As if you needed another reason to love actress Emilia Clarke, she’s gone and won best girlfriend of the year by defending Game of Thrones co-star Nathalie Emmanuel after she received a sexist comment.
In a recent interview with Vogue, Emmanuel – who played Missandei in the hit TV series – said, “In my first season, my costume was pretty revealing, and there was an incident with a supporting actor who made a comment about it on set – I mean, typical – and Emilia straight away had my back.”
“It got handled,” she added.
It’s not the first time Emilia Clarke has taken a stand against sexism in the entertainment industry. In a 2019 interview on Dax Shepherd’s Armchair Expert podcast, the actress said she’s fought against excessive nudity while appearing on-camera.
“I’ve had fights on set where I’m like, ‘No, the sheet stays up,’ and they’re like, ‘you don’t wanna disappoint your Game of Thrones fans.’”
“And I’m like, ‘F*ck you,’” she said.
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It wasn’t always easy for Clarke to be strong in these situations. She also revealed to Shepherd that she would cry before particular scenes. “Whatever I’m feeling is wrong, I’m gonna cry in the bathroom and then I’m gonna come back and we’re gonna do the scene and it’s gonna be completely fine.”
As for Nathalie Emmanuel – sexism isn’t the only struggle she faced while appearing on Game of Thrones. After the show finished, filmmaker Ava DuVernay tweeted, “So…the one and only sister on the whole epic, years-long series? That’s what you wanna do? Okay.”
“It definitely caused me to reflect a lot more – about race and diversity more generally,” Emmanuel told Vogue.
“At the end of the day, if there’s ever a show on the level of Game of Thrones again, representation has to be part of the conversation from the beginning. That way, there’s no single person who has to represent every other person of colour,” she said.
It’s empowering and so inspiring to see Emilia Clarke and Nathalie Emmanuel step up and speak out about the very real issues they’ve faced in Hollywood. By keeping the conversation going, we can only hope real change will occur.
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