Bridgerton’s leads Yerin Ha and Luke Thompson have spoken about season four’s hotly anticipated sex scene and how that “slap-in-the-face” moment revealed a different side of Benedict Bridgerton. During an exclusive interview with Digital Spy, the actors discussed the moment Sophie and Benedict’s passion turned cold when the Bridgerton bachelor asked the maid to be his mistress.
“It was like a slap in the face,” Ha shared, before turning to Thompson to say: “It felt like that because when you were doing the scene, you were doing it with such passion and commitment and genuinely earnest.”
Ha went on to describe that scene as a sobering moment for her character Sophie.
“It’s like a snap back to reality. She actually let her guard down too much and she’s like, ‘Actually, we’re from two different worlds. This is silly’. She’s beating herself up again.”
The Benedict actor broke down the shock his character felt the moment his offer went terribly wrong. “I think he’s sort of blindsided [by her reaction]. I don’t think he’s like, ‘What’s wrong? Everything’s fine’,” he said.
“He can sense that he’s done something wrong, but there’s sort of a blindness to him at that moment. I think he genuinely does think that this is an offer that will work and that he can have his cake and eat it.”
Netflix
Related: Best streaming services
Thompson explained further: “I love it because it’s such a surprise for a character that feels so easy going.
“It’s sort of like a more anxious side of him which we haven’t really seen, so I think it’s really nice. It’s nice because it completes the character in a way. You’re like, ‘Where are his real failures or real vulnerabilities?’, and so that’s what you get to see up front and centre.”
Netflix
Thompson went on to share why a Bridgerton sex scene is about more than just fulfilling expectations.
“What’s great about Bridgerton is that [the sex scenes] are proper story beats,” he said. “The magic of [Sophie and Benedict’s sex scene] is that it doesn’t feel like a token sex scene. It’s the fact that it’s in a staircase and there’s this whole ‘upstairs-downstairs’ thing.
“It feels like a proper dance and it feels like something that really symbolises their relationship rather than just feeling like, ‘OK, now we have to do the obligatory sex scene’. The poetry is already written into it. It’s earned.”
Netflix
Ha shared her experience of filming that staircase scene, stating: “We have a great intimacy coordinator Lizzy Talbot and she creates almost like a dance.
“She choreographs it so it makes it look sexy, because sometimes what you think is sexy doesn’t look sexy. So having her on set is an incredible, incredible thing.”
Bridgerton season part one is available to stream now on Netflix with part 2 debuting on Thursday 26 February. Seasons 1-3 are streaming on Netflix, along with Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story.
Read more Bridgerton news on our dedicated homepage
The new edition of Living Legends, a 100-page all-colour celebration of Taylor Swift, is here! Buy Taylor in newsagents or online, priced at just £8.99.
TV writer, Digital Spy Janet completed her Masters degree in Magazine Journalism in 2013 and has continued to grow professionally within the industry ever since. Â For six years she honed her analytical reviewing skills at the Good Housekeeping institute eventually becoming Acting Head of Food testing. Â She also freelanced in the field of film and TV journalism from 2013-2020, when she interviewed A-List stars such as Samuel L Jackson, Colin Firth and Scarlett Johansson. In 2021 she joined Digital Spy as TV writer where she gets to delve into more of what she loves, watching copious amounts of telly all in the name of work. Since taking on the role she has conducted red carpet interviews with the cast of Bridgerton, covered the BAFTAs and been interviewed by BBC Radio and London Live. In her spare time she also moonlights as a published author, the book Gothic Angel.
Â