Do we like Lena Headey?
Our score: 8 out of 10. A clean harm record, steady refugee advocacy and public stands on women's treatment in Hollywood, held back only by a thin record on LGBTQ+ issues and an unresolved commission dispute.
Lena Headey is the actress who spent years making half the planet hate Cersei Lannister in Game of Thrones, and being very good at it. That's the role everyone knows her for, and it's the thing people still bring up with her, years after the show ended.
The latest chatter comes from a July 2026 Telegraph interview, where she said she was “really shocked by the anger” from fans who felt she had duped them over the Walk of Atonement scene. She credited her body double and said that with around 3,000 extras on set, being naked would have pulled her out of the emotional side of the performance. It's a fair point about a woman setting her own limits at work, and a bit rich that anyone was cross about it.
On the harm check, nothing came up. We found no remarks aimed at LGBTQ+ people, trans people, migrants or anyone else, and no donations or work for causes that push harm. Her public voice has gone the other way: in 2017 she said refugees were being treated with suspicion and fear, and that “we're dehumanizing them”. To be straight with you, the record on LGBTQ+ issues specifically is thin, so this is a pass on what's there rather than a loud ally badge.
The nearest thing to a stoush is a 2022 lawsuit from her former UK agency, which alleged she owed about $1.5 million in unpaid commission, including on a Marvel role that was cut from the film. Headey disputed it, saying the director came to her directly and that she never signed a contract with the agency. The coverage we read reports no ruling or settlement, so it's a contested business argument, not a mark on her character.
She has also been on the other side of the power imbalance. In 2017 she said Harvey Weinstein asked her to his hotel room, grew angry when she said she wasn't interested, and told her not to tell anyone. Weinstein has denied allegations of non-consensual sexual contact, and the coverage we read did not carry a specific reply to her account. Speaking up about it was not a free move for an actress at the time.
The good stuff is mostly about displaced people. She visited Syrian refugee camps in Greece with co-stars Maisie Williams and Liam Cunningham, and kept advocating for people seeking asylum, telling TIME she was “just a human being with a conscience”.