‘House Of The Dragon’ Stars Hated ‘Stunnin’ Viral TikTok Meme: “Over A Decade’s Worth Of Work Reduced To A Single Word”

  • Oops!
    Something went wrong.
    Please try again later.
  • Oops!
    Something went wrong.
    Please try again later.
  • Oops!
    Something went wrong.
    Please try again later.

House of the Dragon stars, Olivia Cooke and Emma D’Arcy, might feud on-screen, but in real life, they both agree going viral and becoming a meme is not a good experience.

In 2022, the duo were doing promo for the premiere of the Game of Thrones spinoff, where they each took turns asking each other questions picked out of a bowl.

More from Deadline

Cooke drew a question that prompted her to ask D’Arcy what was her drink of choice.

“Negroni Spagliato with prosecco in it,” D’Arcy said, which led Cooke to react and say, “Stunnin!”

The Bates Motel alum would then go viral and become a meme, something she is not too happy about.

“I did hate it for a very long time,” she said in an interview with EW. “I was in the pub. A woman opened the door for me and she said with a thick Spanish accent, ‘Stunnin’!’ I was just like, ‘Oh my God. Over a decade’s worth of work reduced to a single word in my lexicon.”

D’Arcy said they didn’t “have anything illuminating to say on it because it’s very hard to know how to react when you become a meme.”

The two are savvier about what could go viral and were a little wear about the life-size chess board set chosen for their EW cover shoot, recalling the Harry Potter chess scene meme.

“Honest to God, when we walked on and I saw the chess board, I was like, ‘Well, this is over.’ It’s in my head the whole time,” Cooke said. “I was like, ‘This is torture. We physically cannot do this.'”

She added, “I refuse to do it. It’s just sad how you work for eight months and it f***ing gets reduced to a f***ing TikTok, and that makes me sad.”

Watch the meme TikTok video below.

Best of Deadline

Sign up for Deadline's Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.