The Eurovision co-host Hannah Waddingham said she was overjoyed to be part of a “beautiful, massive, joyous show” and needed time to digest all the plaudits.
Waddingham, the star of Ted Lasso and Game of Thrones, has been hailed as an “overnight national treasure” for her enthusiastic and occasionally eccentric co-hosting of this week’s Eurovision finals.
The London-born actor, who is better known in the US than in the UK, became an internet sensation thanks to her impromptu dance moves, exuberant facial expressions and linguistic skills.
In a press conference before the grand final in Liverpool on Saturday, which she will co-host, Waddingham said she was “shocked” about the reaction.
Asked by a journalist about her “next plan for world domination” having conquered the stage, screen and now presenting, the 48-year-old replied: “Oh my God! Can I just digest that for a moment please?!”
Waddingham went on to say she was filming a “one-woman Christmas special” at the London Coliseum in a couple of weeks, before adding: “I’m a little bit shocked by your question, frankly!”
She has been a leading lady in the West End and on Broadway for more than 20 years but had played mainly bit parts on screen – such as Tonya Dyke in Benidorm and an adult film star in the BBC’s Not Going Out.
She found wider fame a decade ago in Game of Thrones, which she joined in season five, and more recently in Ted Lasso and Sex Education, but still remains lesser known in the UK.
Waddingham will host the grand final alongside Graham Norton, the Britain’s Got Talent star Alesha Dixon and the Ukrainian singer-songwriter Julia Sanina.
Appearing alongside her co-hosts after a four-and-a-half-hour dress rehearsal on Friday, Waddingham said this was only her second presenting gig – after the Olivier awards last month.
“Everyone makes the effort of their lives,” she said. “All of us here, all of them on stage, everyone backstage – we’re all just people trying to put on a beautiful, massive, joyous show and to be unified by music.
“It’s very much our job to be there for the winners and the losers and that’s why I wanted to get involved.”
She had the crowd in Liverpool Arena chanting her name after reciting the Eurovision rules in perfect French before adding: “You see, Europe, some of us Brits do bother to learn another language.”
Waddingham explained that she learned French in school and was “conversational, rather than fluent” but wanted to inject it into her presentation to “show the hands across the water”. She added: “I just think it’s that fine line of wanting to be respectful to a language and include it but not screw it up, so I hope I’m doing okay there.”
Waddingham said it had been “quite lovely” to work with Dixon and Sanina as they are “two girls that I have such respect for”, adding: “I love that I can watch them from the wings and just think I’m getting to stand shoulder to shoulder with them.
“I’m really grateful that these two women in particular have been standing with me because it’s not an easy gig – it’s quite full-on – so yeah: love you to bits, you’re gorgeous.”
