Victoria star Jenna Coleman said she 'loved' playing the pregnant young queen

Pregnant queen: The actress enjoyed wearing her fake bump
ITV
Chloe Chaplain28 August 2016

Actress Jenna Coleman "loved" playing a pregnant Queen Victoria in ITV’s lavish new drama about the young queen.

During filming for the feature-length first episode, airing tonight at 9pm, the actress revealed she thoroughly enjoyed the task of "basically just walking around with a cushion strapped to me".

Ms Coleman, 30, who has batted away rumours of her own royal romance with Prince Harry, plays the monarch from her coronation at 18 through to her marriage to Prince Albert, with whom the young queen had nine children.

The actress said of her fake bump: "I love it actually, I love it, because I get to play (Victoria) a little grouchier. She kind of doesn't enjoy pregnancy and I have a less tight corset, which is always nice."

Baby bump: Ms Coleman said she snjoyed playing a 'grouchier' version of the pregnant Queen 
ITV

Coleman's transformation also included wearing blue contact lens, which she said "weirded out" her mother when she saw them on set and left her perplexed friends saying: "I know something is different but I don't quite know what."

Despite some teething problems with lenses that were too thick for Coleman to wear, she said that during filming she grew to "hate being on set without them because it changes your face so much".

Coleman follows in a long line of actress to play the world-famous monarch, and Dame Judi Dench in particular provided inspiration for her.

Royal romance: The actress looked annoyed when she was asked about cosy photos of her and Prince Harry on Good Morning Britain 
ITV

She said: "Judi's Dench's Mrs Brown was great and The Young Victoria (starring Emily Blunt) as well. It's great to watch Victoria from where she begins at 18 to Judi Dench's Mrs Brown."

Costing a reported £1 million per episode, the opulent sets for the eight-part series - from Buckingham Palace to Westminster Abbey where she was crowned - were in fact recreated in an old RAF hangar on the outskirts of Leeds.

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