May 1, 2022
'Bridgerton' Star Golda Rosheuvel Recalls Being Told that Coming Out would 'Ruin' Her Career
Kilian Melloy READ TIME: 2 MIN.
"Bridgerton" star Golda Rosheuvel recalled during an April 27 interview on the "Just for Variety" podcast that an out lesbian director advised her against coming out, saying it would "ruin" her career, Yahoo! reported.
"We were talking about being out and proud and representation and whether I should say I was gay in interviews," Rosheuval told Variety's Marc Malkin, the podcast host wrote in Variety.
"And it was an absolute no. 'You absolutely shouldn't do that. It could or it would ruin your career as an actor,' " Rosheuvel recalled the director – who was out, herself – telling her.
The director's advice had the opposite effect: Rosheuvel determined to be out and proud.
"I would rather lose a job than not be true to who I am," the actor told Malkin. "I'd rather not work in an industry that doesn't accept me.... It just wasn't how I was raised.
"And then her being out as a female director, as a lesbian director, I was like, 'I don't understand this advice," Rosheuvel went on to say. "It blew my mind."
The best revenge is living authentically, and Rosheuvel's success proves it: The out actor portrays Queen Charlotte in the series, which is a massive hit for Netflix.
"My partner always says, 'The mere fact that you're on the screen. The mere fact that you're in "Bridgerton" as a Black, biracial, cis-gender, lesbian playing the first Black queen of England," Rosheuvel said, according to the LA Times. "The fact that you're there is immense."
The LA Times noted that Rosheuvel "has been in a decade-long relationship with playwright Shireen Mula."
Noting that ""Love is love," Rosheuvel added: "It doesn't matter whether it's between a man and a woman when you are an actor creating a character."
And Rosheuvel's reign isn't about to end. "Queen Charlotte – and Rosheuvel along with her – will be stepping out in a 'Bridgerton' limited-series spinoff that covers the period when she, Lady Violet Bridgerton and Lady Danbury were on the verge of social prominence," the LA Times pointed out.
