Bridgerton fans might not have picked up on the clues, but the decision to gender-swap Francesca’s love interest from Michael to Michaela was a long time in the making.
Showrunner Jess Brownell pulled back the curtain on the conversations that took place about Francesca’s (Hannah Dodd) sexuality before season 3.
“The reveal of Michaela vs. Michael — from the books — is something that I’ve been pitching from season 1 of the show,” Brownell revealed to Teen Vogue on Friday, June 14. “My approach to telling a queer story on Bridgerton has been to look to the books for thematic cues. I didn’t want to just insert a queer character for queer character’s sake.”
After reading Julia Quinn‘s novel When He Was Wicked, Brownell recalled seeing something special, adding, “I want to tell a story that accurately reflects a queer experience, and the first time I read Francesca’s book, I really identified with it as a queer woman. Maybe not in the way Julia Quinn intended.”
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Brownell used her own experience as a member of the LGBTQIA+ community to expand on Francesca’s onscreen journey.
“Her book is very much about [Francesca] feeling different, and not really knowing why. In the book, I think it has a lot to do with her just being an introvert, but as a queer woman, a lot of my queer experience, and I think a lot of my friends’ [experiences have] been about that sense of feeling different, and navigating what that means,” she explained. “There’s also a lot of research and thought historically about the choice of changing Michael to Michaela.”
Brownell continued: “I think it was important for me in planning a queer story to think about how we might be able to tell a happily ever after and show queer joy, which we don’t always get to see in period pieces. There are some good examples from history, without giving too much away, of women like Francesca, who are able to carve out happily ever afters.”
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Season 3 expanded on Francesca’s love story by having her meet her now-husband, John (Victor Alli), during her debut into society. By the end of the second part, Francesca and John were making plans to move to his native Scotland with his cousin Michaela (Masali Baduza). The book about Francesca’s romance, however, actually followed her relationship with John’s cousin Michael, which upset certain readers.
Meanwhile, Brownell pointed out that the hints about Francesca’s sexuality were already featured on the show.
“My hope is that watching this season, people see how we’re telling a piece of that story, even starting in episode 1 of season 3 with Francesca, in terms of all of the debutantes having always imagined what they wanted their husbands to be like,” she noted. “Francesca realizes, ‘I’ve never thought about that, actually. Why is that?’ It was a thread we were playing with.”
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Brownell also made it clear that she wanted Francesca and Michaela to have a happy ending, adding, “Going forward, what I am trying to do is use examples from history I can jump off [of] and potentially tell a new origin story of how the Bridgerton world might move towards a more inclusive society in terms of sexuality.”
With Bridgerton being set in an alternate dimension, there are plans to evolve the way same-sex relationships are thought of in the Regency era.
“Based on what the show has already established, it didn’t feel right to automatically be in a space where sexuality is super inclusive, but it’s something that I would like to move towards in the story, as we move through time,” the screenwriter concluded.
Bridgerton is currently streaming on Netflix.
