Nicola Coughlan, the Bridgerton actress portraying Penelope in the Netflix show, is adamant about not discussing her appearance or weight loss. In an interview with Elle published on March 4th, she stated, "The thing that sometimes irritates people is when I say, 'I have no interest in body positivity.' When I was growing up, I never gave much thought to actors' bodies. So, I genuinely don't care about it."
The 39-year-old actress was shocked to see the commentary about her body when she appeared in sex scenes with her costar, Luke Newton (who plays Colin Bridgerton) in season three. "It was really bizarre," she noted. "When I was filming the series, I was exercising a lot because I knew I had to fit into the costumes. I had lost a significant amount of weight and was probably a size 10, but one of the corsets was a size 8. And then people started talking about how I was plus-size. I was thinking, 'How f--ked are we that I am the biggest woman you want to see on screen?'"
Coughlan was also confronted with these comments in person. She was particularly upset when a Bridgerton fan approached her in public to discuss body positivity with her. "I remember this really drunk girl once talking to me in a bathroom, saying, 'I loved [Bridgerton] because of your body,'" she recalled. "And then started talking about my body, and I was like, 'I want to die. I hate this so much.'"
Ultimately, Coughlan doesn't want her work on the period drama to be reduced to her size. As she put it, "It's really hard when you work on something for months and months of your life—you don't see your family, you really dedicate yourself—and then it comes down to what you look like. It's so f--king boring."
Her busy schedule also means other sacrifices, like maintaining a long-distance relationship with her boyfriend, Jake Dunn, 26. "We try our best," she explained. "I send him annoying videos all the time and a lot of Facetime, but he's super-busy. Before we were together, I just thought he was a really talented actor. But I love when people have their own stuff going on."
