Turns Out, Phoebe Waller-Bridge's Famous Emmys Afterparty Photo Was Just a Glorious Accident

Phoebe Waller-Bridge appeared on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert on Thursday night and, I've got to say, this was one of the loveliest interviews (it was actually more of a conversation) I've watched in a long time. They covered a lot of ground in the 20-minute interview. They spoke about how Phoebe and her hugely popular show Fleabag were responsible for "making priests hot" and how her Fleabag Live show (which is now available to stream online, for charity) is a "darker, more racy" version of the TV show.

But what really tickled me was when Phoebe explained how she and her sister are surviving lockdown together, with a couple of fruit safe words (yes, fruit), and when she explained the story behind her famous photo, taken at the 2019 Emmys afterparty. You know the one: in the photo, she's perched on a very OTT chair at the Chateau Marmont, with a cigarette in one hand and a gimlet cocktail in the other, and she's surrounded by the golden trophies she'd won at the awards ceremony earlier that night.

Phoebe explained that there actually wasn't much to the photo, which she admits was a fluke but turned out pretty well. She said, "I was just with a bunch of six friends out the back, and one of them [BBC Head of Comedy Josh Cole] took that photo and put it on his Instagram — and then it went mad!" So, that's that team. It was just a glorious accident that instantly became an iconic moment for us all. You can watch the full interview above.