Spoilers for Bridgerton season three, part two follow.
There’s a common Bridgerton proverb that states it’s anything but common for a lady to speak her mind. That’s what makes the arrival of Lady Tilley Arnold so tantalizing. As established in the first half of season three, the widowed Tilley (portrayed by Hannah New) is an assertive outlier in a man’s world. She has a lot of money, unlimited freedom, and doesn’t tolerate the familiar chorus of what ladies can or can’t do. Oh yeah, and she loves a good threesome. Benedict Bridgerton (Luke Thompson) learns this with a mix of curiosity and trepidation in the season’s second half; once he and Tilley begin their romantic relationship, she trusts him enough to reveal she favors a polyamorous life. “We preen and we promenade. We leave calling cards and we marry. We play by all the rules and rarely do we question the meaning of any of it for a moment,†she tells him. “There is so much in society that is unnatural. But a feeling between two people, whatever their sex, is the most natural thing in the world.â€
Tilley’s progressive ideology transforms Benedict, and the duo enjoys an abundance of bedroom lovin’ with another man — don’t worry; her staff is discreet — before maturely going their separate ways. New admits she initially had some doubts about how era-accurate Tilley’s narrative was, but her research proved there were plenty of real-life Regency women who were more aligned with contemporary beliefs than we assume. One particular widowed duchess, she discovered, was almost a direct parallel to Tilley. “That’s a woman from history who we never hear about,†New says. “There should be more of them on television.â€
Your character is the rare addition who was created for the series. Why was Tilley deemed important enough to write from scratch? What is her purpose?
The writers wanted another strong widow. Widows are kind of in control of the ton. They’re the people who make the matches happen. But the writers were keen to bring in a widow who wasn’t interested in the marriage mart. She’s just her own independent woman — emotionally, financially, and sexually. When I read Tilley the first time, I was like, Wow, I’m getting to play this incredibly sex-positive and strong woman who’s also quite complex. She has trauma and grief in her past, but she’s optimistic and interested in intellectual stimulation. She wants to be involved in the arts and sciences. I didn’t expect somebody as strong as Tilley to step into the ton, a world that revolves around love and romance. I think audiences were yearning to see somebody like her.
I didn’t get a trauma read from her. Could you elaborate on that?
Grief is a type of trauma. Tilley has gone through those stages and processed them. Her trauma and grief are what make her such a resilient person. She doesn’t have a backstory exposed, but she’s able to play it in her presence and ability to find joy, listen to others, and be excited by things beyond just a sexual attraction. I like to think she had a genuine love marriage and her husband was much older. There’s a sense he opened up her world. When I thought about all these things, and the long journey of self-discovery, I saw this woman who was in such a good place of understanding herself. I need a bit more of that for myself, too.
We learn nothing about Tilley’s late husband or if she even has children, so it’s nice that you filled in your own blanks. How do you think her past helped her cultivate such an open-minded and contrarian worldview for the time period?
I did research on how young widows of the Regency era would position themselves. I like to base my characters on somebody from history and have them anchor the character. I actually wrote my master’s dissertation on playing biopic roles, and I interviewed a lot of people about their process. So when I did my own Bridgerton research, this amazing woman popped up named Harriet Mellon. She was one of the richest women of the era, if not the richest, because she had been married to the royal banker. When he died, she inherited the majority of his fortune, which his extended family wasn’t happy about. She was a self-made woman with an acting career before she married, and she became very benevolent upon her husband’s death — she would feed the poor from the gates of her house. But she got absolutely slammed in the press; she was a victim of a Lady Whistledown-esque press. She would utter what was considered to be incredibly rude remarks that would then make it into the papers, but everybody respected her for it and they would still invite her to all of their parties.
She gave me life for this character. I don’t stick to these stories as if they’re concrete, but it just seemed like when more and more things came up in the script for Tilley, so much of Harriet’s life fed into it and worked. They both see the world beyond the ton, and that’s why they can float in and out of society and be rebels.
That’s great to hear about Harriet, because I wanted to know if there was ever a fear that Tilley would lean too anachronistic? She seems so inherently modern that a few times I thought, There’s no way this woman would be promenading around so openly with her beliefs during this time.
I absolutely did, and that’s the reason I delved deeply into that history. I even went on JSTOR. We have this prejudiced view of the past and how people behaved; you get history buffs like, This absolutely would never have happened. And then you’re like, Well, hold on a minute. There’s always somebody who’s not playing by the rules. When you start to dig a bit, you realize there’s so many fascinating stories that were suppressed because it wasn’t convenient to perpetuate them in a society where women needed to be kept in their place.
One of my favorite scenes is when Tilley’s friend interrogates Benedict about his artistic pursuits during dinner, and he seemingly has none besides, well, going to parties. In all honesty, what does she see in this man?
That first moment between them in the aeronaut tent is the connection Tilley wants with people. She wants people to be a little critical. Benedict comes into the tent and makes that type of remark without even seeing her. There’s a magnetism that goes beyond observing someone. Luke’s work is incredibly detailed and a breath of fresh air, because there’s spontaneity in his movements and how he carries himself. There’s a sharpness in his expressions. He surprises you in every single scene. I have the sense that Tilley had been observing how Benedict moves in a different way from others. He wants to stay on the border of all of these big events, and I think that’s what attracts her. She’s trying to see why people hide and why people aren’t coming forward.
Luke and I talked about this intensely. We think there’s a meeting of the minds. They talk about the art that interests them and new discoveries in science, but they also enjoy each other’s company. There’s a lot of humor between them. She’s somebody who searches for what brings joy in life, and Benedict is a joyful character. That’s where their relationship starts to unfold. When she begins to reveal to him ideas that are unconventional and potentially risky — such as the stakes of having a polyamorous or gay relationship — it’s a big deal. She sees that he needs to be coming out of these shadows to fulfill his own desires. She’s seen that people can live very depressed lives because they’re suppressing these feelings. Tilley doesn’t want that to happen to Benedict. We don’t have enough time to show everything because there are so many Bridgerton couples to follow, but when you’re acting with an actor of Luke’s caliber, all of those things can be alive in a brief scene.
How does one prepare for filming such an affectionate three-way?
Our director dealt with it in such a delicate way. We have an intimacy coordinator, which is really important — they’ve changed the game. When it comes to sex scenes, there’s an amazing opportunity to crack open your character and show the most intimate part of them. But you can only do that when you’re in a safe space. Working with Luke and Lucas Aurelio, who plays Paul, was a beautiful experience. Every single look and every single move had to function like a line of dialogue. It had to have a subtext under it. That created a bubble of safety.
Can you tell me more about the direction of that scene in particular, and what you were meant to emote with that subtext?
There’s always a moment in these scenes where we see consent given, and the moment of buying into what’s about to happen. There was an equality and sense of investment in that relationship that went beyond any titillation or traditional idea of what a ménage à trois would be. Paying homage to people who live in polyamorous relationships is important. I did a lot of reading about it, and I feel there’s some misunderstanding. A lot of people would ask from a monogamous standpoint, Why isn’t there jealousy? Well, maybe there is, and it’s a good point to accept and investigate why jealousy exists at all. A word I delved into and tried to understand more is compersion, which is an idea that seeing somebody you love also love someone else can bring a great sense of satisfaction. There could be an abundance of love to see someone love someone else, and that’s the opposite of jealousy. There’s a delicate payoff between these very extreme feelings, and that’s what we wanted to convey in that scene — the complexity, beauty, and honesty of it all.
What I love about Tilley at the end of the season is that she’s so incredibly aware of what her emotions are. She has a moment where she can come forward to Benedict and go, I have to admit I’m feeling something that I’m not sure I want to be feeling. If that’s the case, I don’t want it to harm you, because I care for you. That’s the most altruistic way of being in love.
Do you view Tilley’s story as being complete, or is there room for her to return in Bridgerton’s fourth season?
With this show, we never know what’s going to happen. But it was nice to not have the feeling of being left on a cliffhanger with too many questions. Tilley’s final scene was a beautiful summary.