Sanditon Season 3 Episode 3 crescendos with a kiss on a cliff. It’s a tableau that Masterpiece on PBS fans have seen before, but this time, the kiss was beautiful, romantic torture. Alexander Colbourne (Ben Lloyd-Hughes) pleads his enduring love for the beguiling Charlotte Heywood (Rose Williams) and kisses her, but she immediately, tearfully regrets it since she’s promised to marry a farmer named Ralph (Cai Bridgen). What does this mid-season moment bode for the rest of Sanditon‘s final run? And, more importantly, is it just us or was Sanditon star Ben Lloyd-Hughes emulating Matthew Macfadyen’s iconic Mr. Darcy moment in 2005’s Pride & Prejudice?

“It’s definitely a nod to Matthew Macfadyen in Pride and Prejudice and was such a cool moment,” Sanditon star Ben Lloyd-Hughes confessed to Decider.

In fact, Sanditon Season 3 showrunner Justin Young revealed that the Darcy homage was 100% Lloyd-Hughes’s idea. The script originally imagined Colbourne riding up to Charlotte on horseback, but Ben Lloyd-Hughes had another idea. One that he relayed via WhatsApp message.

“Ben’s [WhatsApp] messages were always the same. They always say: ‘Do I need to say these lines or can I do it in a look?’ And nine times out of ten, he was able to do it in a look,” Young said. “That scene, it was him who said, ‘You know what?’ — and it might just have been because he was fed up with working with the horse — but he said, ‘I wondered if it would be more effective if Colbourne just strides across the hill like the moment at the end of Pride and Prejudice.’ And I said, “You know what? I think that’s a great idea.’”

“Well, I’m glad Justin gave me the credit for that,” Lloyd-Hughes said, joking: “I wondered whether he would, later down the line, be like, ‘Yeah, that was all my idea. Just thought it’d really work.’” 

“I just remember reading it in the script as he walks, with his horse, right up to her and the horse is there. And it felt to me like the horse would be a third person in that scene, a bit of a gooseberry. You were slightly missing a beat of this dramatic walk that we hadn’t really had before with either of them.”

Young joked, “So the poor horse was looking forward to the day’s filming, he got shelved and Ben got to do the Matthew Macfadyen walk across the hill. So it was a little nod, but we had other moments on that hilltop of love and that felt like it just set it apart hopefully.”

Lloyd-Hughes hadn’t yet seen Sanditon Season 3 Episode 3 and was happy when Decider confirmed to him there wasn’t a horse in the version we screened.

“Okay, great. Because my idea was, well, he’s just walked. He doesn’t know where she’s going to be and he’s so pent up with emotion,” he said before referring to a previous scene between Colbourne and his brother Samuel (Liam Garriety)

“It’s just one of those moments where you put your coat on and walk. And I love that idea that something draws him to that place and it’s the serendipity of it,” he said. “He’s walking and she’s walking.”

While there might be serendipity in the scene, it does happen rather early in the arc of a PBS-produced season of Regency romance. You usually expect a kiss to happen towards the end, or the climax, of the season. Justin Young said they moved Colbourne and Charlotte’s first Season 3 kiss up to Episode 3 as a gift for the show’s fans.

“We’ve asked a lot of our audience. They’ve been very patient. We built up a huge love story for the series one that we then dashed on the rocks,” Young said. “We needed to give them hope that maybe we will get Charlotte and Colbourne together. There’s only so many longing looks you can give before you need a moment of release.”

“Our obligation first and foremost is to our audience and giving them the most wonderful ride that we can. So we thought actually you kind of need it.”

You can stream the entire third season of Sanditon on the PBS Passport app or wait for Episode 4 to premiere on Masterpiece on PBS next Sunday.