Olivia Cooke took six months off work this year after being struck down with a bout of shingles.
The House Of The Dragon star, has revealed she came down with the painful viral infection late last year while staying in New York so she returned to her native UK for treatment and then took a hiatus from work which lasted until June.
Speaking about battling shingles, Olivia told GQ Hype, “I had a two-month period where I couldn’t do small talk. Someone was like: ‘How are you?’ and I was like: ‘Yeah, I’ve had shingles.'”
She went on to admit the health scare came after several years of taking on back-to-back jobs which left her feeling “really burnt out.”
Olivia explained, “I feel like the past two years, I’ve been, like, jobs, jobs, jobs, and I got really burnt out. Your body has a way of flooring you to make sure that you do actually lie down.”
She spent her time off at her home in London and admits she enjoyed cooking and reorganising her home.
“I was like a real housewife, like, horribly, but I enjoyed it. I was cooking different meals every day and sorting my cupboards out,” the actress told the outlet.
Olivia also focused on her mental health and one of her clear-outs involved deactivating her Instagram account.
She previously admitted she didn’t like the way social media “distorts your mental image of your self”, telling The Guardian newspaper, “I was sick of seeing 21-year-old looksmaxxers being like: ‘If you follow a program, this is what you can do,’ and it’s a side-by-side picture of him at 14, going through puberty, and him now, saying: ‘Look at the transformation.’”
“It’s a lot. It’s very navel-gazy, and it distorts your mental image of your body and your self. And I think that has trickled into our industry, as well,” she added.
Olivia also admitted she didn’t enjoy the nasty comments she received over her storylines in House Of The Dragon, saying, “It can be quite vitriolic at times. I don’t want this to come across as ‘Woe is me’, because I’m very grateful for the job, but to field insults when you’re just walking down the street…”
“They want a picture with you, then afterwards, they’ll say, ‘I f****** hate your character, by the way,’ or, ‘Your character’s a ****,’” she detailed.
“I sort of laugh and say: ‘Well, you can delete that picture.’ I don’t know what you can do. I just try and take it in my stride,” Olivia Cooke explained of the hate directed towards her.
