Sex Education's Simone Ashley Lands Female Lead For Bridgerton Season 2

TVLine has confirmed that Simone Ashley, who on Netflix’s Sex Education played “Untouchables” member Olivia, will fill the role of Kate Sharma (Sheffield, in the novels), a love interest for Jonathan Bailey’s highly eligible Anthony Bridgerton for the Season 2 of Netflix’s Bridgerton. Kate is described as a smart, headstrong London newcomer “who suffers no fools — Anthony very much included.”

The second season will chronicle the pursuit of a suitable marriage for the eldest Bridgerton sibling, Anthony (Bailey), as chronicled in the second book of Quinn’s Bridgerton series, The Viscount Who Loved Me.

“We’re really going to be [focusing on] the eldest Bridgerton brother next season, Lord Anthony Bridgerton,” showrunner Chris Van Dusen revealed last month on the Today show. “We left him at the end of the first season at a bit of a crossroads, so I’m looking forward to jumping in and discovering how he fares on the marriage market.”

Kate is among “a bunch of new characters” Van Dusen said to expect during the hit series’ sophomore run, which is based on author Julia Quinn’s second Bridgerton novel, The Viscount Who Loved Me.

In Season 2, Bridgerton continues to break conventions on race. Anthony’s love interest (named Kate Sheffield in Quinn’s novel) and her family were conceived by the series’ creative team as being of Indian descent in a continuation of the reimagined, multi-racial world of 1880s London’s high society created in Season 1, which included several major Black characters, including the Duke of Hastings (Regé-Jean Page), Lady Danbury (Adjoa Andoh) and Queen Charlotte (Golda Rosheuvel).

Ashley’s previous TV credits also include the ITV miniseries The Sister and the UK version of Broadchurch.