Neflix’s Top 10 Show “Bridgerton” Creates Discussion On Queen Charlotte’s Racial Identity
CHARLOTTE, N.C. — The author who inspired Netflix’s brand new eight-part series Bridgerton, Julia Quinn, says she is supportive of Netflix’s decision to cast Queen Charlotte as a black woman saying her racial identity has always been ambiguous.
In an interview with the Times, Quinn says “Many historians believe she had some African background. It’s a highly debated point and we can’t DNA test her so I don’t think there will ever be a definitive answer.”
Quinn also added that Bridgerton not only casted Golda Rosheuvel as Queen Charlotte, but several other black actors for a specific reason.
Quinn says “It was very much a conscious choice, not a blind choice.”
The series from Shondaland, Shonda Rhimes’ production company, was released on Christmas day, and depicts a show set in Regency-era London following the lives of eight siblings from the wealthy Bridgerton family.
Officials say the show provides a unique twist as an anonymous gossip writer Lady Whistledown shares all of the city’s biggest scandals in her publications.
Historians say the City of Charlotte gained its name from Queen Sophia Charlotte, who held power for nearly 60 years and was married to King George III until she died in 1818.
King George III was more popularly known as the “Mad King” as he was deemed mentally unfit to rule in the last decade of his reign, with some medical historians saying he suffered from a hereditary physical disorder called porphyria.
Historians say locals named the City of Charlotte after the Queen when the town was charted in 1768, when King George and Queen Charlotte ruled the colonies, in order to appease the King.
Mecklenburg County also received its name after Queen Charlotte’s German homeland Mecklenburg-Strelitz, according to historians.
Based on books written by Julia Quinn, the Bridgerton series takes a look into a world where elite families host formal events to introduce their daughters to society in hopes of finding a suitable marriage arrangement, and in the main character Daphne Bridgeton’s case, hopefully a marriage for love too.
