Game Of Thrones: Emilia Clark Did Funky Chicken At Her Audition

In the fourth installment of “Variety Studio: Actors on Actors,” Jay Duplass, the star of Transparent, asked Emilia Clarke if the rumor of her performing the “Funky Chicken” dance at her Game of Thrones audition was true.

“It’s really true,” Clarke confirmed. She then explained that one of her friends, before she flew to Los Angeles, suggested that she should avoid sugar to appear really healthy for the audition. So she avoided ingesting the sweet substance, but before walking in to perform for the show’s producers, the sugar-deprived actress was immediately offered a Diet Coke. She gladly took and drank the soft drink.

With the sugary drink coursing through her body, Clarke, an unknown actress at that time, “went crazy” as she tried her very best to prove to the producers, who had sought her out, that she was the right choice to play Daenerys Targaryen.

At the end of the audition, co-showrunner David Benioff joked that she should do a dance, and Clarke took the suggestion too seriously and broke out the “Funky Chicken.” Why? It’s the only dance move she knows.

Summers span decades. Winters can last a lifetime. And the struggle for the Iron Throne continues.It stretches from the south, where heat breeds plots, lusts and intrigues, to the vast and savage eastern lands, where a young queen raises an army. All the while, in the frozen north, an 800-foot wall of ice precariously protects the war-ravaged kingdom from the dark forces that lie beyond. Kings and queens, knights and renegades, liars, lords and honest men…all play the Game of Thrones.

The cast features: Peter Dinklage as Tyrion Lannister, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau as Jaime Lannister, Lena Headey as Cersei Lannister, Emilia Clarke as Daenerys Targaryen, Kit Harington as Jon Snow, Aidan Gillen as Petyr Baelish, Liam Cunningham as Davos Seaworth, Carice van Houten as Melisandre, Natalie Dormer as Margaery Tyrell, Indira Varma as Ellaria Sand, Sophie Turner as Sansa Stark, Maisie Williams as Arya Stark, Conleth Hill as Varys, Alfie Allen as Theon Greyjoy, John Bradley as Samwell Tarly, Tom Wlaschiha as Jaqen H’ghar, Gwendoline Christie as Brienne of Tarth, Hannah Murray as Gilly, Jonathan Pryce as the High Sparrow, Michiel Huisman as Daario Naharis, Iwan Rheon as Ramsay Bolton, Dean-Charles Chapman as Tommen Baratheon, Isaac Hempstead Wright as Bran Stark, Jerome Flynn as Bronn, and Iain Glen as Jorah Mormont.

Games of Thrones airs Sundays at 9 p.m. on HBO.