Nicola Coughlan has revealed that she asked to be “very naked” in a particular Bridgerton season three scene as a “f*** you” to trolls who commented on her body.
The 37-year-old takes the lead in the newest chapter of the Netflix period drama, portraying Penelope Featherington alongside Luke Newton, who plays Colin Bridgerton.
In a new interview, the Irish actress discussed working with Bridgerton's intimacy coordinator, Lizzy Talbot, regarding the sex scenes in this season and how she was adamant about going “very naked” in one scene as a direct response to the trolls who slammed her weight online.
“You go, ‘Ok, what do I want to show? What don’t I want to show? What’s scripted, and what do I want to add?’” she told Stylist.
“I specifically asked for certain lines and moments to be included.
““There’s one scene where I’m very naked on camera, and that was my idea, my choice. It just felt like the biggest ‘fuck you’ to all the conversation surrounding my body; it was amazingly empowering.
“I felt beautiful in the moment, and I thought: ‘When I’m 80, I want to look back on this and remember how fucking hot I looked!’”
Her remarks come after Coughlan took to Instagram in 2022 asking her fans to refrain from sharing their opinions about her body.
She penned on Instagram at the time: “Most people are being nice and not trying to be offensive but I am just one real-life human being and it’s really hard to take the weight of thousands of opinions on how you look being sent directly to you every day.
“If you have an opinion about me that’s ok, I understand I’m on TV and that people will have things to think and say but I beg you not to send it to me directly.”
She later told the Irish Times: “All I care about is the work. Bodies change, if I lose weight or gain weight or I do anything it’s no one’s business, all I care about is doing good acting and being judged on that.”
Coughlan recently told the Los Angeles Times that she found shooting sex scenes with her co-star to be a liberating experience despite her initial nerves.
She shared: “By the end of the day, we were both lying under a blanket, not clothed, just chillin’. We were like, ‘This is why nudists do it.’”
Bridgerton season 3 part one lands on Netflix on Thursday, May 16 but despite the hype The Standard’s Vicky Jessop wasn’t wooed by the latest helping, giving it two stars.
“But three seasons in, the Bridgerton formula is wearing thin: can you tell? The plot beats are predictable (the old gambit of entering a room just as somebody says the wrong thing is getting old fast), the romance feels copy and paste and they all live happily ever after,” she wrote.
“But do viewers care? Even if newcomers will struggle, the fans will lap it up. This is still wildly addictive viewing, the TV equivalent of a 1 am Maccies: it won’t leave you satiated, but it sure tastes good while it lasts.”
