Bridgerton’s Nicola Coughlan says one member of the family was ‘so mad’ about her intercourse scenes

Nicola Coughlan has shared her mother’s less than thrilled reaction to her sex scenes in Bridgerton.

In the latest series of the Regency-era Netflix hit, Coughlan’s character Penelope Featherington shared a friends-to-lovers romance with Luke Newton’s Colin Bridgerton.

Speaking on the latest episode of The Graham Norton Show, Coughlan, 37, who rose to fame playing a teenager in Derry Girls, said: “I realised I was 35 when I was filming the season, and I’d never played an adult. I was like, ‘How do I do this?’”

She added: “The first two [Bridgerton] series, I looked a lot like Spongebob Squarepants, very curly, ginger [hair], yellow dress, sort a of a tent situation going on.

“But then it was weird having to play the romantic lead and… it’s a sexy show. A lot of sexy things happen in it, and then I realised I was going to have to do the sexy things and I was like, ‘Right.’”

Coughlan said of her mother’s reaction: “My mother was so mad at me about those scenes – as if they were my fault, so I didn’t go to the screening with her.”

The actor has previously spoken about how “empowering” it felt to do the scenes, telling Stylist: “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.

“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 went viral for her reaction to one fan, who had said she was “very brave” for stripping off on camera.

“You know, it is hard, ’cause I think women with my body type, women with perfect breasts… We do not get to see ourselves onscreen enough,” she quipped at a screening.

She added: “I am a proud member of the perfect breasts community, and I hope you enjoy seeing them.”

Coughlan is one of The Independent’s TV heroes of 2024. Read more here, and find Coughlan’s biggest cultural picks of the year.