Bridgerton actress Nicola Coughlan shares candid post asking people to stop commenting on her body
"I am just one real-life human being and it’s really hard"
"I am just one real-life human being and it’s really hard"
Excited about Bridgerton season two? Us too.
In celebrity news this week, actress Nicola Coughlan - who plays Penelope Featherington in the hit Netflix show - has shared an emotive post on social media compelling fans to think before they comment on her body.
Writing to her 1.2 million followers, she shared that as a "real-life human being", she finds it hard to read as many messages as she gets commenting on how she looks all the time.
"So just a thing – if you have an opinion about my body please, please don’t share it with me," she said. "Most people are being nice and not trying to be offensive but I am just one real life human being and it’s really hard to take the weight of thousands of opinions on how you look being sent directly to you every day."
Finishing the post on a positive, she concluded: "Anyways here's a pic of me in my hotel in NY about to go to SNL, it’s unrelated to this post but delighted with my hair in it."
The 35-year-old is also known for her role as Clare Devlin in Derry Girls.
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This comes after years of the actress asking fans to have more compassion for those working in the public eye and to stop being "reductive" about how women look.
"Every time I’m asked about my body in an interview it makes me deeply uncomfortable and so sad I’m not just allowed to just talk about the job I do that I so love," she went on. "It’s so reductive to women when we’re making great strides for diversity in the arts, but questions like that just pull us backward."
"I mean this in the nicest way possible, I’m not a body positivity activist, I’m an actor. I would lose or gain weight if [it was] an important role requirement. My body is the tool I use to tell stories, not what I define myself by."
Concluding her message, Nicola said it would be "nice" if "we didn’t have to keep having this conversation," adding that she would "really love to never be asked about it [her body] in an interview again."
Hear, hear. 👏
Ally Head is Marie Claire UK's Senior Health and Sustainability Editor, nine-time marathoner, and Boston Qualifying runner. Day-to-day, she heads up all strategy for her pillars, working across commissioning, features, and e-commerce, reporting on the latest health updates, writing the must-read wellness content, and rounding up the genuinely sustainable and squat-proof gym leggings worth *adding to basket*. She's won a BSME for her sustainability work, regularly hosts panels and presents for events like the Sustainability Awards, and is a stickler for a strong stat, too, seeing over nine million total impressions on the January 2023 Wellness Issue she oversaw. Follow Ally on Instagram for more or get in touch.
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