★Meet the New Stars of Bridgerton Season 2★

Meet the New Stars of Bridgerton Season 2
Bridgerton has officially added four new cast members ahead of season two, including two book characters and two newcomers.
Watch: "Bridgerton" Star Jonathan Bailey Teases Season 2 Hopes

The cast of season two of Bridgerton is shaping up nicely, duke or no duke. 

The Netflix series just confirmed four new cast members for season two, including two characters from the books and two intriguing newbies who will likely shake some things up in the wake of the Duke of Hastings (Regé-Jean Page) making his exit. Daphne's (Phoebe Dynevor) marriage will remain intact even without her husband on screen, but for season two, the spotlight moves to the oldest of the Bridgerton siblings. 

Anthony (Jonathan Bailey) is now on the hunt for a wife and has set his sights on one lady in particular: Edwina Sharma. Edwina is close with her sister Kate (Simone Ashley) and her mother Mary (Shelley Conn). 

Edwina will be played by Charithra Chandran, a relative newcomer whose only other credit is one episode of the show Alex Rider. 

Edwina, according to the character descriptions offered by Shondaland on Twitter, "has been taught by her older sister Kate to be the perfect debutante. She's kind-natured and endlessly endearing. But while she may be young and naive, she also knows what she wants: a true love match." 

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Spring 2021 TV Premiere Dates
Lady Mary Sharma is the daughter of an Earl whose marriage to a tradesman once embroiled her family in scandal. Now, Lady Mary has returned to London with her daughters "and is forced to endure the scrutiny of the ton yet again." 

Ashley was cast as older daughter Kate back in February, and she completes the Sharma family and what promises to be an exciting sort of love triangle. Kate is "equal parts headstrong and whip-smart. Her sharp wit and independent nature make her a singular force on the 1814 marriage mart, where she hopes to secure a love match for her younger sister, Edwina." 

Bridgerton Cast, Charithra Chandran, Shelley Conn, Rupert Young, Calam Lynch
Instagram, Getty Images, Shutterstock
Rupert Young and Calam Lynch have also joined the cast as two characters who are not in the books. Young plays Jack, "the newest member of the ton with a connection to one of its most notable families." Lynch stars as Theo Sharpe, "a hardworking printer's assistant" and "an intellectual who fights for the rights of all." 

They join returning season one stars including Bailey, Nicola Coughlan, Adjoa Andoh, Ruby Barker, Ruth Gemmell, Claudia Jessie, Luke Newton and Luke Thompson.

Get the scoop on everything we know about season two below!

Jonathan Bailey, Bridgerton
NICK BRIGGS/NETFLIX
The New Lead
Anthony Bridgerton (Jonathan Bailey) takes center stage in season two as he attempts to settle down and finally takes his place at the head of the family. That involves getting married, and if the show is following the plot of the book The Viscount Who Loved Me, he finds the perfect wife but becomes distracted by her meddlesome older sister, Kate. 

And yes, he will play Pall Mall. Pall Mall is basically croquet, and the book features a beloved scene in which Anthony and Kate play. It's the only specific scene author Julia Quinn requested the show include. 

Bridgerton, Jonathan Bailey
Netflix
The New Lord Bridgerton
It's quite the shock that Lord Anthony Bridgerton is even considering marriage or owning up to his responsibilities. In fact, Bailey said he sees him as an example of why the oldest male shouldn't just automatically get all the power. 

"We've come quite far with the idea of equality between sexes, but there's still a lot of conversations that need to be had about men in power," he explained. "Hopefully, Anthony is someone who's gonna make people realize that some men just don't have what it takes." 

However, Bailey thinks he means well. 

"With Anthony there's just so much conflict with everything he's doing," he says. "He means so well and he's got such a good heart and he loves his family and once I fell in love with him and realized that he meant well, that means that you can really push the boundaries as to how unfair and toxic he can be to his lovers and to his sisters and to his mother."

Regé-Jean Page, Phoebe Dynevor, Bridgerton
LIAM DANIEL/NETFLIX
No More Simon, But a New Romance to Swoon Over
Season one's Simon (Rege-Jean Page) and Daphne (Phoebe Dynevor) will be taking a backseat in season two after their happy ending at the end of season one. In fact, Page won't even be appearing in the second season, while Daphne will still be around just to support her siblings. It also sounds like we might not miss the Duke and Duchess of Hastings quite as much as we fear we might.

Quinn doesn't know exactly what's happening in season two, but she could at least promise a heck of a romance. 

"All I know is that, you know, having written the source material, I think we're all going to be happy because they really set it up beautifully for all of us to really want Anthony to both win in life and get his comeuppance," she tells E! News. "At the same time, and I think it's gonna happen. His love interest just really is his match and it's going to be great." 

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Simone Ashley, Sex Education
Netflix
Meet Kate Sharma
Sex Education star Simone Ashley has been cast as Kate Sharma, the leading lady opposite Anthony. According to Netflix, Kate is a "smart, headstrong young woman who suffers no fools—Anthony Bridgerton very much included." The book describes her as "the most meddlesome woman to ever grace a London ballroom." 

In April, Shondaland offered a new character description for the incomparable Kate: "Kate is equal parts headstrong and whip-smart. Her sharp wit and independent nature make her a singular force on the 1814 marriage mart, where she hopes to secure a love match for her younger sister, Edwina." 

Charithra Chandran
Instagram
Meet Edwina Sharma
Edwina is Kate's younger sister, and she's who Anthony originally sets his sights on. She "has been taught by her older sister Kate to be the perfect debutante. She's kind-natured and endlessly endearing. But while she may be young and naive, she also knows what she wants: a true love match." She will be played by Charithra Chandran. 

Shelly Conn
Dave J Hogan/Dave J Hogan/Getty Images
Meet Lady Mary Sharma
Lady Mary is Kate and Edwina's mother. She is an Earl's daughter whose marriage to a tradesman once embroiled her family in scandal. Now, Lady Mary has returned to London with her daughters "and is forced to endure the scrutiny of the ton yet again." She is played by Shelley Conn.

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Calam Lynch
Instagram
Who Is Theo Sharpe?
Calam Lynch has joined the show as Theo Sharpe, a character who is not known from the books. He is "a hardworking printer's assistant" and "an intellectual who fights for the rights of all." 

Rupert Young
Dan Wooller/Shutterstock
Who Is Jack?
Rupert Young will play Jack, a man who has no last name just yet. That might because this newcomer to the ton has "a connection to one of its most notable families." 

Bridgerton
Netflix
The Future of Lady Whistledown
Lady Whistledown's identity is not revealed quite so early in the books, but on the show, we now know we have Penelope Featherington (Nicola Coughlan) to thank for all the best gossip in London. We do not, however, know what this means for Penelope's future. 

All we have is a promise from Coughlan and Claudia Jessie, who plays Pen's BFF Eloise, that Eloise is going to be "pissed." 

"She loves her best mate so much, and also she's properly in awe of Lady Whistledown," Jessie said. "She's like in love with Lady Whistledown. She wants to find her. I feel like the reason her quest seems so strong is because she's always looking for a way out and Lady Whistledown is an example of that autonomy, earning her own money, being a badass, outing people. That's Eloise's cup of tea. And then she's gonna find out it's her best mate... carnage."

Coughlan revealed on Twitter that she had a costume fitting on Feb. 12, but gave no details beyond that. 

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Bridgerton, Nicole Coughlan
Netflix
An Intricate Weaving
While Quinn's books are "tightly focused," she says, on her protagonists, the show has already given us hints of things to come way down the line—like, for instance, the slow burn of Penelope and Colin (Luke Newton), whose story gets told in book four. Quinn says she never would have thought of it. 

"From a writer's point of view, it was fascinating and brilliant because, as I'm reading [the scripts], it was incredibly flattering because it was so clear to me that the writers had all read all the books and they were thinking so holistically about the whole thing," she says. "They were bringing in things and hinting at things and potentially setting things up in a way that was so incredibly respectful of and honored the source material, but at the same time, you know, the changes that they made... it was so clear to me that that was the best thing to do for a television series." 

There's one book for each Bridgerton sibling, and while eight seasons of Bridgerton might be a stretch, that doesn't mean we have to miss out on any of the romance. 

Bridgerton Cast, Luke Newton as Colin Bridgerton
Can Nguyen/Shutterstock, Netflix
It Hasn't Started Filming Just Yet
After actor Luke Newton appeared to tease the cast's return to set in