Los Angeles, May 16: "Game of Thrones" star Emilia Clarke hates the phrase "strong women" characters and believes it is "sexist". The 31-year-old actor, who is attending the Cannes Film Festival, where her new film "Solo: A Star Wars Story" is screening, said the usage of the phrase is particularly useless due to a presence of a female lead in a film. "Take the 'strong' out of it, find another adjective, damn it. I'm just playing women," Clarke said in an interview as part of the Kering Women in Motion talks, reported Variety.

"If it's not strong, what is it? Are you telling me there's another option, that there's a weak option? You think a lead in a movie is going to be a weak woman? It just doesn't even bear having the conversation, so enough already with the strong women, please," Clarke added.

The actor also said there are no strong men characters in films, unless they are physically strong. Clarke, who plays Daenerys Targaryen in hit HBO series, also revealed that she received equal pay on the show. "On Game of Thrones, I have always been paid the same amount as my male co-stars. It was my first job and I was not discriminated against because I was a woman, in my paycheck," Clarke said.

The actor said some of the instances of women not being paid equally in Hollywood were "actually shocking" for her. "You start to dig deep and see where it is, rife in the industry. So I think it's mainly in the beginning, just be aware of that and going, 'Can you just check?' You just start to fight harder for that stuff," she added.