When India Amarteifio first saw Bridgerton, she was “completely overwhelmed by all these people who looked like me in period dress. I thought, ‘I want to be a part of this.’” Now, she will be: the 21-year-old actor from south-west London is poised to take the lead as the younger incarnation of Golda Rosheuvel’s character in Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story, the Regency romance’s hotly anticipated prequel centred on the teenage years of the titular monarch, believed to be Britain’s first mixed-race royal.

Penned by Shonda Rhimes herself, the Netflix extravaganza opens with Charlotte’s arrival in 18th-century London, aged just 17, from her native Germany. Against her will, she’s betrothed to the young King George III (Corey Mylchreest), a man she has never met, and – in the show’s reimagining of history – is eager to plot her escape. But then, despite herself, she slowly falls in love with her new husband and begins settling into her position of power. At first, she feels like a fish out of water in a largely white court, and faces immense pressure from her mother-in-law (Michelle Fairley) to provide heirs, but once she finds her voice, she manages to spark a remarkable societal shift that lays the foundations for the thrillingly diverse world of the original series.

I know you were a child actor. When did you make your screen debut?

I was in a Vodafone advert with my mum when I was eight months old. I only found out about it the other day – she told me they did an open call and she just rocked up with me [laughs]. Growing up, I loved theatre and dance, and when I was nine, I auditioned for The Lion King in the West End. I did that for about a year, then moved onto Matilda, then Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Around that time, I got a scholarship to Sylvia Young Theatre School. When I was 12, I was doing West End Live with them in Trafalgar Square – we were doing Little Shop of Horrors and I was dressed as a tree. I hadn’t warmed up properly and I jumped into the splits and felt my hamstring tear. I carried on in the moment, but then, as I got older, I realised it might never properly heal. I was always trying to push myself and kept pushing on the injury. We had a careers evening when I was 14, and I started thinking: “If I keep doing this, I’ll have a short career.” So, I started focusing on acting and ended up getting small roles in Doctor Who, The Tunnel and Sex Education.

When did you first hear about Queen Charlotte?

In November 2021, my agent called me to say I had an audition and it was something to do with Bridgerton, but not the third season. I did a tape and then had about five different auditions, and chemistry reads with Corey and Arsema [Thomas, who plays the young Lady Danbury]. I found out about four or five days later that I’d landed it and then we went straight into rehearsals. It was really bizarre and surreal – Bridgerton is its own universe, like Marvel. It felt so unreachable, and it didn’t feel real for the longest time. It was probably when I went in for my first costume fitting that I thought, okay, this is actually happening. My early chats with Shonda and Tom [Verica, the show’s director] helped, too. They were adamant that they didn’t want me to emulate anything that Golda had done – I could create my own Charlotte. As a teenager, she’s very inquisitive and headstrong. She knows herself but she’s also not afraid to falter. Her actual history gave me more than I needed in terms of background.

How helpful was it to know all of that history when Queen Charlotte, like Bridgerton, is primarily a fantasy?

It’s definitely not a historical retelling – it’s a reimagining of history, so that gave us a lot of freedom. But also, there are nods to the real history, too: we see Charlotte travelling from Germany, her relationship with her brother, her dogs, the snuff. I did as much research as I thought was sensible. I read Janice Hadlow’s book about Georgian history [The Strangest Family: The Private Lives of George III, Queen Charlotte and the Hanoverians], and I went to Kew Gardens, where they lived, and saw her cottage. We got to have a private tour and I even saw the armchair Charlotte died in. [The Queen was suffering from dropsy in 1818, which causes painful swelling and eventual organ failure, and was mostly confined to her bedroom during her final days.] Being there, I felt such a connection to her.

And how much pressure did you feel when you finally arrived on set?

I was constantly overwhelmed – going into Blenheim Palace felt like the biggest thing ever, but then the costumes were just gorgeous, and the jewellery, and all the sets were huge. I was like, “Oh my God!” and that was perfect because Charlotte’s entering this new world too. There’s a lot riding on it obviously, but when we were on set, there were also moments when you forgot how big it was and you felt like you were just making a film with your friends. I think if I’d constantly been thinking about people’s expectations of the show, it would’ve been too much.