Sarah Snook on how she overcomes the ‘Colliwobbles’

Australia’s leading lady Sarah Snook has opened up on all things Broadway during a sitdown with former co-star Kieran Culkin, sharing an unwitting reference to a historic AFL slang word.

Australia’s leading lady Sarah Snook has opened up on all things Broadway with an unwitting reference to a historic AFL slang word.

Snook reunited with her sibling on Succession, Kieran Culkin, for Variety’s Broadway Actors on Actors series.

The real-life friends and Emmy winners are performing two blocks away from each other on Broadway — Snook in The Picture Of Dorian Gray and Culkin in Glengarry Glen Ross.

Culkin asks Snook if she’s ever been part of a play or something when you think ‘this isn’t very good’.

Kieran Culkin and Succession co-star Sarah Snook are performing two blocks away from each other on Broadway. Picture: WireImage

She replies: “I’ve been in a play that was really good, but I wasn’t good in it. Or at least I wasn’t enjoying it. It was a potential transfer to Broadway, and I was like, “Please don’t. I couldn’t do this role there well”.

She adds: “I got the collywobbles.”

Immediately Culkin says “that’s not a word” but Snook elaborates that she got in her head.

“I think it’s a British word, maybe. Your wife probably knows it,’’ Snook said.

The collywobbles is in fact a British English informal expression referring to both an uncomfortable feeling in the stomach due to nervousness or fear, and intestinal distress like cramps or diarrhea.

The real-life friends sat down for Variety’s latest Actors on Actors piece. Picture: Emilio Madrid for Variety

Actor Sarah Snook with husband Dave Lawson, who featured in famous Toyota footy ads. Picture: Getty Images

But for footy fans the ‘colliwobbles’ refers to the period between Collingwood’s 1958 and 1990 premierships, where the Magpies reached nine AFL/VFL Grand Finals for eight losses and a draw in 1977.

It’s unclear if Adelaide born Snook is a big AFL fan but her husband, comedian Dave Lawson, grew up in Melbourne and featured in famous Toyota footy ads.

Snook’s success is more outside the English language, with The Picture Of Dorian Gray, the adaption of Oscar Wilde’s classic, becoming the most successful Australian show in six years on Broadway.

In the chat that was almost 40 minutes of laughs and fun, she and Culkin talked about parenthood, forgetting lines, acting in Bad Projects and why Broadway is ‘so f...ing athletic’.

Originally published as Sarah Snook on how she overcomes the ‘Colliwobbles’