When the actress Nicola Coughlan joined the cast of Shondaland’s period costume drama “Bridgerton,” as the young socialite and secret gossip pamphleteer Penelope Featherington, the hair and makeup artist Marc Pilcher informed her that the creative brief they had for her character was only one word: “dowdy.”Penelope, the demure youngest daughter of the domineering matriarch Lady Portia Featherington, was to be done up in garish pastel dresses and gaudy jewelry, with a hairdo clogged with curls — none of it particularly flattering.
“For the first two seasons, the objective, in the nicest way, was not meant to make me look nice,” Coughlan said in a recent interview.
“A lot of the Featherington aesthetic was a ‘more is more’ approach.”A supporting player through the show’s first two seasons, Penelope is the main character of Season 3, which begins streaming May 16 on Netflix.
And as she has moved into the spotlight, her entire style has been altered: a transformation that fans of the show refer to as the “Bridgerton glow-up.”
Persons:
Nicola Coughlan, “, Penelope Featherington, Marc Pilcher, ” Penelope, Portia Featherington, ” Coughlan, Penelope, ”
Organizations:
Netflix