Bridgerton review: Shonda Rhimes makes her Netflix debut with sumptuous period drama washingtonpost.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from washingtonpost.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Netflix’s ‘Bridgerton’ is the Modern World Dressed up in Regency-Era Clothes 5:15 pm ‘Bridgerton’ reimagines Britain’s Regency era where British high society can include black families and the norms and mores carry with it a contemporary charge and sensibility.
Based on Julia Quinn’s best selling novels, the Shonda Rhimes’ produced Netflix series, ‘
Bridgerton,’ created by Chris Van Dusen, immediately struck me in the same way as Ryan Murphy’s ‘Hollywood.’ The setting and the imagery is familiar but everything feels different. There is an obvious attempt to reinvision these stories to address prevalent themes that are relevant today.
By Stacy Lambe Netflix
Adapted from Julia Quinn’s best-selling romance novels by longtime Shonda Rhimes collaborator Chris Van Husen,
Bridgerton is an ensemble drama set in 1800s London where one’s place in society matters and scandal must be avoided at all costs. With so many characters to navigate in this sprawling drama, the cast helped ET break down the many family members, friends and royal figures.
More specifically, the Netflix original follows
Daphne Bridgerton (Phoebe Dynevor), the eldest daughter of the revered Bridgerton family, as she makes her debut into the Regency era’s competitive marriage market. While hoping to find a match that’s sparked by true love, Daphne must adhere to society’s strictly traditional rules when it comes to meeting potential suitors, who must meet the approval of her eldest brother
REVIEW: Shondaland has never been my dramatic home of choice. Perhaps burned by the flights of fancy taken by
Grey’s Anatomy in its third season, I’ve steered clear of Shonda Rimes’ particular brand of soapy, glossy television. I appreciate that her shows have helped give the likes of Kerry Washington and Viola Davis the regular spotlight their talents deserve and kept Kiwi Martin Henderson gainfully employed, but I’ve always felt there are better examples of each genre Rimes and her team have tackled.
ER,
New Amsterdam have all delivered the medicine better,
9-1-1 has a better feel for firefighting (although is just as prone to going over the top as
Ang Leeâs
Emma Thompson) to the clunky critical take (
Patricia Rozemaâs
Mansfield Park).Â
Some are made-for-television misfires and some are shiny Oscar contenders, but these adaptations all have the same hallmarks: rich, eligible bachelors; blushing single ladies; stodgy parties called âballs,â where men and women face each other in lines and dance awkwardly, touching as little as possible; a meltdown, partway through, about family fortunes or social status (or, ideally, both). Austenâs prose is characterized by both her wit and her knowing restraint; she was responding to the romance literature of the time with sparkling social commentary, leaving the salacious details of pleasure gardens and sexual ruin to other writers.