Has Bridgerton found the next Bond?

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a British actor in possession of a hit series and a face that hasn’t been thrashed by the ugly stick will, at some point, be mooted as the next Bond.

So it’s surprising that it took Ladbrokes almost a fortnight after the period drama Bridgerton dropped on Netflix on Christmas Day to slash the odds on its star, Regé-Jean Page, becoming 007.

For anyone still uninitiated, Bridgerton is the love child of Jane Austen and Jilly Cooper. It’s a Regency romp for those who feel that Georgette Heyer would be improved by more action on the library ladder.

Celebrated for its colour-blind casting and near parity of male and female nudity, the series is essentially a sexed-up pastiche of the period dramas we all know and love. With the aesthetic of Sophia Coppola’s Marie-Antoinette, it is the visual equivalent of gorging on a box of Ladurée macaroons. In short, it was just the diversion the nation needed during a January lockdown.