survive, and then finally actually getting out and going. ‘Do you know what? I get to decide who I am now. And I’m not going to be that person anymore.’
“For me, it’s a redemption arc,” they continue. “I think she was a piece of work in hell. She would have had to be […] It was life in prison. That’s where I was in my head with that, because otherwise, it’s quite hard to relate it to something realistic. You just think about how people behave in those very small communities. Essentially, I think you can completely change to survive.”
I think she was a very different person in hell.
With that in mind, it’s no surprise that Béart’s favourite scene to perform as Karlach is the moment Gortash lies dead at her feet, and she finally gets to unleash the anger she’s been suppressing for the entire game.
“That’s the core of her. That’s the bit of her she’s been hiding until she can’t anymore,” Béart’ explains. “It’s a piece I auditioned with, so I always knew it was coming. When it did happen, all the gates were off. All the ugliness can come out. It was a very satisfying and cathartic experience to film.”
Ultimately, even with this anger, Karlach decides to be a better person once she’s escaped Avernus. She certainly gets the redemption arc that Béart had in mind.
“There’s the puppy dog [side], there’s the teenager. That’s the Karlach that was cut off, the arrested development,” Béart explains. “It’s all there, and I think it’s all supported by the text, and it’s certainly something we were discussing as we were recording.”
No Happy Endings In The Hells
In the Baldur’s Gate 3 fandom, there is a perception that Karlach’s story has a big oversight — you can’t fix her infernal engine. Some fans have been clamouring for one since launch, but as Béart puts it, this just isn’t Karlach’s story.
“We want a different ending because we want her to be happy and to live forever,” Béart explains. “The writing is there because that’s what the writer wanted to put out. That’s very deliberate. Sometimes, that question is posed to me as if it was a mistake. It’s not. It’s very much what was intended.
“All I’ll say with this is, we have a lot of folks who’ve met with me, who have chronic and terminal illnesses, and they say they are comforted — not only seen, but comforted — by Karlach’s journey. I think it would be a very cheap trick to take that away from them with some sort of magic spell.
“People die, and sometimes we’re carers, and sometimes the person we love says, ‘I’ve had enough chemotherapy. I’m ready to go’, and that’s very hard for that carer, and that’s an interesting position to be put in as a player. The fact that it’s ignited such passion in our players is a testament to the writing.”
Even outside of the real-life parallels, Béart feels that it just suits the character. “She’s a Viking, she’s going to die young. She wants to. She wants to go to Valhalla. That’s her identity,” they say. “Of course she’s gutted about time being taken away on two fronts, being put in hell and then having this ticking time bomb in her chest pretty much, [but Larian] wrote a tragic character.”
Romance, And Being Unapologetically Queer
Karlach isn’t all tragedy, however. She’s also a lover — and in my opinion, queer as hell. I asked Béart if that was on their mind while playing the character.
“I’m non-binary, so I’m going to be taking a non-gendered approach to things,” they tell me. “I’m not really thinking about it when I have to play more traditionally feminine characters, although in games, not so much. You play a lot of gender-nonconforming female characters.
“What I didn’t want was for our sapphic players to feel left out,” they continue. “I’ve seen a lot of times in video games where someone has made a decision that only men are to be catered to. Maybe some lesbians might play or some bisexual girls might play, but you know, screw them. And I just wanted everyone to have that experience.”
To make up for this, Béart kept the female experience in mind while recording and spoke to women about how to keep their performance authentic. They are quick to add that this wasn’t just communicated through their performance, but by the animators, directors, and everyone on the team who shaped Karlach’s character.
“Karlach is a big biker chick,” Béart says. “I think in the original [character] breakdown was something like ‘She would turn up on a Harley Davidson’. And like, yeah, that’s a lesbian.”
What I didn’t want was for our sapphic players to feel left out
While they add that Karlach is definitely pansexual, they are glad that she is so loved by the ladies. “I played it very neutral. And if that reads as appealing to everyone, then that’s wonderful,” they say. “But the last thing I wanted was for her to look sapphic, which I think she does, and not be.”
That’s not to say Karlach doesn’t have broad appeal, something which Béart is very aware of. “The real surprise is the amount of straight men that adore her,” they smile. “For all our beauty standards and the tall girls out there that have always felt left behind. I think it’s been very eye-opening. People’s attraction is a lot broader than we thought it was.”
So, just to be clear, Béart is not saying that Karlach is only for the girls. “Being inclusive doesn’t mean excluding others. It really was quite the opposite of what I was trying to do.”
Unfortunately, we might start to see fewer games like this. Ever since Donald Trump’s win in the 2024 US election, we’ve seen tech companies pivot to the right. I ask Béart if this means that the next game like Baldur’s Gate 3 will struggle to break through, and they tell me that it’s already happening.
“Without exposing devs, I know that’s happening. Their storylines have been cut,” they share. “Historically, appeasement is a really bad thing. […] But Indies exist. And people can write, and communities will get together, and we will absolutely get through this together.”
What Comes Next
With Baldur’s Gate 3’s lengthy ongoing development coming to an end, Béart has other projects lined up, like the indie game Fading Echo, in which they play the lead, and the beat-’em-up Absolum.
The fact that we know about these already is quite rare in this secretive industry, something Béart is only all too aware of.
“Culturally, in games we NDA to the eyeballs,” they say. “I know devs that worked on things for years that have then been cancelled, and they will never be allowed to talk about it, which is heartbreaking.”
This is why Béart started their video series, It Takes A Village. They’re planning to bring it back for another season soon, and they tell me it’s already been a huge success.
“I know people have booked jobs because of being on [It Takes A Village], I know of people who in 20 years in the industry have never been interviewed before. It’s about time we turn this around, give people their flowers.”
So, just like actors, we could start to see writers, developers, directors, and everyone else who works on a game keep it alive long after launch, just as we saw how the Baldur’s Gate 3 cast elevated it to a cultural phenomenon.
Even just taking a look at Karlach, Béart doesn’t want to take full credit. She was written by Sarah Baylus from Larian, and then there are the cinematic leads and even other actors who recorded some of the additional mocap, which was used alongside the mocap recorded by Béart and the rest of the cast.
I interviewed some of these folks last year, if you want to check that out.
The next time something like Baldur’s Gate 3 hits the industry, hopefully, everyone will gather around to give us more insight into how it was made. And that’s something that Béart certainly wouldn’t mind.
“I’m an introvert as well, believe it or not,” they laugh. “I’ll get to hide and go ‘Your turn, your turn’.”
