Hannah Dodd is the cover of the new edition of YOU Magazine where she talks about getting her role in Bridgerton, life before acting and more! You can check the interview bellow and the photos in our gallery:
Imagine doing audition after audition for a role in Bridgerton, only to lose out in a gut-wrenching final round. Imagine watching it turn into one of Netflix’s biggest shows while you remain stuck in an admin job, juggling spreadsheets.
And then finding out there’s a juicy part waiting for you in the third season after all. You could say it’s all been a lot for Hannah Dodd to take in.
‘I felt like a competition winner being taken around the set,’ the 28-year-old actress says about joining the period drama as Francesca, the shyest of the aristocratic Bridgerton siblings. ‘I thought I’d stepped into my TV screen.’ With her wide almond eyes, Dodd reminds me of a young Kate Moss, albeit from sleepy Colchester instead of gritty Croydon.
She twirls around the photo studio in bright yellow Louis Vuitton (she’s had dance training since the age of two). ‘Oh yeah, get that ballet out,’ she says, stretching her leg at an extraordinary angle while poised on a chair in huge heels. She winces. ‘My muscles are like, “Ain’t done this in a while!’’’
These are Dodd’s first steps inside the Bridgerton hit factory. The series is made by Shonda Rhimes, the American creator of Grey’s Anatomy, who signed up to make shows exclusively for Netflix for a reported £115 million in 2017. But Bridgerton still surprised everyone when it smashed the streaming giant’s record in 2020 for its most watched English-language drama.
Two years later, it broke its own record. Season three is out this month.
The show is also a star maker. Set in the 19th-century court of the fictional English Queen Charlotte, it is based on the novels by Julia Quinn and focuses on the eight Bridgerton siblings as they enter a London society dominated by Lady Whistledown, the anonymous gossip columnist.
The racy first season transformed the lives of Regé-Jean Page, who played the Duke of Hastings, and Phoebe Dynevor, who was Daphne Bridgerton, his love interest. Both were relatively unknown, two alumni of BBC One’s teen drama Waterloo Road. However, 12 sex scenes and 113 million viewers later, both became global names.
The same Bridgerton magic was sprinkled on the careers of Simone Ashley (Kate Sharma) and Jonathan Bailey (Anthony, Viscount Bridgerton) in the second season. This third season centres on Nicola Coughlan (Penelope Featherington), but the guaranteed fan favourite? Hannah Dodd.
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