Later, she confesses she doesn’t always “like” it, making way for Bridgerton’s most awkward, and perhaps most real sex scene yet. “Sex is a really complicated, vulnerable thing – it isn’t simple. It isn’t always steamy and immediate and fluid the first time you do it,” says Carter, adding, “I feel really proud to be part of that little moment of the show.”

Though Bridgerton may be Carter’s main claim to fame these days, she also starred in Dear Octopus at the National Theatre earlier this year. The play, written by I Capture The Castle’s Dodi Smith in 1938, follows four generations of the Randolph family as they reconvene for one weekend at the family home. As the matriarch’s companion, Fenny, Carter shed her mean girl act and embodied a wallflower dealing with her own unrequited love story; in fact, the character is not all that dissimilar to Prudence’s sister (and the star of this season of Bridgerton) Penelope Featherington.

It was at the theatre that Carter truly felt at home. “I grew up in London and I’ve been going to the National since I was two years old,” she says. In fact, her parents (British acting royalty, Imelda Staunton and Jim Carter) met in the very same rehearsal room where she prepared for Dear Octopus.

The play will be available for streaming on National Theatre at Home from July 12.

We spoke to Carter about being part of the Bridgerton family and working at the National Theatre.

Bessie Carter on playing Prudence in Bridgerton and starring in Dear Octopus at the National Theatre