{"id":843212,"date":"2026-06-04T06:27:20","date_gmt":"2026-06-04T06:27:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/843212\/"},"modified":"2026-06-04T06:27:20","modified_gmt":"2026-06-04T06:27:20","slug":"inside-varietys-power-of-women-london-cynthia-erivo-emilia-clarke","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/843212\/","title":{"rendered":"Inside Variety’s Power of Women London: Cynthia Erivo, Emilia Clarke"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tCynthia Erivo<\/a>, Emilia Clarke<\/a>, Suki Waterhouse<\/a>, Emma Corrin<\/a> and Hannah Waddingham<\/a> took center stage at Variety\u2018s inaugural Power of Women<\/a> London, presented by Lifetime, as the five women reflected on their careers, the importance of community and the causes they champion.<\/p>\n

\n\tHeld Wednesday at the Chancery Rosewood Hotel and hosted by \u201cSaturday Night Live U.K.\u201d cast member Ania Magliano, the event began with Waterhouse\u2019s performance of her new single, \u201cBack in Love.\u201d Variety publisher and co-president Dea Lawrence gave opening remarks, touting London as \u201carguably the biggest entertainment hub outside the United States,\u201d followed by Variety co-editors-in-chief Cynthia Littleton and Ramin Setoodeh.<\/p>\n

\n\tClarke, the evening\u2019s first honoree, talked about her recovery after she suffered two brain hemorrhages at 22 and 24 when she was starring on \u201cGame of Thrones\u201d: \u201cFifteen years after my first bleed, I have the hindsight to see how difficult that time truly was. I never had the chance to reflect on what my two brain traumas had done to me.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tShe continued, \u201cWhat about my anxiety? Surely that is normal, working in our image-obsessed industry? Breaking a rib after filming a sex scene? Well, maybe that was his fault. But sometimes even blacking out after long night shoots, the pain all over my body, I didn\u2019t even think I should find out why. I just put it down as stress in my non-stop work schedule.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cDisclosure Day\u201d star Josh O\u2019Connor introduced Corrin as the next honoree, recalling how the two met when Corrin was brought in to be a reader for \u201cThe Crown\u201d auditions: \u201cThe producers were an entire season away from even thinking about who might play Princess Diana, and yet by the end of the first audition, that camera was spinning firmly in Emma\u2019s direction.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt\u2019s incredibly meaningful to be here tonight amongst such inspiring women using their voices and platforms with such purpose,\u201d Corrin said. \u201cI\u2019m doubly honored to be here tonight as the first non-binary recipient of the award. I think it\u2019s crucial now, more than ever that no matter how we identify, we\u2019re able to come together and support each other. So much change can be affected by these networks of mutual support.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tLawrence surprised the crowd by presenting the Power of Women Icon of the Year award to Dame Joan Collins, who reflected on her successful career as a performer and producer: \u201cI discovered that to survive in this business and to thrive, you have to show which women are needed to reinvent themselves. We have to reinvent ourselves time and time again.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tCollins also teased her upcoming film, \u201cMy Duchess,\u201d in which she plays Wallis Simpson, the Duchess of Windsor: \u201cIt\u2019s in the last nine years of her life when she was a strong and powerful woman at the beginning, but her strength and her power were totally destroyed by, sadly, another woman. I think it shows a lot of what is going on in the world, which is elder abuse.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tUpon taking the stage again, Waterhouse reflected on her newfound experience as a mother: \u201cBecoming a mom has humbled my entire being. I really feel a connection to all women and my horizons \u2014 and my heart \u2014 have just exploded. I think to my childhood and I marvel at the grace and level-headedness of my mother, who\u2019s here tonight. She raised four absolutely terrorizing children. Women are often complimented as selfless, but I am glad to have had an example of a mum who gave so much to her family and also continued to give to herself, always learning, working.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cTed Lasso\u201d star Waddingham talked about how the conversation around powerful women in the industry should go beyond strength: \u201cYou see us front-facing, you see us strong, you see us glamorous in whatever way. You see us falling apart when we\u2019re meant to on camera, or on a stage, you see all those sides. But it\u2019s the quiet part that we have to support. Myself and Cynthia [Erivo] have supported each other a lot, both in theater and on screen, when we\u2019ve had really difficult days.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tAfter being introduced by Edward Enninful, co-founder and chief creative officer of EE72, Erivo was the last honoree of the night. She used her speech to reflect on her charity work for LGBTQ+ organizations and addressed how fans responded to the clip that went viral<\/a> from a video paired with Variety\u2018s recent cover story<\/a>, in which she declined to talk about \u201cWicked.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cAll of a sudden, I am a woman who is degrading the project that put me where I am and I should be more grateful. Now please don\u2019t get me wrong, there have been those who appreciated my candor, however the former made me think about what it actually means to be a powerful woman \u2014 what it costs, who gets to embody it fully, and who has to bury a little of themselves so as not to offend,\u201d she said. \u201cI think we\u2019ve fallen in love with the concept of the powerful woman, but in reality, we seldom celebrate or raise up a woman when she claims her power, steps into it and uses it.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cynthia Erivo, Emilia Clarke, Suki Waterhouse, Emma Corrin and Hannah Waddingham took center stage at Variety\u2018s inaugural Power…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":843213,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[33],"tags":[185,26732,231607,159988,171,45755,166452,345060,122121,67,132,68],"class_list":["post-843212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-cynthia-erivo","tag-emilia-clarke","tag-emma-corrin","tag-entertainment","tag-hannah-waddingham","tag-power-of-women","tag-power-of-women-london","tag-suki-waterhouse","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116690422993774038","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/843212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=843212"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/843212\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/843213"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=843212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=843212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=843212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}