Bridgerton star Phoebe: Why I had to fast-forward naughty bits
IT’S the scene that millions of besotted Bridgerton fans didn’t want to see – especially on Valentine’s Day.
The Mail on Sunday can reveal that Regé-Jean Page, who plays the handsome Duke of Hastings in the hit Netflix drama, has a real-life girlfriend.
Until now, the 31-year-old actor’s steamy sex scenes with co-star Phoebe Dynevor, who portrays Daphne Bridgerton, have been given an extra frisson for smitten audiences by the actor’s apparently single status.
But he was last week spotted embracing writer and part-time footballer Emily Brown in a street close to the £800,000 home they share in North London.
Dressed in a black coat and green scarf to keep out the cold, he tenderly held his 30-year-old lover’s face before wrapping an arm around her.
Ms Brown, who was insulated in a blue quilted coat and white chunk- soled boots by US designer Steve Madden, plays for South-West London’s FBB Warriors and supports non-league side Dulwich Hamlet, whose woolly hat she wore for her stroll with her boyfriend.
Shortly after their embrace, Mr Page clambered into a chauffeur-driven car. He is understood to have flown to New York for another filming assignment.
Born in London but brought up in Zimbabwe, Mr Page made his first TV appearance in 2004, but has only in recent years
‘Emily is witty and great fun to be around’
hit the big time – first in the US miniseries Roots, then in the American legal drama For The People.
However, his portrayal of Simon Basset in Bridgerton has attracted not only a series of TV awards nominations but legions of swooning fans – and a second series is in the pipeline.
The actor and Ms Brown, who works as a freelance copywriter with commissions from firms including Nike, Converse and Uber, bought their home together in February last year, a few months after filming for Bridgerton had finished.
While the Duke leaves little to the imagination during his TV bedroom scenes, Mr Page’s life has been rather more shrouded in mystery. Indeed, his colourful teenage years as the purple-haired lead singer of a band called The Super Nashwan Kids, who performed in London pubs, only recently emerged.
Ms Brown certainly appears to share his sense of mischief. Asked during an inter
view with the student newspaper The Tab if she had ever misbehaved while studying at Manchester University between 2009 and 2012, she replied: ‘I managed to sneak a giant vase, about 75cm [30in] tall, from a club without anyone noticing, even though there were flowers poking out of it. I also decided I wanted curtains for my room so I stole a blind. And a guy from the band Faithless gave me a load of weed once when I was in Ibiza…’
Before her relationship with Mr Page, Ms Brown dated Jack Badu, a football coach who would accompany her to Dulwich Hamlet games. Colleagues on the networking site LinkedIn describe her as ‘witty’ and ‘great fun to be around’. Another rather enviously wrote of her: ‘Even after a massive party, she seems to skip about the world like a bunny who’s never even heard the word hangover.’
Today, the ranks of those envious of Ms Brown are certain to grow all over the UK.