Lady Olenna Tyrell, played by the British actress Diana Rigg, was a certified Game of Thrones bombshell — may she rest in peace. A matriarch and a part-time assassin, she was one of GoT's many badass women, and, thanks to the folks over at Bustle, there's proof that she's always been a bombshell. Diana Rigg, who plays Olenna, is practically British royalty for her work on stage and screen. She won a Tony Award for her role in the Broadway production of Medea in 1994 and an Emmy award for her role in the TV movie Rebecca in 1997.
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Her real claim to fame, though, was her role in the '60s television show The Avengers, which was actually the first British show to be aired on American television. On the show, she played a spy named Emma Peel. Fun fact: "Emma Peel," according to the A.V. Club, evolved from the idea of "man appeal" — as in, production wanted a woman character with masculine appeal. In short: Diana Rigg played a badass in the 1960s. She also played a badass in 2017. The more things change, the more things stay the same.
See a photo of Rigg as Emma Peele:
And now watch this video of her first appearance in The Avengers:
Q.E.D., Diana Rigg has always been a badass.
Rigg admitted in 2014 that she got in her role in The Avengers through pure luck. "Do you know, I have no idea how I got The Avengers?" she. "I'd left the Royal Shakespeare Company, and I was one of a long list of girls, and got it on my audition. We were filmed and you had to fight a stuntman. There was a stuntman called Ray Austin, and the poor man, by the time I got to him — it was about 4 in the afternoon — he'd been bashed around by so many desperate actresses, absolutely determined to get the part. He was a very sorry sight."
Honestly, we wouldn't be surprised if the audition process for Game of Thrones were the very same. (Although, of course, a veteran like Rigg should never have to audition.)
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