Nicola Coughlan says she ‘doesn’t care’ about body positivity as her appearance has come under scrutiny since she shot to fame by Bridgerton.
The 39-year-old Irish actor, who reprized her role as Penelope Featherington in the final season of the Netflix drama, responded to public backlash for her performance in the April issue of Elle UKpublished on March 5.
“You know what was really crazy, when I was filming that series, I was working out a lot because I knew I had to, so I had lost a lot of weight,” she began, expressing her annoyance that her body type was widely described as plus-size during filming.
“I was probably a size 10, and one of the corsets was a size 8. And then people were talking about me being plus size, and I was like, ‘How damned are we that I’m the biggest woman you want to see on screen?'” she recalled during the interview.
Coughlan also criticized the way conversations about her performance often veer towards her appearance. She recalled meeting a fan who praised the show for her body.
“I remember this really drunk girl once talking to me in the bathroom and saying, ‘I loved.’ [Bridgerton] because of your body.” And I started talking about my body, and I thought, ‘I want to die. I hate this so much,” she recalled.
Coughlan received particular attention during the series’ third season, with romantic scenes opposite Luke Newton.
While some viewers praised the image as a step forward in body representation, she said she has little interest in becoming a spokesperson for body positivity. “What I say sometimes that pisses people off is that I have no interest in body positivity,” she admitted.
She went on to explain that when she was younger, she didn’t evaluate actors based on their bodies, and she doesn’t want that conversation to define her career.
“Growing up as a kid, I never thought about that. I didn’t look at actors or think about their bodies. So I don’t really care,” she admitted. “There are a lot of things I’m passionate about, but it’s not one of them… That’s someone else’s thing. It’s not mine.”
The actor previously addressed the issue in a 2022 Instagram post, asking fans not to send comments about her body directly to her. She said it can be difficult to receive thousands of opinions about her appearance.
