High Tea and High Drama

Shocking, appalling and very entertaining - Picture courtesy of Wikipedia

by blogSpotter
Pass me the smelling salts! I think I shall faint… you see Lady Mary just kissed Matthew Crawley as his fiancée Lavinia lay upstairs, suffering with Spanish flu. Where are their morals? Aren’t they worried someone might see? ? I’m watching Downton Abbey, the incredibly popular costume drama now taking England and America by storm. This lush, lavish period show is in its essence a soap opera – a very classy soap to be sure. Averaging 6 million people per episode, Downton Abbey is the most popular period show since 1981’s Brideshead Revisited. In fact, it’s one of the most popular shows overall – it garnered 6 Emmies this year for such things as directing, writing, costumes and overall series. The venerable Maggie Smith won for best supporting actress as Dowager Grantham.

Downtown Abbey is Julian Fellowes’ brilliant fictional creation, portraying the lives of the Earl and Countess of Grantham with all their servants and extended family. It’s set in the era of World War I, in the lavish environs of a country estate in Yorkshire. Exterior scenes of Downton are shot at Highclere Castle in Hampshire – a real country estate. Village scenes are filmed in Oxfordshire. We’re immersed in a bygone world -- no budgetary shortcuts have been taken. Downton gives us luminescent clothing, cars and furnishings that hark to the beautiful world of English nobility in the early 20th century. The show also offers some historical perspective along with the glossy imagery. With talks of class warfare, and Lady Sybil betrothing her chauffeur, it’s clear that pure aristocracy is fading – a new, egalitarian world is fast approaching.

Too often in historical dramas, people are sporting modern hairstyles or speaking in current idiom; Downton is painstakingly accurate in all of its costume and speaking styles. The people are no less human though – there is as much sex, intrigue and double-crossing as there ever was on Dynasty or The Young and the Restless. The series offers some cultural diversity as well as sex... Coproduced by British and Americans, Downton also has a starring character, Countess Cora, who's American. She has a down-home, Yankee sensibility and a lack of any stuffiness or pretension. It may be this mixing of the cultures that gives the show such a big following on both sides of the Atlantic.

Is there anything not to like? I’m probably the wrong one to ask – I’ve already seen all the episodes and am champing at the bit for Season 3. Are there things that other people would find silly or unbelievable? This is essentially a soap, so of course. Mrs. O’Brien goes from evil schemer to faithful redeemer and then back again! Captain Crawley comes back from WW I paralyzed and impotent but he miraculously gains back the use of all his body parts in less than one episode. Every plot twist seems to guarantee that the sexiest and most comely people will survive to flirt, nay, make sweet Edwardian love again. Some characters have “expendable” stamped on their foreheads and you know they’ll be a next casualty. Spanish flu really gave the writers a chance to clean house all in one episode.

But I must give credit to the series creator and chief writer, Julian Fellowes. Julian is known mostly for Gosford Park in his previous endeavors. With Downton, he’s created a mix of enchanting, believable, flawed, exciting people in an era which was pivotal and exciting itself. There is a gift to making us care and making us wait impatiently for a next episode or season. Bravo (and maybe cheerio?) to all that.

© 2012 blogSpotter