Magazine Issues

The cast of Reign has been featured in a large number of magazine spreads. This is a list of them all, including dates of publications of actors names.

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TheWrap's “Drinking With the Stars - Adelaide Kane

"I really want her to just pitch a fit"

—Adelaide Kane's advice to Mary Stuart

CW's “Reign” has Mary ruling France without husband Francis and her portrayer Adelaide Kane is pretty upset about it.

During interview for a new episode of TheWrap‘s Drinking With the Stars, Adelaide Kane revealed that Mary will always try to do the right thing, but the fact that Francis (Toby Regbo) now has an illegitimate child with her lady-in-waiting Lola (Anna Popplewell) will be a source of tension for the newly-crowned rulers of France.

“It's pretty much her only job, to get pregnant and have babies,” Kane said of Mary's royal duties. “Having the baby around is almost rubbing her nose in the fact that she hasn't had a child yet, and that's going to be very painful for her.”

Meanwhile, Mary hasn't forgotten about what led to this whole mess in the first place — Francis and Lola sleeping together. “She's trying to make the best of it with Lola, Lola's still her friend,” said Kane. “It's been brought up with Francis once or twice, but I think there's still a conversation that needs to happen. Maybe a few glasses should be thrown and a casual slap across the face is required. She hasn't blown up about it yet and I really want her to!”

Mary's unrelenting nobleness in the face of all adversity has Kane wanting the queen of France and Scotland to blow off some steam. “I want to break something,” Kane joked. “Everyone else gets to break things and I never get to break anything … I want to have an episode where she's channeling Queen Catherine (Megan Follows) and is all sassy.”

Kane also discussed what she calls the show's “stealth feminism,” by referring to the checklist which highlights gender bias in media.

“We pass the Bechdel test almost every week!” she cheered. “Not many shows can do that, not many movies can do that, full stop. We get a lot of flack for being, essentially, a costume melodrama — we're a little soapy and campy, which is okay, I love it — but I have to say we're like a stealth feminist show. We also have really healthy, normalized versions of female sexuality.”

The show is also known for scenes of Mary taking charge and Francis taking a back seat, which Kane revealed she's discovered fans are really into. “There are a couple of great gifsets on Tumblr of those scenes,” she laughed. “Where Francis is like ‘So turned on right now.’ Every time Mary exercises her power, Francis is so into it! He's like, ‘Yeah, that's my woman!'”

Reign airs every Wednesday at 9 p.m. ET on M3 and Thursday at 9 p.m. ET on The CW.

‘Reign’ Star Adelaide Kane on Francis’ Indiscretion Casual Slap Across the Face Required Part 2

‘Reign’ Star Adelaide Kane on Francis’ Indiscretion Casual Slap Across the Face Required Part 2-1

Real Style

Jonathan Keltz does an interview with Real Style on October 1st, 2014

Real Style: Tell us about Season 2 of Reign.
Jonathan Keltz: It is definitely a darker season. The season picks up right off where we left off and the plague has come to France and is leaving no prisoners. It is definitely a chaotic and turbulent time and that’s where we begin and then things spiral out of control. Nobody is safe. It is an enemy that unites us all. It is a common enemy, but we still find ways to poke and prod at each other as well. [For Season 2] I’m more tied down to the show and there’s more of the character versus less, so it’s a good thing.

Real Style: How does Leith change this season?
Jonathan Keltz: I can’t get into too much detail, but the season ended with me gaining land and money and the beginnings of some wealth. I’m maintaining my friendship to the new King of France. This new relationship that’s budding with Yvette Castleroy, we’ll see what happens there. I’m still unaware that’s she the daughter of the man who’s the fiancee of the one I was formerly in love with. It’s a bit of a tricky moment and this new relationship will be put to the test. The old relationships and whether or not that’s true love will be put to the test as well.

Real Style: Greer could possibly be in your future?
Jonathan Keltz: Greer could possibly be in my future. How far Yvette Castleroy and I get could change things as well in terms of who gets married, when they get married, who gets married to whom.

Real Style: What was it like kissing Celina Sinden [who plays Greer]?
Jonathan Keltz: Ha! There’s never anything wrong with working with a wonderful actor or actress. Yeah, it was lovely getting to do all the romance stuff. We had some really lovely scenes. We were actually just talking about it last night. One of our favourite scenes that we’ve ever shot was the first date scene that we had. It was a really sweet and lovely candlelit date and it was the first day I was shooting on the show and it was a lot of fun. There was just something really charming about the way it all went by. We’re both in relationships and thankfully both of the people we’re in relationships with are actors so they understand and they have to do scenes like that as well.

Real Style: What’s your favourite part of working on Reign?
Jonathan Keltz: We have a really fun cast and a really great relationship between us all. Getting to escape into that world is the most fun. I love just hanging out at the studio. We have these unbelievable castle sets that the detailing is amazing. The crew and the art department and the wardrobe department; everyone in makeup and hair has all done a fantastic job. You’re walking down the halls and you look up and there’s all this detailed painting in the ceilings. In the days when we’re out of the studio I get to ride a horse through the woods and charge around on missions.

Real Style: You would never guess that it was shot in Toronto.
Jonathan Keltz: You would never guess. Now we do shoot in Ireland, but we have a studio that we shoot at and we built a courtyard and a village set in the back-lot of the studio, so there is some outdoor stuff [in Toronto]. We shoot in a lot of conservation areas or ruins and old churches on the outskirts of Toronto.

Real Style: What’s your favourite part about Toronto?
Jonathan Keltz: I love Toronto. It’s a really great city. It’s a really eclectic city where you can get whatever you ant out of it. I really loved being here for TIFF this year and being immersed in it. I’d say that right now my favourite thing would be the summer we’ve been having. It’ll get a little bit more brutal and unforgiving in a couple months but it’s the end of summer that’s really my favourite time.

Real Style: What are your plans when you’re done shooting Reign?
Jonathan Keltz: I’m hoping to do some feature stuff during the hiatus – fingers crossed we get picked up for a third season. We’ll be starting up again first week of July so it’s not a lot of time to squeeze something in and try to get some vacay as well. My girlfriend’s family is Brazilian and we’re hoping to sneak down to Brazil for my first time during the hiatus.

Real Style: That would be nice.
Jonathan Keltz: That would be nice indeed. Dream scenario: shoot an awesome movie with the newly married George Clooney and then go tromp around Brazil for a bit with the love of my life. Nothing wrong with that.

Unknown Photoshoots

Adelaide Kane in an Unknown Photoshoot in 2014.

"I learned by watching my favorite TV shows. I would just rewind and say the words back, until they sounded right to me. I never studied the American accent, in terms of getting a teacher or taking phonetics classes. I’ve always been a good mimic. It really wasn’t that hard for me

TV Guide

Adelaide Kane in TV Guide for their September 2014 issue.

Entertainment Weekly Magazine

Adelaide Kane in Entertainment Weekly Magazine for their September 2014 issue.

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: When we next see you on the show, you’re the Queen of France.
ADELAIDE KANE: Yes.

What does this mean for you as the character—will we be seeing a new side of Mary? How has your character evolved?
Well she’s been the queen of Scotland for a very long time, but she’s been more of a figurehead. She hasn’t had a particularly active role in ruling her country. So I think Mary will step up to the plate and actually be an active ruler, as opposed to just a figurehead or someone who is purely used as a political tool. So we’ll see her become a little more proactive, a little more politically involved as well as see her struggle to step into her parent’s shoes.

And will you take after Mary de Guise, as played by Amy Brenneman, or will we see you more as a Queen Catherine-type?
Well, I don’t know. They’re both pretty manipulative because their power came from the men they married as opposed to their own blood line. I don’t think Mary needs to manipulate, she’s not that type of person, but certainly with rule and politics does come a certain, I don’t know, you need to have a certain guile about you to rule in that world. And I think she and Francis definitely have a different vision for the monarchy. She wants a more honest, straightforward, decent type of ruler, as opposed to mad King Henry or the forever scheming Catherine. I think there’s want to be more honorable but we’ll see if they can do that. I don’t know if they can. Catholics, and there’s o much ill will floating around, and there were struggles diplomatically, so in trying to be egalitarian rulers they’ve got a lot to come up against with the more traditional values that they have. There’s also a lot of change in this time.

There’s no feast – all famine right, as the season begins?
Well they’re royals, so there’s a couple of feasts.

You seem to be implying that there might not be too much of a ‘happily ever after’ with your marriage to Francis.
[Laughs]

What can you tell us about where’s that’s going?
Well I said last year, everyone was so excited because they got married and it was supposed to be a happy marriage. But the story just begins, because from history we know that they never had children. And back then there would have been a lot of tension without babies. And remember, Lola had a child. Which I think they’ve already spoiled ahead for this season, so I think I’m allowed to say that. So having that reminder about, when they themselves are trying to conceive will be a source of tension between the two of them. Heirs are so important, male heirs in particular. And then I think just them trying to handle the nobles like every time the monarchy shifts a generation, everyone tries to see if they can gain control over the new king. There’s a mad scramble and they’ve had whatever it is, 20 years of Henry’s rule and they know how he operates. There’s a security in that. But Francis is a brand-new ruler, and everyone has to figure out whether they can manipulate him or not. But Mary is part of that as well. Can she be manipulated or manipulate Francis? I think its going to be very interesting to see how the power shifts around them.

But before you can really get into the politics, there will be a party. There will be a coronation, right?
Yeah girl!

Can you tell me about what you’ll wear?
I wear a really big dress. My dress is magnificent. It was custom built by our wizard in the wardrobe department. They made this dress. It’s gorgeous. I have a lot of photos on my phone I’m saving for Instagram. I have a particularly hysterical one of me playing with my dress that was taken when I wasn’t looking. It’s a real big dress [Laughs]

I swear you have the best job on TV just because of the clothes.
Arguably, yes. Being on TV is kind of the best job in the world.

If you were to compare the coronation dress to the wedding dress, how would you describe it or put it forth?
It’s a little sexier, a little more adult. It’s bigger. It’s a bigger dress [laughs]. A lot more hardware. The wedding dress for Mary was very much a princess dress but the coronation dress is more adult, kind of a more powerful statement dress. It really says something. It has a lot of impact. It’s a beautiful dress.

It seems like a statement about how your character has changed from one season to the next.
Exactly. Exactly. There’s definitely more power dressing going on in the second season.

Are you discounting at all the fact that you may or may not have a baby this season? It didn’t happen in history but this isn’t a documentary series so …
This is very true. I don’t know if there will be a literal baby. That would be pushing it too much but you know, pregnancies, I don’t know.

Yeah. Could you have a miscarriage?
Maybe. That would be freakin’ heartbreaking. I would be destroyed by that. It would be so sad. But no, I think that they won’t pull any punches when it comes to that since we have in a lot of other ways. We’ll have to wait to see since we’re only a couple of episodes in. It hasn’t been definitively teased either way. But yeah, I have my own speculation about what they’re going to do about it but [showrunner] Laurie McCarthy is very closed-mouthed about it all.

What do you think they’ll do?
I think there will probably be a pregnancy. I think that the possibility of not having a baby will get very stressful. Maybe she’ll go crazy. Maybe she’ll go a little baby crazy. There could be a hysterical pregnancy. That’d be awesome.

Like a phantom pregnancy.
Right. Wouldn’t it be hilarious if everyone went crazy in the castle—can you imagine? A phantom pregnancy! That would be a pretty interesting avenue to explore. I think that would be terrifying for everyone, especially given how Henry went crazy. Maybe I should start writing new premises for the show.

You totally should.
Here’s your new lines! Laurie would just be like, ‘no, Adelaide, stop.’

You never know. Many successful actress in Hollywood have a side hustle— maybe yours can be screenwriting.
Oh, god. That bar is just too high for me.

Like a lot of fans, I’m really going to miss King Henry. Do you think he might come back? Whether as a ghost or in flashbacks—something?
I don’t know. We’ve touched on supernatural elements in our show but they’ve never, ever come to fruition. Think about it. The only supernatural elements that have been given any credence or plausibility has been supported at all in the show are Nostradamus’ visions. That’s the only thing we’ve supported as maybe being true. But other supernatural incidences have been basically discounted.

Right.
So, I don’t know. We might introduce ghosts. We film in a creepy old castle so it seems rather appropriate. We have Catherine de Medici, who is incredibly superstitious. I think it’ll be interesting to see if we do real ghosts or fake hauntings or what. Or do we do both and kind of red herring it, like ‘there’s no such thing as ghosts on our show’ or ‘are there?’ We do that a lot.

If you can’t do ghosts, please convince Laurie to bring Henry back in flashbacks because he was amazing.
Flashbacks? He was rather delicious as a mad, tyrant, charming king.

And I have to add, that we were promised a lot of sex this season. But if Henry is not around, who will be doing it?
Um, about that. I have gotten naked three times already and we’ve barely started. So I would say yes, there will be a lot more sex. Definitely going to be happening.

So is Mary having the most sex?
Mary is shagging everyone in the castle. It seems strange to say but Mary is shagging every kitchen maid in sight. I joke. But there’s definitely lots with Lola, and Greer and I have actually filmed like two sex scenes already. So yeah.

I can’t wait.
More, you know…mushiness.

That’s one way to think about it. Speaking of mush, I loved Amy Brenneman as your mom. Do you think there’s any possibility she’ll come back as your mom at all this season?
I have no idea. There’s always the possibility but she has her own show …but I’d love for her to come back if she’s up for it. It’d be super, super awesome but I doubt it.

Will there be any other guest stars this season?
Oh we have so many guest stars. We have a couple of gentleman who’ve just joined us. Craig Parker and Sean Teale, who are playing an evil villain named Narcisse and Count Condé, respectively. We have some gentleman who are eye candy, which should be lovely. And I just read on Entertainment Weekly that we have another young woman joining us as well.

I wrote that. Way to give me my own spoilers.
Right, giving you your own spoilers [laughs].

_{This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
Courtesy of: insidetv.ew.com/2014/09/10/reign-adelaide-kane-season-2/}

TV Week Australia

Adelaide Kane in TV Week Australia for their August 2014 issue.

West Australian

Adelaide Kane in West Australian for their July 2014 issue.

TheWrap's “Drinking With the Stars - Torrance Coombs

Torrance Coombs is a master of intrigue.

The actor, who plays Sebastian on The CW's “Reign,” revealed a few tantalizing details from the show's highly-anticipated season finale on this episode of TheWrap's Drinking With the Stars.

While Coombs promised a few shockers, he was mum on specifics.

“I'll tell you there's a confrontation coming up,” Coombs said. “We will see everything with the darkness come to a head. The confrontation is maybe not what people expect. It's fun. I like where we went with it.”

“As always, when one problem is solved, it opens up another,” Coombs continued. “So, I think our finale will satisfy people in terms of tying up most of the loose ends, but it certainly doesn't leave everything … in a happy place necessarily or in a resolved place before next season.”

The season finale of Reign airs Wednesday at 9 p.m. ET on M3 and Thursday May 15 at 9/8 central on The CW

'Reign' Star Torrance Coombs 'It's Weird Trying To Have Sex With Somebody and Not Thrust'-0

JustJared Exclusive

Adelaide Kane in justjared.com for their April 2014 issue.

Just Jared: Congratulations on the renewal for a second season of Reign! Did you celebrate?
Adelaide Kane: Oh yeah, definitely! The rest of the cast all went out that night. What’s funny is that I booked a flight to come out to LA, so I didn’t get to celebrate with the rest of the cast. But they told me on set before they told anyone else because they wanted me to tweet simultaneously with the leads of some of the other CW shows. It was all I could do not to tell everyone, and they let me announce it to the whole crew. So exciting!

JJ: How far into shooting are you?
AK: We’re still on season one. We’re currently shooting 119. Oh my gosh, three more episodes and then season one is done. I can’t believe it. It’s really gone by exceptionally quickly. It’s crazy. [JJ Note: Interview was completed on March 8]

JJ: What are you going to do during your hiatus?
AK: Who knows! I’m trying to get some work, trying to keep hustlin’. (laughs) If I get too much time off, I’m going to get bored, so I’m just auditioning, seeing if I can get a feature for the break. Other than that, I want to go to Thailand. I might visit my family. My cousin’s having a baby, so it’s very exciting. And I was thinking of going to New York or London and spending a couple of weeks there exploring the cities.

JJ: What’s your favorite thing to do in Toronto?
AK: Honestly, eat. Toronto has a really good food game. I have my favorite places that I go. They’ve got a bunch of really cool, hip bars. I live in a really kind of hipster area.

JJ: Do you have a favorite restaurant?
AK: I do, Gusto. Gusto 101 is my favorite restaurant in Toronto.

JJ: Do you have a favorite prop from set?
AK: I love when I get to write things because they gave me a calligraphy set. That’s super fun. I like my quill, my ink quill. It’s beautiful.

JJ: Did you know calligraphy beforehand? Did you just learn it on the spot?
AK: They gave me a big sketch pad and a bunch of modern quills and ink, and a bunch of different alphabets so I could pick out which one I like best. Just to practice with while I’m at home. They give me advanced notice if they want me to write anything important. I’ve got quite good at it actually!

JJ: What’s the most fun thing that you’ve done to prepare for a scene?
AK: Horseback riding, that’s my favorite thing. That’s my favorite extracurricular work thing. Every other weekend, they send a driver and I go all the way out to the farm and ride for a couple of hours. So much fun. We finally settled on one horse for me to practice on, Hummer. I used to ride Spartan, but Spartan doesn’t listen to me, he gives me so much attitude. But Hummer is a good boy. (smiles)

JJ: Do you have a most memorable scene that you’ve shot so far?
AK: Yeah, actually. I was doing kind of a racy scene with Toby [Regbo]. One of the Canadian politicians there, a female premier, was visiting set, and just happened to be on set while we were doing this racy scene. She brought kids with her and stuff, and they had to be turned around. It was just SO funny. We were like, “Hi!” She came on to shake our hands and I was like re-dressing, putting my bodice over my corset and pulling my skirt back up. Like, “Hi, nice to meet you.” So awkward.

JJ: Has anyone played any pranks on set?
AK: Not really. I mean, not really in the way of pranks. We’re all just really silly and goofy. We all pull faces. The girls and I, when the heels start hurting, we all cupcake. We just drop into a squat and skirts go [poof], and we all look like ridiculous little cupcakes all lined up. But yeah, everybody’s really lovely.

JJ: Do you have a favorite off-screen memory?
AK: There are a lot of them. The cast all hangs out, and we play Cards Against Humanity, go grab drinks, stuff like that. It’s hard to pick a night. I’d say most recently, I went dancing with Anna [Popplewell] and Caitlin [Stasey]. That was a really fun night and we ended up having a snowball fight on the way home. Which is not a good idea when it is subzero. (laughs) And we walked home from the bar, which is a bit goofy.

JJ: Describe your cast members in one word. Toby Regbo.
AK: Intelligent.

JJ: Torrance Coombs.
AK: Goofy!

JJ: Megan Follows.
AK: Boss.

JJ: Anna Popplewell.
AK: Sweet.

JJ: Caitlin Stasey.
AK: Kitten.

JJ: Celina Sinden.
AK: Lady-like.

JJ: Alan Van Sprang.
AK: Hilarious.

JJ: What’s your favorite music right now?
AK: I’m listening to Alt-J, BANKS, Woodkid. I’m a fan of Disclosure. One of my favorite, favorite, favorite bands that I’m just playing to death at the moment is First Aid Kit. I’m into either like sort of folksy Civil Wars kind of stuff at the moment, or sort of like moody. I listen to a lot of moody music recently, which is funny because I’m so happy. But it just makes me happy. So weird.

JJ: Do you follow any other TV shows yourself? What’s your favorite?<
AK: I just binge watched Game of Thrones. I have House of Cards lined up that I need to watch second season of. I love Archer. (laughs) Archer, it’s like a South Park kind of thing, it’s so funny. What else do I watch? I’m always re-watching Charmed, one of my favorite shows, I loved it so much. I heard they were rebooting it over at CBS and I was like, “Damn it, I want to be a witch.” I’m hoping they put it off so I can have many long years on Reign, and then go be a witch.

JJ: Any favorite movies?
AK: Yeah. Star Wars, the original Star Wars. Indiana Jones. The Fifth Element is my favorite movie of all time. I like Some Like It Hot, I like older movies as well. I mean, yeah, I got my gear that I like Rocky Horror Picture Show, I’m a big fan of. Casablanca, Gone With The Wind.

JJ: Favorite food?
AK: I love Mexican food so much, I could that all day, every day. I’ve been missing California, and California avocados and Mexican food. I love Italian food as a close second, so I’m like lucky in Toronto they have pretty stellar Italian food. I can’t find a good Mexican place there, it’s driving me up the wall. (laughs)

JJ: Do you have a favorite person to follow on Twitter?
AK: Grumpy Cat. (laughs)

JJ: Favorite person to follow on Instagram?
AK: I like following my family members on Instagram. My cousins post pictures of their babies and puppies, and their friends. My mom posts goofy pictures with her partner and my brother. I like seeing what everyone is doing back home because I don’t get to talk to them as often as I’d like to. It’s just too hard with the time difference.

Teen Vouge

Adelaide Kane in Teen Vouge for their November 2013 issue.

Bello Magazine

Adelaide Kane appears in Bello Magazine. in April 2014

On fashion: “When you wear a corset and ball gown and heels all day, every day, you get sick of dressing up. I get excited to dress up for modern events, like the People’s Choice Awards, for example. Doing events like that is super fun, because I don’t really dress up to go out anymore. I don’t really even go out anymore because I work so much.”

“And when I do go out, I’m in boots or really comfy platforms and jeans and a t-shirt or a sweater, and that’s it. I do not dress up, because of course I’m in stilettos all week. But it is fun to once in a blue moon dress up for an event. That, to me, is cool.”

On life necessities: “My cell phone…I couldn’t live without it, definitely. And jeans! All I wear is jeans. Also Mexican food. I know it sounds goofy. And just books. I can’t live without books.”

On her favorite shows: “I started watching The Originals, because I know a lot of the kids in The Originals, and there are a lot of Australians, like Phoebe Tonkin, and Claire Holt. And Luke Mitchell’s in The Tomorrow People, and I’m just really excited about young Australians doing well this season in television, which is awesome. When we’re successful enough, we can take the work back to Australia.”

CBS Watch Magazine

Adelaide Kane, Torrance Coombs and Toby Regbo glamed up in Dolce & Gabbana, and high-end designers in the current issue of CBS Watch in March 2014.

Torrance on clicking with the cast: “We were out every night at the pub, sharing stories, sharing laughter, and somehow magically in Ireland, you wake up and you’re not hung over. I don’t know how that works.”

Adelaide on almost missing out: “I had a moment a few years ago where I wasn’t sure if I was acting for myself or because people expected it of me. A bit of a crisis of faith, I suppose. I did some soul-searching, took a break and decided I was going to live my life only for me.”

POP! A celebratory toast begins the fashion shoot with the cast of The CW’s new drama Reign, and the actors are feeling the excitement. “This is weird in the most wonderful way,” says Adelaide Kane, dancing in a suite at The New York Palace hotel. The starlet steps into a Dolce & Gabbana outfit and puts on a set of outrageously heavy earrings. The series is only four days away from its network debut and its royal trinity of stars—Kane, Toby Regbo and Torrance Coombs—is in New York for Comic Con, the sci-fi and comics convention, where the cast got its first taste of audience affection in the long road from casting a pilot to airing the premiere. Months of hard work and the hopes of several careers are bound up in the weekly drama about teenage Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots, in the court of France on the eve of her wedding. But the Comic Con fans were ecstatic, so the troika is celebrating.

“It’s the closest thing I’ve experienced to being onstage, getting to feel an audience’s immediate reaction,” says Regbo, who made his stage debut at London’s Royal Court Theatre when he was 17 and now stars as Prince Francis on The CW’s drama.

Reign is part fantasy, part history and all imperial drama. To amp up the heat, producers turned a historical romance into a love triangle, giving Francis an illegitimate half-brother, Bash, played by Coombs, who competes for Mary’s admiration and the attention of his father, the king of France.

While there is a palpable three-way spark onscreen, there is nothing but playfulness as the actors loosen their corsets and lay down their swords at The New York Palace. The room practically bubbles with the affection among Kane, Regbo and Coombs. The mutual lovefest has been going on since they first met while shooting the pilot on location in Ireland. “We were out every night at the pub, sharing stories, sharing laughter,” says Coombs, who is back in tights after his turn on Showtime’s hit series The Tudors. “And somehow magically in Ireland, you wake up and you’re not hung over. I don’t know how that works.”

Once Reign got the green light from The CW, filming moved to Toronto and the pub crawls were less frequent. “In Canada, it doesn’t work,” Coombs says, laughing. “We sort of tried the first week, like, ‘Hey! We’re going drinking!’ And then everyone was, like, ‘Oomph. …’ We were feeling it the next day. So there’s still that summer camp feel, but we’ve settled into a rhythm now. We’re just living our lives—we’re citizens of a city now, not visitors.”

A reporter can’t help but ask: Did any of the onscreen romances erupt into their personal lives? “Actors are notorious for sleeping with co-stars and it causes a lot of trouble,” says Kane. “But everyone in this cast is attached, in serious committed relationships, and it makes everyone relaxed.”

Having sweethearts back home inoculates the cast against steamy gossip fodder (and heartbreaks), but the awkwardness of love, rejection and adolescent peer pressure is front and center in the script. “Do I fit in? What should I do with my life? The characters in Reign are having those same anxieties on the screen,” says Coombs. “At some point [in my teens], I became afraid to be ridiculous in public; I felt like I had to cast it away and have everyone think I was cool.”

Adelaide_stairs Filming Reign has been liberating in other ways as well: “I just did the first nude scene of my career,” says Regbo. “They give you a little drawstring bag, called a modesty sack. It was anything but.”

In addition to losing their inhibitions—and sometimes their clothing—filming a period piece required the actors to learn a whole new set of skills. Instead of fistfights there are sword fights, and when one is learning new tricks—albeit 500-year-old ones—it is impossible to be overly self-conscious. Coombs practiced what he thought was an elegant dismount from his horse, take after take, but his cloak got caught on the saddle. At last, riding into the frame, he stuck the landing perfectly. Next? “My horse then backs into a tree and starts scratching his ass,” he says.

“Bloody horse, acting just like a horse would,” laughs Regbo.

Kane sees parallels between the dramas of teenagers in courtly France and her own. Queen Mary is torn between her obligations to her country and her duty to herself. “I had a moment a few years ago where I wasn’t sure if I was acting for myself or because people expected it of me. A bit of a crisis of faith, I suppose,” she says. “I did some soul-searching, took a break and decided I was going to live my life only for me.” Within the year she was cast on Teen Wolf and soon after as Mary Stuart in Reign. Of course, the options available to her are wildly different from the life-or-death choices of a 16th-century queen, she admits. “I’m not responsible for other people’s lives, so that’s great.”

The high-stakes plot of Reign centers on the superstitions of a medieval castle, with doomsday prophecies from Nostradamus and dire warnings from ghosts. To Kane, the specters present a chance to explore a different side of herself. “I have ‘dream clicks.’ It sounds silly, but I’ll dream a few frames or seconds of something months or years or weeks or days away, and I’ll be going about my life and I’ll turn and look up and hear a click in my head and will know exactly what’s going to play out in the next three to five seconds. And I take it to mean that I’m in the right place, and I’m doing the right thing.”

The setting sun begins to light up Gotham’s skyscrapers. It is a magical and golden hour, so has Kane experienced a prophecy about Reign? “Actually, I’ve had quite a few of those clicks since we started,” she says, with a smile.

Glamour magazine

Adelaide Kane, Caitlin Stasey, Anna Popplewell, Jenessa Grant and Celina Sinden appear for October 2013.

Adelaide Kane on the costumes: “Spanx are a piece of cake compared to a corset! I actually had to spread out my lunch into three small meals because if I ate too much at once, my stomach would hurt. On the plus side, you almost don’t need to act. The corset helps you carry yourself and walk in a different way all on its own.”

Anna Popplewell on filming on location: “Celina and I are from England, Adelaide and Caitlin are from Australia, and Jenessa is from Canada. So we were all far from home and went on amazing touristy adventures in Dublin, including a visit to the Guinness factory. I like Guinness, but it’s too filling!”

Jenessa Grant on royal dreams: “I wasn’t really the princess type—I actually wanted to be Aladdin, not Jasmine. I always used to look up to the male characters in movies because they were the ones in on all the action. But these days, I think there are stronger female heroes on-screen.”

Caitlin Stasey on her favorite royal: “Cleopatra. She was such a powerful woman.”

Vanity Fair

Adelaide Kane appears in Vanity Fair. in January 2013 issue.