Nadine Jane: She’s a Gemini rising. 

Nicola Coughlan: Oh no way! 

Jane: No, it’s a good thing. I know it gets a bad reputation.

Coughlan: No, but it makes total sense.

[laughs]

Jane: So there’s no wrong answer to this question. But how into astrology are you?

Coughlan: I don’t know. I mean, I’m a Capricorn. Which is a famously, like, an uncool sign, but then we have, like, David Bowie and Kate Moss. But you’re an Aquarius.

Luke Newton: Yes. And that’s all I know. 

[CLIP] Coughlan (as Penelope Featherington): Shall I pretend to flirt with the imaginary cellist? 

Newton (as Colin Bridgerton): No. Me.

Jane: In a few words, can you describe your characters? 

Coughlan: So, Pen is someone, I think, who’s very misunderstood. She’s very shy in some ways, but she’s really ballsy in others. 

Jane: Penelope has a very formidable birth chart. She’s a Gemini rising, and so it’s …

Coughlan: Oh no way! 

Jane: No, it’s a good thing. I know it gets a bad reputation.

Coughlan: No, but it makes total sense.

Jane: Yes. The duality of her character definitely shows up in that younger in life, she’s gonna struggle with identity, figuring out who she is, but eventually she can’t help but break out of her shell.

Coughlan: That’s amazing.

Newton: That’s so cool. 

Jane: And then so Colin, he’s a Sagittarius rising, which is the opposite. He’s surprisingly sensitive, and so he may come across as this worldly person who’s very brave, maybe the life of the party in moments, but at the end of the day, his chart’s actually very vulnerable, very sensitive, and very deep if you get to know him. 

Newton: Yeah. Really sort of made a lot of sense, doesn’t it? 

Coughlan: It makes … Yeah. I don’t know how much we can say, but that makes a lot of sense.

Newton: What Colin and Pen have in common is their kindness and their compassion for other people, but also their sense of humor as well. They both don’t take things too seriously. 

[CLIP] Newton (as Colin Bridgerton): I’m not the man I was last season. I seek you out at every social assembly because I know you will lift my spirits and make me see the world in ways I could not have imagined. 

Jane: Venus is a planet of love. It basically explains what’s a person like romantically. This particular part of the birth chart’s enormously compatible with each other.

Newton: Really?

Jane: So we’ll start with Penelope. I don’t think this is gonna surprise you, but she’s a Venus in Taurus, which is steadfast, constant. It’s said that when a Venus in Taurus falls in love, they fall in love for forever.

Coughlan: Oh!

Jane: And so there’s a steadiness, a constant, and maybe even, arguably, a stubbornness to it of, like, “I’ve decided I love this person.” 

Coughlan: As a kid, she was like, “That guy.”

Newton: Yeah.

Coughlan: OK. Wow. 

Jane: And then, by contrast, Colin has a Venus in Pisces, which actually is the most romantic Venus sign you can have. It’s extremely romantic. The only downside of it is there can be, like, a lack of certainty by contrast to the very strength of Venus in Taurus. So her Venus allows Colin to feel safe enough to explore his romantic side.

Newton: It really feels like she changes that for him. It’s always talked about being friends to lovers, so you feel like maybe you would lose elements of the romance there. But if anything, it just accelerates it.

Coughlan: Yeah, it does, because it means so much.

[CLIP] Coughlan (as Penelope Featherington): Your eyes ... are the most remarkable shade of blue. And yet somehow they shine even brighter when you are kind. 

Jane: One of the things I noticed about the charts is, like, in the long run, the romantic passion side of their romance will sustain. So there’s this planet called Mars, and it has to do with what’s our attraction to each other. It’s sort of like the animal instinct of the birth chart. And so they have what’s called a square, which is essentially like, “Fight hard, make up well.”

Newton: Yeah.

Coughlan: It’s like they can logically deny, but, like, they physically can’t deny one another. 

Jane: The moon signs are very compatible, and actually, on a deep level, the two characters are very similar. And so, beginning with Penelope. So she’s a new moon in Aries. She’s gonna make waves in this lifetime. She’s gonna be seen to be visible. No longer will Whistledown be an alter ego. It’ll be integrated, very likely, into who she is as a person. 

[CLIP] Coughlan (as Penelope Featherington): Forgive me. I shouldn’t have said that. 

Sam Phillips (as Lord Debling): Do not apologize. I find your frankness immensely refreshing. 

Jane: And then for Colin, in the long run, he will very likely want to settle down into a peaceful life. So his moon in Aquarius, to some extent, always felt different growing up. Like, I’m kind of a Bridgerton. I’m kind of not a Bridgerton. In the long run, he’ll really love to create his own home, his own family, so that he can begin feeling, you know, a part of things. So what they share in common is, in some ways, astrologically, they both, on the deepest level, feel like outsiders. But that’s the very thing that likely won’t keep them compatible in the long run. 

[CLIP] Newton (as Colin Bridgerton): That was bloody brilliant. 

Jane: In the future, what they’ll have to work on is, like for Colin, “Do I admire this thing about Penelope?” “She’s growing, she’s a part of this huge scene, or do I envy it?” “Or do I want to be like that myself?” And then for Penelope, “Do I want to settle and feel kind of tethered in the way that Colin’s going to allow me to do?” “Can I have love be as important as ambition?”

[CLIP] Newton (as Colin Bridgerton): You’re coming with me.

Coughlan (as Penelope Featherington): What? Your family will see me. 

Newton (as Colin Bridgerton): For God’s sake, Penelope Featherington, are you going to marry me or not? 

Newton: There’s actually so many elements of that in the show. As in, we’re talking future, but very near future. 

Coughlan: I don’t know how much you can say, but that’s an awful lot of sense. 

Newton: But I really have that sense. I’ve always had that sense that he wanted to settle down. You know, when we get towards the end of the show, I’m sure we’ll explore that and see what we can do.

Coughlan: I think they have so much fun together. I think that they just really love each other’s company. Like we always say, if we look at the Duke and Daphne and Kate and Anthony, we’re like ... I feel like Colin and Pen, we’ll just have the happiest time. 

Newton: Yeah.

Coughlan: They’re best friends. Yeah.

Jane: Absolutely. Thank you guys so much for being here. This was so fun for me.

Newton: It was a pleasure.

Coughlan: It was so fun. You nailed it.

Jane: Thank you. Awesome.

Newton: Thank you. I was surprised at how it aligns. I kind of wish that we’d spoken about this before.

Nicola Coughlan: I know, I know. Yeah!

[laughs]