When Colin Firth dived into a lake at a stately home in the BBC’s 1995 adaptation of Pride and Prejudice, everyone assumed it was the corporation’s prudishness that stopped him stripping off.
Now it has emerged that the National Trust includes a “no nudity” clause in its contracts barring actors and actresses from removing their clothes in filming on its properties, to avoid causing distress to visitors on a day out.
The clause may explain the famous scene in which Firth, playing Mr Darcy, arrives at a lake on a hot summer day and starts to shed his clothes for a swim — but plunges in wearing his shirt and trousers.
Firth has said in the past he assumed he had to stay clothed