Is there anything more romantic than fancying someone so much you want them even when they're lit up by nothing but the vein-exposing blue-white luminescence of a chicken shop? Is there anything more charming than overlooking the smell of hot oil so you can take in the beauty of young love? Don’t ask us, ask Stranger Things’ Charlie Heaton and Natalia Dyer, who play Jonathan Byers and Nancy Wheeler respectively, and ended a boozing session at Shepherd's Bush's Chicken Cottage the other night.
Charlie, who doubles up as a musician, had just finished playing drums for Faye Webster at her Shepherd’s Bush Empire gig in West London, when Natalia surprised him outside. So gleeful to see her, Charlie picked Natalia up and gave her a bunch of hugs and kisses. They then went to the Defector’s Weld, a cannily-named pub, along with Game of Thrones’ Maisie Williams and her boyfriend Ollie Jackson. The Netflix-starring pair then sidled into the dazzling gorgeousness of Chicken Cottage, where they waited by the formica bar for their food to be prepared aka deep fried/taken out of their little glass cubbyhole and put into a bag. We’ve not seen any pictures of the food, or of them eating the food, but you don’t go into Chicken Cottage and lean up against the bar just for the atmosphere, do you?
Just when we thought Stranger Things gave us all the thrum of nostalgia we needed, along comes the actual stars of the show, living their actual lives, to remind us of just how fondly we look back on those times we used to end every night in a chicken shop. Well, unless we’re vegans, right?
The story is added an extra bittersweetness as it seems like it’s the first time Charlie and Natalia have seen each other since he was refused access to the Stranger Things premiere in LA after traces of cocaine were found in his possession. At the time, he released a statement to say: 'I do want to clarify that I was not arrested or charged with a crime, and cooperated fully with the U.S. officials at LAX.'
'I’m sorry to all the fans and my Stranger Things family for missing the premiere. We are all so proud of this season and I would never want this story to negatively impact the show.'
It’s a good thing that the rest of his private life, which runs in tandem with the love triangle that Nancy and Jonathan share with Nancy’s boyfriend, Steve Harrington (except Steve’s actor, Joe Keery, isn’t in the equation IRL), is only going to bring positive energy to the show. For any fans rooting that Nancy and Jonathan to sail off into the sunset (or upside down) together, their IRL coupling provides some hope, at least in the way it provides eager fan-fic-ers with some material they don't need to photoshop too heavily to fit in with their fantasies of the Nancy/Jonathan 'ship'
What we're still wondering, though, is whether Maisie Williams joined them. The actress has previously left the BRIT awards early to get some fried chicken!
Photo: Goff Photos
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.