If the Covid era has robbed us of many pleasures, it has at least provided some opportunity for wildly escapist television drama.

Enter “Bridgerton,” a sly and sexy Netflix series set in Georgian England in 1813 https://bloom.bg/3nU1E54 

Launched as it was becoming clear that this is going to be a very long winter, Bridgerton is a mix of:

Historical romp
Tart commentary on the 18th-century marriage market
And an experiment in “color-blind” TV casting http://bloom.bg/3nU1E54 

The series is an American-British co-production, the first of a $150 million deal cut by Netflix with U.S. showrunner Shonda Rhimes and her Shondaland production company, whose back catalogue includes:

“Grey’s Anatomy”
“Private Practice”
“Scandal” http://bloom.bg/3nU1E54 

The plot is based on a series of romantic novels by Julia Quinn, following Daphne Bridgerton (Phoebe Dynevor) as she negotiates the “marriage mart.”

Not only would the sex make Ms. Austen blush, but here the women take charge and manipulate the men http://bloom.bg/3nU1E54 

It’s a clever repurposing of the “Brideshead Revisited” formula, Evelyn Waugh’s classic novel about privileged Oxford University and stately home living, which is reliably screened or remade as every new recession bites http://bloom.bg/3nU1E54 

It was published in 1945 amidst British post-war austerity. As Waugh said:

“It was a bleak period of present privation and threatening disaster... in consequence, the book is infused with a kind of gluttony ... for the splendours of the recent past” http://bloom.bg/3nU1E54 

Adaptations of Brideshead have been released at many dark periods:

1981 TV series, shown when U.K. unemployment hit three million
2008 film produced after the Great Recession

By no Covid coincidence, the BBC and HBO are shooting another TV version http://bloom.bg/3nU1E54 

We’re once again drawn to bling and richness:

There are almost 7,500 brightly colored costumes in the 1st season of Bridgerton
In one room of a magnificent stately home, the glass window fittings alone cost $54,436 http://bloom.bg/3nU1E54 

Netflix knows that olde world Britain is big box-office escapism in the U.S.:

Netflix’s U.S. viewers spent more than 16 billion minutes watching “The Crown” last year
Within a month of its debut, 63 million households have watched Bridgerton http://bloom.bg/3nU1E54 

What makes Bridgerton stand out even more is its diverse casting, which challenges audience expectations of this hitherto highly conservative genre.

“Downton Abbey” and “Brideshead,” in comparison, were racially homogenous http://bloom.bg/3nU1E54 

The handsome, troubled duke is played by Rege-Jean Page. Queen Charlotte of Mecklenburg Strelitz (Golda Rosheuvel) is Black, as is the duke’s relative, Lady Danbury, played by Adjoa Andoh.

These characters make direct reference to their race http://bloom.bg/3nU1E54 

Nicola Coughlan, the actor who plays knowing ingenue Penelope Featherington, puts things in perspective:

“On Game of Thrones, you can suspend your belief for dragons, for Bridgerton, you can suspend your belief that we have a Black queen and a Black duke” http://bloom.bg/3nU1E54 

Bridgerton heralds a sea change in our sensibilities.

Yes, in times of crisis, we continue to look to romance and riches for distraction. But Rhimes has proved that as long as audiences are entertained, they'll welcome innovation too http://bloom.bg/3nU1E54