It has been, with ‘Gambit de dama’ the great success of the Netflix season. His commitment to diversity, which has led its creators to turn the English court of the early 19th century, the so-called Regency period, into a utopian multiracial scene (not multicultural, because here everyone shares the same culture), it has gained followers and detractors in equal measure.
But what has ended up seducing a large part of his audience has been his infallible formula of love affairs + luxury and pageantry + handsome protagonist (Simon Basset, played by Regé-Jean Page, born in Zimbabwe, British by training and American professional). What his fans are now wondering is … will there be more Bridgerton soon, that I’ve been left hungry?
After the mega-success of its first eight episodes, it is speculated that it is very possible that eight seasons of the series will be made in total, since there are eight Julia Quinn novels on which television fiction is based.
Each novel is dedicated to the love affairs of one of the Bridgerton brothers. In a recent interview, showrunner Chris Van Dusen said: “I would love to be able to focus on this and dedicate myself to telling the stories and love affairs of all the Bridgerton brothers, of course I do.” For now, we already know that a second season will start shooting this same 2021.
The series has been number one in 76 countries and has made the fifth best debut in history on a streaming platform, according to the magazine ‘Variety’. If ‘Lady’s Gambit’ became Netflix’s most watched series after breaking the record of 62 million views in its first 28 days, ‘The Bridgertons’ surpassed that number in just two weeks.
But the success of the series was born long before the series began shooting. Julia Quinn, its author, has been included 19 times in the New York Times bestseller list.
Her career as a writer began in a very unique way. Although since she was little she devoured books, her father did not agree with her readings, things like ‘Sweet Dreams’ (a series of romance novels signed by various American authors), so he told her that she could only continue reading this type of thing if she could show her in some way that they were good for her.
Julia told her father that she was actually researching herself so she could write a book. And, just like that, he sat down and wrote two chapters of a romance novel. Three years later he would finish it and send it to the publisher that published ‘Sweet Dreams’. They rejected it.
That both are series very oriented to the female audience is not by chance. Behind both is the same person. In fact, ‘The Bridgertons’ is the first Netflix creation of the avowedly feminist screenwriter, director and producer Shonda Rhimes, whose salary is 82.5 million euros a year since she was hired in 2018.
Netflix pays her this exorbitant sum to make successes, such as those she previously achieved as a co-creator and producer of series such as ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ and ‘Scandal’. His was also the script for the infamous ‘Princess by surprise 2’, where he met Julie Andrews, now the voice of the narrator of ‘The Bridgertons’. He’s from Chicago and just turned 51.
A lot. Especially in clothes. 7,500 garments were designed. Only Daphne, the protagonist of the first installment, wears 104 different dresses . Costume managers John Glaser, John Norster and Ellen Mirojnick provided the two main families in the series with two different color palettes.
Bridgertons usually wear pastel blue and pink garments, while Featheringtons wear very bright colors and variegated garments, usually in yellows and greens. In fact, during filming, the Featheringtons were called the ‘Kardashians of the Regency’.
The bee that appears several times in the first season is a key element in Julia Quinn’s novels. It turns out (attention minispoiler) that the Patriarch of the Bridgertons, Edmund, died of a bee sting. This is why her oldest son, Anthony, is terrified of this insect.
Thus, the bee becomes the shadow of the father who plans over the lives of the eight children and is present at the key moments of the action. There, and on the collar of one of Benedict’s shirts (episode 7). We will see her again.
Sometimes. Costume designers have explained that many liberties were taken for the sake of the ‘modernization’ of history. But one of them powerfully draws attention, because more than a freedom it seems a mistake. At various points we see Daphne putting on or taking off (well, not her, the maid) her corset.
A corset so tight that I even left real wounds on her skin. But is that the corset was not worn directly on the skin. It was worn over a white camisole. This avoided hurting the skin on the one hand, and on the other, did not dirty the corset (it was easier and cheaper to wash or throw away a linen camisole than a complex corset).
The streaming platforms have series and movies that are developed in the same period or others very close to give and take.
For example ‘Outlander’ (Netflix, Movistar), ‘Poldark’ (Movistar), ‘Pride and prejudice’ and ‘Sense and sensitivity’ (Netflix), ‘Young Jane Austen’ (Amazon) and a curiosity, the miniseries’ La Death Comes to Pemberley ‘, adaptation of the internationally best-selling novel by the writer PD James, which is a tribute, in a mystery key, to Jane Austen, and which stars the great Matthew Rhys (‘ The Americans ‘,’ Perry Mason’). By the way, who also co-stars, with Jamie Dornan and Ann Skelly, ‘Death and Nightingales’ (HBO),
