The result of the association between Shondaland and Netflix, Bridgerton became one of the streaming giant’s biggest hits by bringing the saga of romantic novels written by Julia Quinn to the small screen. With Outlander as a super-famous background, the story takes us to the Regency period, when eight brothers from a powerful family try to find love, while also dealing with the socially pre-established and the expectations that the world has on them. With two seasons (each dedicated to the story of one of the family members), the last installment ended with the big reveal about the true identity of Lady Whistledown, played by the genius of Nicola Coughlan. We talked to her and this is what she told us.
We left Penelope in a pretty painful place, where do we find her in the new season?
Very painful! We close the story with her losing her two best friends, so she feels really at the worst time in her life. But I think in this season we’re going to see how much she matured: she’s ready, she moves to London and quickly realizes that, in order to have her own life and identity, she has to grow up.
It’s crazy, because we watched her grow from “the girl in the corner watching” to the main character. What is it like to accompany that evolution in your history?
It’s really exciting! I think there are a lot of things from the show that I see in my own life, it was quite scary to have to take this step forward. Obviously I’ve been in the series since the first season and I was very happy to give life to a secondary character. We actually talked to Luke [Newton] about how hard it is to take that step forward, so it was like – emotionally – he was with her, saying, “Of course you can do this!”
In that transformation, we saw Penelope in many yellow and orange outfits, but this season her wardrobe turned to cold tones…
Totally, and I think it’s super interesting because already in the first episodes we realize that this transformation is only aesthetic. Penelope’s real changes have to come from the inside out. So she goes for this whole new look, but at some point she realizes that she’s the same girl and she has to work on herself. But I think the most interesting thing is that this is the first season in which she dresses how she always wanted and not how someone else forced her.
Of course! Because, in fact, in the first seasons we hear her complain that that’s what her mother chose…
Absolutely. She doesn’t like yellow at all, she never did. Neither does curly hair… Quite the opposite of me! I love it.
Ohlala
Written by Sole Venesio
Published April 17, 2024
Translated via Google
