‘Bridgerton’ Star Katie Leung on Playing Season 4 Villain Lady Araminta

SPOILER ALERT: This story contains spoilers for Season 4, Part 2 of “Bridgerton,” now streaming on Netflix.

The Ton is no stranger to scheming mothers with an agenda.

As Lady Araminta Gun in “Bridgerton” Season 4, Scottish actress Katie Leung has delivered one of the Shondaland universe’s most compelling antagonists to date — a twice-widowed mother who is revealed to have quietly pocketed her stepdaughter Sophie Baek’s (Yerin Ha) dowry to fund her own daughters’ debuts. The secret comes crashing down in the finale when Sophie finally confronts Araminta in front of the whole family. A reckoning long overdue, it leaves Araminta’s relationship with Sophie further fractured and her standing with the Bridgertons in ruins — and as Benedict (Luke Thompson) and Sophie ride off into their happily ever after, there is no redemption arc waiting for Lady Araminta Gun.

The role marks a triumphant pivot for Leung, known for her role as Cho Chang in the “Harry Potter” franchise and, more recently, as the voice of Caitlyn in Netflix’s animated series “Arcane.” In the Cinderella-inflected fourth season of “Bridgerton,” based on Julia Quinn’s novel “An Offer From a Gentleman,” Leung commands every scene she’s in, communicating volumes with a single (terrifying) look. The internet has taken notice: Audiences love to hate her. But Leung thinks they’re hating the wrong person.

“Nobody blames her husband,” she says of the late Lord Penwood, whose secret illegitimate daughter set the whole conflict in motion. “Everyone else is just like, ‘Araminta is terrible.’ And I’m like — that’s really unfair.”

It’s a question worth sitting with: If a man’s hidden betrayal created the crisis, why does the woman left to manage the fallout become the villain of the story?

Leung spoke with Variety about embodying a woman the world is quick to villainize, why new motherhood made her a better actor and the very specific power of surrounding yourself with people who look like you.

This is “Bridgerton”‘s first real season-long antagonist. Was there any pressure stepping into that?

If anything, there was less pressure. She was always going to be unlikable from the very beginning, so I wasn’t worried about whether audiences would resonate with her. I’ve spent a huge part of my life and career trying to please other people, and I think that had a lot to do with me as Katie — whereas with Araminta, and where I am in my life right now, that just wasn’t something I cared too much about. My main goal was to make sure she was still human in spite of playing the wicked stepmother. There’s a lot of trauma and darkness in her story that we get to explore. That actually made it quite easy to step into.

You’ve talked about Araminta being “formidable” — and you’ve described yourself as the opposite. How did you bridge that gap?

I was maybe slightly worried about maintaining the status she carries, because people are genuinely afraid of her. I would say I’m the opposite — nobody is afraid of me. So I was like, I don’t know how I’m going to do this. But whatever I was doing, I think it worked. A lot of people have mentioned the eyes. I guess there’s a lot you can say with your eyes that you can’t put on paper. And that probably comes from seeing women in my life who have been so repressed that the eyes become their only real means of communication.

The costume and hair clearly helped too.

Enormously. Once I was in all of it — the wig, the gowns, everything — I just felt like I inhabited Araminta and her dominance. I didn’t have to do much else. She’s a classy lady, and I certainly feel that when I’ve got the clothes on.

You came onto set alongside Isabella Wei, Michelle Mao and Yerin Ha, who play your daughters. How did those relationships develop?

We had too much fun. Isabella and I kept talking about the fact that we were expecting to feel anxious — waiting for that moment where insecurity would crop up — and it just never came. I think part of it was that I’m a new mom. When I started on this job, I had a one-year-old, and that takes up so much of your energy that I genuinely didn’t have the capacity for overthinking. I had just enough to do my work to the best of my ability, and beyond that, the usual nerves just weren’t an option. It really served me.

But I also think a big part of it was feeling safe. Being surrounded by people who looked like me — for Asian women, not just one, but multiple in the same scene, in the same show — that’s unheard of. You’re not conscious of it until you look back in retrospect and ask yourself, why was that so different? And that’s why.

Let’s talk about Araminta’s arc with Sophie. She keeps Sophie’s dowry secret, uses it for her own daughters — and genuinely seems to believe she’s justified. How did you interpret that?

It’s quite complex. I think she felt she deserved Sophie’s portion because she was raising a child that wasn’t her own. And when she originally offered to take Sophie in — at the funeral, putting her under her roof — I don’t think Araminta believed she was being manipulative. She was sincere about it. In her mind, she was doing Sophie a favor.

And then when the truth comes out, I think the real crack is her daughters’ reactions. Up until that point, Rosamond and Posy were always at her beck and call. Seeing them — especially Posy — disagree with her, respond to the situation with their own moral compass, that’s what exposes her. She felt exposed.

Does she feel shame? Does she think she was wrong?

There’s definitely a transition, even if nothing is concrete. The way I played that final scene is that there’s something like hope, or the beginning of remorse — amplified by Sophie, who comes to her not with anger but with genuine calm and kindness. She tells Araminta: They love you, my father loved you. Araminta expected Sophie to match her energy, to blow up. And she doesn’t. Sophie kills her with kindness, essentially. And Araminta is taken aback.

Where do you see her going after that — with Sophie, with her daughters, with the Bridgertons?

There would be too much shame to stay in close proximity to any of them. She does the walk of shame on her way out. I can’t imagine she’d want to face them again. But I do think the relationship that would most need mending — and that she would eventually come around to — is the one with Posy.

You’ve said you don’t think of Araminta as a villain. Is that still your position?

As Katie, her behavior was despicable. There’s no excusing it. But as the actress playing her, I had to find empathy, and that was genuinely easy to find. When you think about that era — what it was like to be a woman, a single mother with two teenage daughters, and no male financial support — she was left to fend for herself. And nobody blames her husband. Nobody calls him out for what he did to her. Everyone else is just like, “Araminta is terrible.” And I’m like — that’s really unfair. Beyond Sophie being a symbol of his betrayal, if the truth had gotten out, their entire reputation in the Ton would have collapsed. Her daughters would have had no prospects. She had spent years rebuilding. The stakes were everything.

You’ve now done “Harry Potter,” “Arcane” and “Bridgerton” — three massive universes. How has your relationship with that scale of work changed?

The more confident I’ve become about who I am as a person, the more I’m able to enjoy the work. That’s come with age and experience. My first job — “Harry Potter” — I had never acted before in my life, and suddenly I was in front of 20 cameras and 100 people, completely lost, still figuring out who I was. I can’t say I had the time of my life. But with “Arcane,” with “Bridgerton” — I felt like I deserved to be there. I never questioned it. And once you stop questioning it, you can actually focus on bringing your best work.

Will we see Araminta in Season 5?

Never say never. As of now, I haven’t heard anything. But as long as she makes you feel something — love her, hate her, whatever — then I’ve done my job. And honestly, I love that people love to hate her. That makes me very happy.

This interview has been edited and condensed.