Is Lady Danbury Leaving Bridgerton for Season 5?

2 min read

THE RUNDOWN

• Season 4 of Bridgerton concluded this week.

• The finale shows Lady Danbury heading off on a trip.

• The showrunner addressed her departure.

During the conclusion of Bridgerton’s season 4, there was a touching goodbye between two of the show’s leading ladies: Lady Danbury, played by Adjoa Andoh, and Queen Charlotte, played by Golda Rosheuvel. One of the season’s tensions was Lady Danbury’s hope to explore the world and Queen Charlotte’s insistence she stay by her side. In the end, she got to set off on her travels. But is she gone for good?

In an interview with The Wrap, showrunner Jess Brownell explained that Lady Danbury will absolutely return for season 5, saying she is a “big part of Season 5, when she does eventually come back.”

The decision to have her depart was “more about shaking up the dynamic” than writing her off the show, adding that “it felt on theme this season to examine relationships in which there’s a power imbalance.”

Sophie and Benedict, played by Yerin Ha and Luke Thompson, are the main love interests in season 4 and one of the conflicts that kept them apart was a difference in class. Another character, Alice Mondrich (Emma Naomi), has been part of a couple struggling with upward mobility in the Regency era. Alice ends up becoming the Queen’s lady-in-waiting, essentially filling in for Lady Danbury.

“Now that Danbury and the queen have been through their conflict this season, I think going forward, the queen is going to be able to see Danbury much more as a peer,” Brownell said. “It allows us to put Alice in sort of the service lady in waiting role in storylines, and allow Danbury to just be an actual friend to the Queen.”

This brings the Mondriches “one step closer to being a part of the main story.”

“If season 3 was about letting them join the nobility, season 4 was about letting Alice become a lady in waiting. In season 5 and beyond, it keeps Alice and Will really connected to whatever is going on, without us having to veer away from the leading couple,” Brownell said.

When Brownell was asked about a potential spinoff, she responded, “There are always conversations about spinoffs. I leave that to Shonda. I’m so focused on Bridgerton and hoping to see all eight siblings stories told that I try not to meddle in spinoffs, but I would definitely love to be a viewer of a Lady Danbury spinoff—or any of these characters really.”