Gillian Anderson Receives the Variety Icon Award

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Sporting an elegant multicoloured leather dress, she’d been greeted when walking to the stage by an enormous, heartfelt roar of applause from the packed main auditorium at Cannes’ legendary Palais des Festivals, also site of the Cannes Festival.

“I Googled what ‘icon’ actually meant to see how I identified with being given this award,” she said hesitantly, beginning her speech.

“What I can certainly say is that I have played a lot of iconic women in my very long career. Women who have come through barriers and decades to stand above the rest in dramas and in our hearts,” Anderson said.

And she listed just a few:: Dana Scully, Miss Havisham, Margo Channing, Blanche DuBois, Marilyn Monroe, Lucille Ball, Margaret Thatcher, Eleanor Roosevelt and David Bowie.

“I’m very honoured,” she said, concluding – when others would argue that she’d shown consistently impeccable taste playing exceptional women – and men – who were, in many ways, decades before their time.

Anderson’s speech was interrupted by spontaneous applause from the audience, particularly from younger parts of the auditorium for Showtime’s upcoming “The First Lady.”