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Emilia Isobel Euphemia Rose Clarke (born 23 October 1986) is an English actress, best known for her role as Daenerys Targaryen in the HBO fantasy series Game of Thrones (2011–2019), for which she received nominations for four Primetime Emmy Awards. She is also known for playing Sarah Connor in the science fiction film (2015) and Qi'ra in the film (2018), as well as starring in the romantic dramas Me Before You (2016) and Last Christmas (2019).
Clarke studied at Drama Centre London. Her television debut was a guest appearance in the BBC One medical soap opera Doctors in 2009, at age 22. Clarke made her Broadway theatre debut as Holly Golightly in the play Breakfast at Tiffany's (2013), and played Nina in a West End production of The Seagull that was suspended due to the COVID-19 lockdowns. She also played G'iah in the Marvel Cinematic Universe miniseries Secret Invasion (2023).
Clarke is of partial Indian descent on her mother's side, as her maternal grandmother was born to Clarke's great-grandmother and a man from British Raj. She credits this background for her family having a "history of fighters", stating, "The fact that my had to hide her skin colour, essentially, and try desperately to fit in with everyone else must've been incredibly difficult." Clarke has also publicly discussed her ties to India, stating that she is proud of her Indian heritage and sees it as an integral part of her identity., which Clarke attended|left]]Clarke became interested in acting at age three after seeing a production of the musical Show Boat. When she was ten, her father took her to a West End audition for The Goodbye Girl, a musical by Neil Simon.
Clarke was privately educated at both Rye St Antony School in Headington and St Edward's School, Oxford, which she left in 2005. In a 2016 interview with Time Out, she stated "I went to posh boarding schools, but I wasn't the posh girl at the posh boarding schools." She also stated that most of the people at her boarding school in Oxford were from Conservative backgrounds, which meant she and some of her friends often felt like outsiders.
After graduation, Clarke unsuccessfully applied to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, and the Guildhall School of Music and Drama. She worked and travelled before enrolling at Drama Centre London, where she graduated in 2009.
One of her first film roles was in Drop the Dog, a University of London student short film. She graduated from drama school in 2009. She worked at various non-acting jobs after graduating while auditioning for roles. She starred in two commercials for the charity Samaritans, portraying a domestic abuse victim. Her first credited television role was a bit part in a 2009 episode of the British soap opera Doctors. Clarke was cast in her first professional film role, playing Savannah in the 2010 television film Triassic Attack. The film was released in November 2010 on the Syfy channel in the United States where it received negative reviews. Despite the film's reviews, she was named a "UK Star of Tomorrow" by the film magazine Screen International.
Clarke received critical acclaim for her portrayal of Daenerys, which traces an arc from frightened girl to powerful woman. Matthew Gilbert of The Boston Globe called her scenes "mesmerising", adding that "Clarke doesn't have a lot of emotional variety to work with as Daenerys, aside from fierce determination, and yet she is riveting." Emily St. James for The A.V. Club commented on the difficulty of adapting such an evolution from page to screen, but concluded that Clarke was able to "more than seal the deal here."
Clarke said by being cast as Daenerys, she had avoided the "typical bonnet duty that you have to go through as a young British actress". In 2017, she reportedly became one of the highest-paid actors on television, earning between £1.2 and £2 million per episode of Game of Thrones. In 2019, she said she had been uncomfortable acting nude in her first experience at age 23 of a large film set, but had since become "a lot more savvy" about what level of nudity is needed for a scene. Clarke received multiple award nominations and wins for her role of Daenerys. She was nominated three times for Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series in 2013, 2015, and 2016. At the 2019 Emmys, she was nominated for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series, her first nomination in the category.
In addition to the television show, she lent her voice and likeness to the 2014 video game of the same name. She also made a cameo appearance during Kit Harington monologue on Saturday Night Live in April 2019. She said in a November 2019 NPR interview that if she "were to get stereotyped as the mother of dragons, I could ask for worse. It's really quite wonderful." In a 2021 interview with theSkimm, Clarke stated that she would change the way her character died.
In May 2013 Clarke was cast in a film adaptation of the novel The Garden of Last Days. James Franco was set to direct and star in the film; however, he left the project two weeks before filming after creative differences with the film distributor Millennium Entertainment. In a 2019 interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Clarke said she was offered the role of Anastasia Steele in Fifty Shades of Grey. She said she turned down the part because of the nudity required.
In 2013, she was cast as Sarah Connor in the science fiction action film Terminator Genisys (2015). The film, which also stars Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jai Courtney, and Jason Clarke, received unfavourable reviews from critics but was a box office success, grossing over $440 million worldwide. Clarke was nominated for Teen Choice Award for Choice Summer Movie Star – Female and Best International Actress at the 2016 Jupiter Awards for her performance.
She starred as the female lead, opposite Sam Claflin, in the film adaptation of the best-selling novel of the same name, Me Before You. The film which was released on 3 June 2016 and directed by Thea Sharrock, received mixed critical reviews. The film was a box office success with worldwide revenues of $200 million. For her role as Louisa "Lou" Clark, she shared nominations with Sam Claflin for the Teen Choice Award for Choice Movie Liplock and the MTV Television Tearjerker Award. In 2017, she played the lead as Nurse Verena in the supernatural psychological thriller film Voice from the Stone. The film was released in April 2017 for a limited release theatre run, followed by video on demand and digital HD. She was cast as the female lead in in November 2016. The movie, which was directed by Ron Howard and premiered in May 2018, details the origins of Star Wars characters Han Solo and Chewbacca. Clarke played Qi'ra, Han's childhood friend and love interest. The film received favourable critical reviews despite being the second-lowest grossing Star Wars film. The film was released worldwide on 25 May 2018. Her performance received positive critical reviews with many calling her one of the standouts of the film. Clarke, along with Jack Huston, was cast in 2016 as leads in the film Above Suspicion (2019). The film is based on a thriller novel by Joe Sharkey and directed by Phillip Noyce, and was announced at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival. The film received generally favourable reviews with Clarke's performance being highly praised by critics. It also had a turbulent release which left it vulnerable to piracy. In late 2019, Clarke starred opposite Henry Golding in the romantic comedy Last Christmas. The film was written by Emma Thompson and directed by Paul Feig. In a January 2020 interview with Bustle magazine, Clarke stated she was inspired by Will Ferrell character in the 2003 comedy film Elf. Despite its unfavourable reviews, critics praised Clarke's performance, and the film went on to become a box office success grossing over $121 million worldwide.
Clarke starred as Nina in the West End production of Anton Chekhov's The Seagull, directed by Jamie Lloyd, which began previews on 11 March 2020 at the Playhouse Theatre. The production was suspended on 16 March due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The play was Clarke's first West End production. It resumed two years later in July 2022 and was broadcast internationally via National Theatre Live. The play, along with her portrayal of Nina won acclaim, with critics calling Clarke's performance, "magnetic" and "undeniably charismatic." In 2021, Clarke published the first in a series of comic books titled M.O.M.: Mother of Madness that she co-wrote with Marguerite Bennett.
Clarke was cast as the lead in the English language adaptation of the 2015 Korean romantic comedy The Beauty Inside. , the film was yet to begin production. It was announced in May 2019 that Clarke is set to play the English poet Elizabeth Barrett in the film Let Me Count the Ways, which The Wife director Björn Runge was set to direct.
Clarke played G'iah in Secret Invasion for Disney+, set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (2023). In October 2021, Clarke was cast as Jean Kerr, wife of Joseph McCarthy, in a biopic titled McCarthy. In October 2022, it was announced that Clarke is set to play Irish author Constance Lloyd in director Sophie Hyde’s film An Ideal Wife.
In 2026, Clarke starred in and executive produced the Cold-War era drama Ponies. Variety praised the series as an endearing spy caper that allowed Clarke to show her range. Clarke's on-screen chemistry with co-star Haley Lu Richardson was also praised with Collider contributor Tania Hussain writing "Clarke and Richardson drive the series with an electric chemistry and partnership that feels well-earned".
In April 2018, she was named the sole ambassador to the Royal College of Nursing (RCN). As the RCN's ambassador, Clarke pledged to use her voice to fight for greater investment in nursing and to challenge misconceptions. Clarke also pledged to join nurses and healthcare workers to tackle the issues affecting the profession, including a falling number in training and shortages in the current workforce.
Clarke was also one of the numerous UK-based actresses to lend her voice to the Time's Up initiative, aimed at exposing sexual harassment and abuse, and creating a society free of gender-based discrimination in the workplace. In August 2018, Clarke, as well as Gemma Arterton, Lena Headey, Tom Hiddleston, Felicity Jones, Wunmi Mosaku, Florence Pugh, Gemma Chan, and Catherine Tate, featured in the short film titled Leading Lady Parts which took aim at the film industry's issue of gender inequality during the casting process.
In 2019, upon revealing the brain aneurysms she suffered in 2011 and 2013, Clarke launched her own charity named SameYou. The organisation aims to broaden neurorehabilitation access for young people after a brain injury or stroke. On 26 September 2019, she co-hosted a YouTube live stream with Irish YouTuber Jacksepticeye that raised over £200,000 for SameYou. After the conclusion of the final season of Game of Thrones, a fundraiser called "Justice for Daenerys" was started in which fans of the series raised over £83,000 for her charity. According to the fundraiser creator, the purpose was to collectively show their appreciation for both Clarke and the character of Daenerys Targaryen. In 2020, Clarke was presented with the Public Leadership in Neurology award by the American Brain Foundation for her efforts in raising awareness about neurorehabilitation. In the 2024 New Year Honours, Clarke and her mother, Jennifer Susan Dodd Clarke, were both made Members of the Order of the British Empire in the civil division (MBE) for their role in the creation of SameYou. She was Investiture with the Insignia on 21 February 2024 at Windsor Castle by the Prince of Wales.
In April 2020, Clarke began a fundraiser to help raise funds for her charity's COVID-19 fund. The fundraiser, which aimed to raise £250,000, supported both the Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts, and the University College Hospital in London. The organisation's initiative aimed to make a larger portion of beds available to coronavirus patients by providing a virtual rehabilitation clinic for people recovering from brain injuries and strokes. In a further response to the pandemic, Clarke announced the launch of an Instagram series of poetry readings, derived from a collection called The Poetry Pharmacy: Tried-and-True Prescriptions for the Heart, Mind and Soul. She began the series by reading a poem about loneliness, which she dedicated to her charity SameYou and announced that other performers would be joining the initiative, stating that every performer would dedicate their reading to a charity of their choosing.
In September 2020, Clarke joined Emma Thompson, Sanjeev Bhaskar and Robert Lindsay in a virtual reading of the play Private Lives by English playwright Noël Coward. It was announced that all funds raised from the performance would be used as a crisis grant to support those in the theatre industry who were struggling financially as a result of the pandemic.
In a 2013 interview with Allure, Clarke stated that her mother had rules when she was growing up: "Don't do drugs, don't have sex, and don't touch your eyebrows." She stated that she was bullied as a child for "having ridiculous eyebrows". Her father, who was an important figure in her life, died in 2016 due to cancer. Clarke stated that "My father always told me — Never trust anyone whose TV is bigger than their bookshelf." In an essay she wrote for The New Yorker in 2019, Clarke revealed that she had suffered a subarachnoid haemorrhage caused by a ruptured aneurysm in February 2011. She underwent urgent endovascular coiling surgery and subsequently suffered from aphasia, at one point being unable to say her name. She had a second aneurysm surgically treated in 2013.
Once filming wrapped on the final season of Game of Thrones, Clarke, as a tribute to her role as Daenerys Targaryen, celebrated her time on the show with a wrist tattoo featuring a trio of flying dragons.
From 2012 to 2013, Clarke was in a relationship with Seth MacFarlane. She also dated Charlie McDowell from 2018 to 2019.
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Time magazine named her one of the 100 most influential people in 2019. Clarke has also been honoured for her charitable work. In 2019, she won a Shorty Awards for a video that was made to raise awareness for her charity SameYou and the Royal College of Nursing.
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