The Duke of Buckingham

An English aristocrat freshly arrived in New York society, the Duke of Buckingham carries himself with practiced charm and old-world polish. He moves through Mrs. Astor's ballrooms as a prize catch, courteous to mothers and daughters alike, his title preceding him like a calling card. What he wants is harder to read than his manners suggest.

Ben Lamb plays him with a smoothness that never quite curdles into villainy, which is the trick of it — you like him even as the show invites you to wonder what an impoverished duke actually needs from an American heiress. That tension between courtesy and calculation is what makes him fun to watch across a drawing room.