“Making it about how I look is reductive and boring,” the actress said of the response to her nudity in season 3 of the Netflix hit series
LEONARDO MUNOZ/AFP via Getty
Nicola Coughlan arrives for the Time 100 Next event at Current at Chelsea Piers in New York on October 9, 2024.
Nicola Coughlan is not here for your body shaming.
The actress bared much of her skin as she led season 3 of Bridgerton alongside Luke Newton, and she’s hitting back at people who called her “brave” for being vulnerable.
“Don’t call me brave. I have a cracking pair of boobs. There’s nothing brave about that, that’s actually just me showing them off,” she told TIME of the response to her nude scenes — and her body more generally.
“I’m a few sizes below the average size of a woman in the U.K. and I’m seen as a ‘plus-size heroine,'” she said. “Making it about how I look is reductive and boring.”
Coughlan, 37, admitted that she “worked my arse off” to make Bridgerton‘s third season, so she’s not on board with commentary being so focused on her looks. “I barely saw my family and friends, and people were just going, ‘But your body’ … I don’t take it as nice.”
“What if I was suddenly going to play a ballerina and lose a s— ton of weight, are you not going to like me anymore?” she questioned, calling the discussion overall “insane and so insulting.”
Liam Daniel/Netflix
Luke Newton as Colin Bridgerton, Nicola Coughlan as Penelope Featherington in ‘Bridgerton’ season 3
The topic of her nudity in the show was coming up even before it premiered. In May, she told Stylist she had “specifically asked for certain lines and moments” revolving around her nudity “to be included” in the show.
“There’s one scene where I’m very naked on camera, and that was my idea, my choice. It just felt like the biggest ‘f— you’ to all the conversation surrounding my body; it was amazingly empowering,” she said.
James Gourley/Getty
Luke Newton and Nicola Coughlan hold hands at the Bridgerton season 3 premiere in Australia
“I felt beautiful in the moment, and I thought: ‘When I’m 80, I want to look back on this and remember how f—ing hot I looked!'”
Coughlan added that she feels “great” about the nudity in Bridgerton season 3 “because not only did I consent to it, but I drove it.”
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Seasons 1-3 of Bridgerton can be streamed in full on Netflix, along with its prequel spinoff, Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story.
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