Gillian Anderson reveals she had 'intimate' lunch with former US president Bill Clinton

Gillian Anderson had a bit of a fangirl moment when she met Bill Clinton. Photo / Getty Images

Gillian Anderson hoped Bill Clinton would call her after an "intimate" meeting.

The 53-year-old actress - who stars as historic First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, the wife of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, in Showtime series The First' Lady - revealed that she had once met former President Bill Clinton when he was first running for office in the early
1990s during a lunch do in the Hollywood Hills.

She said: "I met Clinton. I met him when he was running for office, the first time. It was lunch for him at somebody's fancy house in the Hollywood Hills. At the end of his speech, we created a line for him and he walked down the line and we got to meet him. He did the most miraculous thing in the world. That thing where he shakes your hand and grabs your elbow at the same time."

The former X-Files star went on to joke that the politician gave her a "look-back" and that when she got home she checked her voicemail because she genuinely believed he would call her.

Speaking on Jimmy Kimmel, Live, she added: "He holds your arm further up, slightly intimate little thing, makes eye contact and then moves on to the next person. I went home, this was in the days of answering machines, I literally thought that I was going to go home to a message from him. Then he looks back at you. I did. It was that real!"

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Gillian - who also starred as former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in Netflix series The Crown and won an Emmy Award for her portrayal of the formidable politician - also explained that it was "nice" to attend the ceremony in person after being forced to accept her Golden Globe award for the role virtually due to Covid-19.

She added: "That was the first time we were seeing each other again which was nice. For the Golden Globes, I was shooting in Prague and was all alone in a hotel room all dressed up in front of a computer for the entire Golden Globes. But there was a technician who was in the room with me!"