Posted on 01/16/2012 1:19:51 PM PST by Steelfish
JANUARY 2012
Julian Fellowes is as English as Earl Grey and clotted cream. As an actor, director and writer, he has continually peeked under the petticoats of British mores and conveyed the details with relish to audiences.
His writing of the upstairs-downstairs whodunit Gosford Park won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay in 2002, and his subsequent films Vanity Fair and The Young Victoria established Fellowes as the class-fixated Anglophile’s Anglophile.
His two novels, Snobs and Past Imperfect, mined the same dishy blueblood vein, and both were Sunday Times bestsellers.
A lifelong Conservative, Fellowes was made a Peer of the Realm in 2011 and bestowed with the title Baron Fellowes of West Stafford. Now with season two of the Edwardian-era Downton Abbey, the internationally syndicated costume drama he conceived and wrote for ITV, airing in the States as part of PBS’ Masterpiece, Fellowes—who was once shortlisted to replace Hervé Villechaize on Fantasy Island—stands tall as the reigning lord of ka-ching.
Downton, the period piece most watched in the U.K. since Brideshead Revisited, left off last season with the outbreak of WWI and the able-bodied men in the household heading off to the trenches. We caught up with its creator by phone, during an uncharacteristic break in his schedule.
Hello, Julian. Where am I calling you—in the country or the city? I’m actually at my office in the House of Lords in London. Well, an office is a rather optimistic description. It’s sort of a giant cupboard.
Congrats on your peerage. Thanks. I mean, it’s been very, very interesting. I am quite political, so being actually here and a part of it all is thrilling. I do what I can—everyone recognizes that I have other things going on.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimesmagazine.com ...
Watching Gosford Park on DVD with his commentary on was an education in and of itself.
I love Downton Abby
I been watching since Season 1
I love Downton Abby
I been watching since Season 1
I just ordered Season One...uncut version.
Great show! Everybody’s watching it. I was in Spain in December and the Spanish were getting their popcorn ready for the next season. British TV is available all over Europe, of course, but I think they were getting a dubbed version so I imagine lots of other people in Europe are too.
I was channel surfing last year and I happened to stop on an episode of Downton Abbey. Now I’m hooked.Never thought I would watch a British Drama with all its pomp and circumstance, ever.
I think it’s impossible to watch and not get hooked! It’s the first show, other than “24,” that I’ve watched religiously in decades.
What a novel concept, writing and dialogue that actually uses words from the English language that aren't profanity!
That's why I always love to watch old British mysteries, etc: just to hear people use the language in ways unheard of today.
I hearing they working on Season 3 right now in March this go way to 1930s on this one
Their reaction to beginning off WW2 and Edward VIII abdication
Both my mother & I are addicted. I was tortured last night because I HAD to watch the Golden Globs & so missed DA. I will say that the cast of DA was there & Elizabeth McGovern looked so beautiful.
The British can do great scandal w/ out resorting to sleazinss or trashiness. Love it, love it, love it!
ping
Thanks for the ping.
For those interested in an exuberant and absorbing discussion of the characters and plot, there's an FR thread running currently devoted to the "Abbey".
Just type the "title" words "Downton Abbey 2" into the FR search box and join the fun.
Maybe someone (unlike me) who knows how to post a live link on this thread will do so.
Cheerio and pip, pip.....
Leni
And to think I came upon D Abbey while channel surfing. Thank goodness for that!
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