Just when you thought Bridgerton couldn’t get any steamier, their newest promo for Colin and Penelope appears to be gearing up for one of the most highly-anticipated sex scenes yet.
Netflix released a new video on Wednesday, March 27, of Colin (Luke Newton) and Penelope (Nicola Coughlan) sharing a tender moment while standing in front of a mirror.
“A look such as this from Mister Colin Bridgerton would surely make even the most perennial of wallflowers swoon, would it not?” read the caption for the post.
Fans who read Julia Quinn‘s Romancing Mr. Bridgerton — which served as inspiration for the third season — are familiar with the scene where Colin tells Penelope that he has a fantasy of having sex with her in front of a mirror so that she can see how beautiful she looks naked.
Colin and Penelope’s love story has been years in the making as viewers watched the two build a strong foundation before becoming the focus of season 3. Coughlan, 37, previously hinted that viewers were in plenty of romance.
“Luke and I read the books at the beginning of season 1, and it was funny to us. We were like, ‘Imagine if we have to kiss and do this,’” she recalled to Entertainment Tonight in June 2023. “And then season 3 came on and we were like, ‘Oh god.’ And then it’s like, it’s my friend. I have to kiss my friend. And you can’t pretend to kiss someone, you have to really kiss them. It’s a spicy one. It’s a lot of the stuff from the books that the fans expect has made it into the show.”
Earlier this year, Coughlan joked that she asked for a more “PG version” of the upcoming season for her family.
“If you want to watch it with your mum and dad, go for it, [but] having seen bits,” she quipped on Australia’s Today FM in February. “But, even in season 1, I skipped bits with my mum. She was like, ‘That episode was short,’ and I was like, ‘It was a short one. It was a short one. Yeah.’”
Coughlan noted that the PG cut would be “significantly shorter” because of Penelope and Colin’s steamy journey, adding, “I don’t think I can do episode 2 with my mum, let alone … I’m not gonna say it.”
Meanwhile, showrunner Jess Brownell praised Coughlan and Newton’s chemistry for allowing the show to move up Penelope and Colin’s season. (Season 3 was originally presumed to be following Luke Thompson‘s character Benedict Bridgerton since the third novel, An Offer From a Gentleman, is about his connection with newcomer Sophie.)
“[We have] really [been] getting to know Pen and Colin. We’ve been watching Pen’s crush and seeing how oblivious Colin is to it. That’s a dynamic that you can only play out for so long before something has to change,” Brownell noted to Entertainment Weekly in December 2023. “This really felt like the right time to lean into what’s been set up with them.”
The first half of Bridgerton season 3 premieres on Netflix on Thursday, May 16. The remaining episodes drop on Thursday, June 13.
