It’s official: Season 4 of Netflix’s “Bridgerton” will focus on the love story of perpetual bachelor Benedict Bridgerton.
Benedict, who is portrayed by Luke Thompson, has taken a backseat in recent seasons but will now be the next Bridgerton sibling to find their soulmate. The season will follow the events of Julia Quinn’s third “Bridgerton” novel, “An Offer From a Gentleman,” which sees Benedict searching for a “lady in silver” he meets at a masquerade ball who turns out to be a low-born woman named Sophie Beckett.
In the “Bridgerton” Season 4 logline that accompanied the announcement, Netflix confirmed that Benedict’s love interest is still that woman. “The fourth season of ‘Bridgerton’ turns its focus to bohemian second son Benedict (Luke Thompson),” it reads. “Despite his elder and younger brothers both being happily married, Benedict is loath to settle down — until he meets a captivating Lady in Silver at his mother’s masquerade ball.”
When Variety spoke with new “Bridgerton” showrunner Jess Brownell about the Season 3 finale in June, she teased Benedict Bridgerton as the Season 4 lead and broke down the decision to reveal his pansexuality during Colin (Luke Newton) and Penelope’s (Nicola Coughlan) season — which is based on the fourth “Bridgerton” book, “Romancing Mister Bridgerton,” and swapped places with Benedict’s story for the TV series.
“I knew that people out there had a feeling Benedict might be queer,” Brownell said. “And personally, it made sense to me. He’s not just open minded, it’s that he seems like the type of person who wouldn’t be as concerned with gender — someone who might be more fluid and pansexual. He’s really attracted to someone’s spirit. And so it felt like we should make sense of those pieces that were in Seasons 1 and 2. That was what we were attempting to do with his storyline.”
At the end of “Bridgerton” Season 3, Benedict has a threesome with his new flame Lady Tilley Arnold (Hannah New) and her friend Paul (Lucas Aurelio), after encouragement from Tilley to explore. When Tilley decides she wants to return to their monogamous stage and not “share” him, Benedict gently ends the relationship, not quite ready to settle down after discovering a new part of himself.
“Benedict has always been a little lost — or free depending on the way you want to look at it. But now he’s trying to find something a bit more solid in himself,” Thompson told Netflix’s Tudum, which unveiled the news of “Bridgerton” Season 4’s lead Tuesday.
Thompson’s turn as lead comes after three seasons on “Bridgerton” in a supporting role as Benedict, following the previous seasons of Shonda Rhimes’ period romance focused on his on-screen siblings and their partners: Daphne Bridgerton (Phoebe Dynevor) and Simon Basset (Regé-Jean Page), Anthony Bridgerton (Jonathan Bailey) and Kate Sharma (Simone Ashley) and Colin and Penelope.
Still left to go in the lineup of leads are the remaining “Bridgerton” siblings: Eloise (Claudia Jessie), Francesca (Hannah Dodd), Gregory (Will Tilston) and Hyacinth (Florence Hunt). While Rhimes and Brownell have plans to tell the entire eight-book story, and have already laid the groundwork for Eloise and Francesca’s coming plots, Netflix has only formally renewed the show through Season 4.