Simone Ashley is Bridgerton‘s Kate Sharma, the show-stealing actress who graces the series with class, smarts, and just enough snark to keep fans intrigued.
The show’s sophomore season focuses on another Bridgerton sibling finding love, and his potential love interests, all prim and proper, are waiting for their Prince Charming — except one. The girl who isn’t too concerned with impressing Anthony Bridgerton is the one who develops the most exciting relationship with him, naturally. Ashley spoke about the headstrong nature of Sharma today, with Tiffany Hadish and Twitch, on Ellen.
“It was a lot of fun to play that, I liked the fact that she wasn’t a people pleaser and she wasn’t afraid to be opinionated and controversial and break the rules a little bit. I mean she was there to protect her sister and I wanted to stay true to that throughout the whole story.”
Her sister, Edwina Sharma, is the one who traveled to London to meet the Viscount, and Kate only wished to tag along to look out for her. Ashley also talked about her character’s impact on that journey, and how Kate shook up the show when she joined her sister in London to find romance and adventure.
“Kate comes with her family back to London to help Edwina find her true love match and things don’t really go as planned when she meets Anthony Bridgerton.”
Of course, it isn’t all butterflies and heart eyes between the two at first. Kate isn’t the one Anthony is “supposed to” end up with; her younger sister Edwina checks off all of his boxes. So why is he so drawn to Kate? The two aren’t exactly full of adoration for one another either, but the attraction grows nonetheless. Sure, it’s a classic enemy-to-lovers trope, but it works. It’s intoxicating.
Season two of Bridgerton is streaming on Netflix, so you can get caught up now if you’ve yet to watch it, and fall for Kate the way we all have.