Downton Abbey Star Michelle Dockery Is Engaged

Michelle Dockery, star of Downton Abbey, is engaged to her boyfriend of three years, Jasper Waller-Bridge. If his last name sounds familiar that's because his sister is Phoebe Waller-Bridge, who is most famous for creating and starring in Fleabag, the critically acclaimed sitcom that won three Emmys, and who was also the showrunner, head writer, and executive producer of the first season of Killing Eve.

The couple took the old-fashioned route in announcing their engagement—with a placement in The Times. “The engagement is announced between Jasper, son of Michael Waller-Bridge of King’s Lynn, Norfolk, and Teresa Waller-Bridge of Battersea, London, and Michelle Dockery, younger daughter of Michael and Lorraine Dockery of Gidea Park, Essex,” it read.

Dockery and Waller-Bridge, who is the co-founder of Day One Pictures, a film and TV production company focused on telling stories about music, met through mutual friends in 2019 and made their first public appearance together later that year at the Rome Film Festival. "It was all taken slowly and in a considered manner but they are really enjoying being together," a source told the Daily Mail at the time. After their engagement announcement, Dockery was seen out and about in London sporting a diamond ring.

This happy news comes six years after the actress suffered the devastating loss of her former fiancé, public relations executive John Dineen, to cancer. He died in December 2015 at the age of 34. "I refer to myself as a widow, yes," she told The Guardian in 2017. "We were engaged, and married at heart, and so I do consider myself a widow."

Wedding planning won't be the only thing keeping Dockery busy over the coming months. She has reprised her role as Lady Mary Crawley once more for the highly anticipated Downton Abbey movie sequel, Downton Abbey: A New Era, which is set for a March 2022 release.

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