The Climb of Freddie Dennis
The other love story in the court of King George and Queen Charlotte is the quiet, queer tale of Reynolds and Brimsley.
Freddie Dennis, who stars as Reynolds, King George's secretary in “Queen Charlotte,” spends a good amount of time at his local climbing center, Stronghold, in London Fields.
The London-born actor moved away from the city at the age of 8 and returned as a teenager, where he stayed and enrolled at University College London to study geography.
“What made me do geography? A passion for the world,” Dennis says jokingly on Zoom sitting in his home office surrounded by books and plants that he admits to not being able to keep alive despite trying his hardest.
“I've always been really passionate about cartography, different places and cultures, it just made the most sense to study it,” he adds.
Dennis had always wanted to be an actor, but a lack of confidence stood in his way. The 26-year-old enrolled in the one-year course at the Oxford School of Drama when he was 23, during the pandemic. The drama school's alumni include Claire Foy, Nicola Coughlan and Freddy Carter.
“I never thought I'd get in because I've never acted. One of the final rounds to get onto the course, we had to send in a tape, the choices were between being a small bird or a squirrel. I did the squirrel and I sometimes watch that video and think, ‘What on earth am I doing with my life?'” he recalls in his articulate, calm voice.
In the tape, Dennis pretends to discover a walnut, he goes over to it and touches it a bit before freaking out when he sees a person. He eventually returns to the walnut, cracks it, runs off and climbs up a chair as if it were a tree.
“Because it was based very rural in Woodstock, Oxfordshire, they managed to keep everything in person, but it was slightly difficult with the social distancing element of it. Instead of kissing or touching, you caress the air and then press it,” he says of his acting lessons during COVID-19.
Dennis graduated in October 2021 and booked his role on the new Netflix series, a “Bridgerton” prequel, only four months later.
“The first few were absolutely s–t. If I were to look back on them, I would just go, ‘There's a man staring into space and doing nothing. There's nothing going on,' but you do slowly work it out and it's a confidence game of working out how and where to make bold, interesting choices,” he says of his auditioning process now.
Dennis taped his audition for the character of Reynolds in “Queen Charlotte” while on a family holiday celebrating his father's birthday in Prague, Czech Republic. He was told the role had one line, but it could develop into more. His sister helped him film his tape.
“Ten days later I woke up with COVID[-19], feeling incredibly ill and that's when I got a call saying I've got the job,” he says.
Reynolds, the king's secretary, is stern and upright, literally and figuratively. When he's not tending to the needs of the king, he stands like a decorative lamppost in his Georgian fashion. But it's when he's behind closed doors with Brimsley, Queen Charlotte's secretary played by Sam Clemmett, that the armor peels off during their poignant love affair.
“That was one of the things I found hardest actually because I'm quite empathetic and compassionate, but
there's only so much of that Reynolds is allowed to show. There was a lot of working out just when and where to be human,” says Dennis, whose natural instinct during difficult scenes was to mother the characters.
He's recently found himself “crying quite a lot” when watching the final season of HBO's “Succession.”
“It's witty, sharp and heart-wrenching as well. This season there's been an added element of more humanity than in the other seasons,” he says.
Dennis grew up watching sitcoms such as the “Peep Show” and “The Simpsons,” which has added to his curiosity and desire to try and play all types of characters.
He confesses to finding it difficult to watch himself on screen in the beginning and it knocked his confidence down. But with all the press junkets he's had to participate in for the series, he's forced himself to watch and says he's proud of the work he's done.
“When you watch yourself because you know yourself so well, it's very difficult to divorce Freddie from the character of Reynolds. I will always see myself and see what I'm doing and remember what had happened on either side of the action and cut. It's really difficult not to be quite vain, which I don't like. It should be about character and performance, but why does my forehead look so massive?' he says.
In the current “Bridgerton” series, there is no whereabouts of Reynolds' character, which has resulted in Dennis' Instagram inbox being filled with messages asking how his character died. He's also received heartbreaking messages from people about the queer storyline.
“I really hope he isn't dead and that there's more legs to the story.”