Hannah Waddingham has come a long way since playing Septa “the Shame Nun” Unella on Game of Thrones. Sure, she had an iconic line, yelling “shame” over and over as she marched Cersei Lannister naked through the streets of King’s Landing, but her costume covered so much of her head that she wasn’t really recognized for it.
And then, he played Rebecca on the Apple TV+ hit Ted Lasso, and now gets recognized “right left and center,” as she said on a recent visit to Jimmy Kimmel Live! “That was my finest, prettiest hour,” she joked about playing Septa Unella. “nd thankfully, everyone’s shocked. So that’s good.”
"I loved [working on Game of Thrones], because it meant I could just sit sleeping in the trailer for hours on end, look like I’d been dug up, and they’d say, ‘Yeah, that looks great.’"
She also struck up a friendship with Lena Headey (Cersei); they may have been mortal enemies on the show, but in the real world they love hanging out. “We met on and just fell in love with each other immediately,” Waddingham said. “I just think sometimes you meet what we call in England, birds … and you’re just like, yeah, you’re a bird, I’m a bird, that’s it, we’re in.”
Hannah Waddingham is nominated for an Emmy this weekend!
And now they have something else in common: they’re both Emmy nominees. Headey was nominated for Emmys five times for playing Cersei, and never won, which is criminal. Now, Waddingham is nominated for her work on Ted Lasso, going up against the likes of Aidy Bryant (Saturday Night Live), Kate McKinnon (Saturday Night Live), Cecily Strong (Saturday Night Live) Hannah Einbinder (Hacks), Rose Perez (The Flight Attendant) and her own Ted Lasso costar Juno Temple in the category of Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series.
Will Waddingham bring home the gold where Headey couldn’t? We’ll find out when the 73rd Primetime Emmy Awards air this Sunday on CBS and Paramount+.
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