Downton Abbey was an acclaimed British television period drama. It was one of the most widely watched television dramas in the world. The show premiered in the United Kingdom in 2010 and ran there through 2015. In the United States, it aired from 2011 to 2016 as part of the “Masterpiece” drama series on the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) . “Downton Abbey” followed the lives of the Crawleys, an aristocratic British family, and their servants, beginning in the years leading up to World War I (1914-1918). The series was notable for its large cast of characters, colorful dialogue, historical context, clever plot twists, and many subplots. It won many awards, including a number of Emmy Awards.
“Downton Abbey” was set on the fictional country estate Downton Abbey in Yorkshire, England. Robert Crawley, the Earl of Grantham (Hugh Bonneville), was head of the estate. His wife, Cora (Elizabeth McGovern), was the daughter of Isadore Levinson, a wealthy American. The couple had met when Cora came to the United Kingdom with her mother, Martha, who wanted Cora to marry into the British aristocracy. Robert originally married Cora for her money because Downton Abbey was deeply in debt, but soon he fell in love with her. To ensure the survival of the estate, Robert’s father had insisted that Cora sign an agreement that legally combined her fortune with the estate of Downtown Abbey. The estate was entailed —that is, it was restricted so that only certain heirs, rather than all the heirs, were allowed to inherit it. The entail required that the estate pass to the male who inherited Robert’s title. The Crawleys eventually had three daughters—Mary (Michelle Dockery), Edith (Laura Carmichael), and Sybil (Jessica Brown-Findlay)—but no sons.
Patrick Crawley, the only son of Robert’s cousin, James, was expected to wed Mary to keep the money within the Crawley family. But father and son perished when the British ocean liner Titanic on which they were sailing sank in 1912. Robert’s sharp-tongued mother, Violet, the Dowager Countess of Grantham ( Maggie Smith ), was often at odds with Cora, but she worked with her daughter-in-law to fight the entail and encouraged her granddaughter Mary to wed Matthew Crawley (Dan Stevens), a distant cousin, who was the new heir. However, Matthew, a lawyer, was proudly middle-class and reluctant to embrace the Crawleys’ aristocratic lifestyle.
Other main characters in the series included the housekeeper, Mrs. Hughes (Phyllis Logan); the butler, Charles Carson (Jim Carter); Robert’s valet and old military friend, John Bates (Brendan Coyle); the footman Thomas Barrow (Rob James-Collier); and the maid Anna Smith (Joanne Froggatt). “Downton Abbey” also featured a number of special guest actors.
“Downton Abbey” was created by the British motion-picture director, screenwriter, actor, and novelist Julian Fellowes. In 2011, Fellowes was awarded a life peerage. He became Baron Fellowes of West Stafford and began to sit in the House of Lords. Fellowes also wrote the screenplay for the motion picture Downton Abbey (2019), which featured actors from the TV series.
