Downton Abbey

The second big-screen spin-off after 2019's Downton Abbey, positively bursts with all our favourite ingredients.

My own hope is that Fellowes will be brave enough next time - and there will surely be a next time - to embrace a genuinely new era and let the Crawleys flog their ancestral home to the nation. There are also some genuine chuckles, and a few shamelessly derivative storylines...Downton is the gift that keeps on giving.' Meanwhile, Mr Barrow the butler (Robert James-Collier), who had a personality transplant some time ago and is no longer a rotter, is still grappling with his sexuality. There are also some genuine chuckles, and a few shamelessly derivative storylines, with especially firm nods to My Fair Lady and Singin’ in the Rain. It is all cheerfully risible although heading for a note of seriousness to compare with what Wagner was aiming for with Siegfried’s Funeral March.' But she is less of a dope now she is married to Andy the jug-eared footman (Michael Fox). Could Daisy even have a future in moving pictures? A new valet in tight breeches, Mrs Patmore (Lesley Nicol) allowing her to go to the shops on her own ... these are the things that have always made Daisy’s day. It is 1928, and a dishy director, Jack Barber (Hugh Dancy), wants to hire the stately pile to make a silent film. As always with Downton, the suspicion mounts that Fellowes has found out from Wikipedia what was happening at the time and shaped his narrative accordingly. Among the more ruthless of us at last night’s glitzy world premiere in London, this kindled the fleeting hope that his lordship might be about to expire in spectacular fashion, perhaps of an overdose of kedgeree. Downton’s creator Julian Fellowes did not get where he is today (the House of Lords, for starters) by denying his fans what they expect. Back To The Future, Eyes Wide Shut and True Lies are fine examples of cinematic oxymorons - film titles which contradict themselves.

The likes of Dame Maggie Smith, Michelle Dockery, Hugh Bonneville and Elizabeth McGovern are all back as the Crawleys try to figure out why the Dowager Countess ...

Downton Abbey The Movie is available to buy on digital, DVD and Blu-ray now. "Downton Abbey: A New Era will satisfy fans of the original series, serving up a pair of storylines that have fun and heart in equal measure." Have a look:

Experts told FEMAIL the success of Downton has seen the cast 'propelled to global superstardom' and their style on the red carpet last night in London ...

The further the '20s went along, the more the world was changing in so many ways. Right: last night, Tuppence was absolutely glowing as she stepped out in her stunning black gown and showed off her blossoming baby bump 'It is a far cry from 2010 and the fashion back then. The updated hair is a perfect match for the perfect fashion styling for the cast. It was a change from Laura's earlier red carpet style. Laura Carmichael also ticked the box with her look thanks to stylist Rebecca Corbin-Murray. We take that further. There is natural soft movement makes her look appear younger, fresher and perfect for a red carpet. Speaking about the project, Julian shared: 'It's really a new era. It’s quite the transformation and I’m here for it.' She styled her brunette bob in glamorous curls while she bolstered her striking features with a slick of mascara and a touch of bold red lipstick. On the red carpet last night, Elizabeth McGovern showed off her signature sense of style as she stepped out in a black Azzi & Osta gown with a sequinned chest, puffed sleeves and a daring side split.

But while Downton Abbey is entering a new era at the end of the Roaring Twenties, it's business as usual for fans of the hit ITV drama.

And quite rightly, Maggie Smith takes centre stage as the series enters the modern age. Lady Mary is having marital troubles, Lord Grantham is questioning his existence and another much-loved character has been making clandestine visits to Doctor Clarkson (David Robb). And there are plenty of more secrets aired in the latest batch of soapy subplots.

The 36-year-old actress, who plays newcomer Myrna Dalgleish, sported a soft grey dress with a diamanté embellished bodice which met a feather detailed waist ...

Laura worked her magic on the red carpet with a number of poses, as her dress blew in the wind. Of course, it isn't available to buy. Laura Haddock puts on an extravagant display in a dramatic sheer grey feathered gown with a flowing cape as she attends the Downton Abbey: A New Era premiere

DOWNTON ABBEY 2 A New Era sees the married Lady Mary flirting with Hugh Dancy's director character, while her husband Matthew Goode's Henry Talbot is away ...

A big absentee in the trailers is Lady Mary’s husband Henry Talbot, who was away on business for much of the first movie. DON'T MISS Downton Jim Carter: 'We do laugh a lot at home... DOWNTON ABBEY 2 A New Era sees the married Lady Mary flirting with Hugh Dancy's director character, while her husband Matthew Goode's Henry Talbot is away on business.

The Downton Abbey: A New Era cast posed on the red carpet dressed to the nines, with Laura Carmichael, Michelle Dockery and Joanne Froggatt stunning at the ...

Downton Abbey: A New Era will be released in the UK on Friday, April 29, and in the US on Friday, May 20. A New Era will see the debut of Laura Haddock as a glamorous 1920s film star, with the actress seeming unimpressed by the iconic manor in the much-anticipated sequel. The stars of Downton Abbey stunned on the red carpet as they attended the A New Era film premiere in London on Monday evening.

Downton Abbey actor Dan Stevens, who played Matthew Crawley, opens up about why he left the hugely successful period drama after season 3.

Before Downton Abbey, the actor was largely known for his period drama roles, but has since had the opportunity to expand well beyond this niche genre and take on a varied selection of parts. Stevens explained that he initially signed on to Downton Abbey up to season 3, and when the contract was up, felt an urge to explore different roles and genres. While Stevens admits that many people thought he was "mad" for exiting the show, the actor was excited to enter "the great unknown" of his career. However, Matthew's death was not originally part of the Downton Abbey storyline, but a necessary plot point after Stevens' decision to leave the role. In a recent interview with The Guardian, Stevens explained why he decided to leave a lead role on a such a successful series. Downton Abbey actor Dan Stevens has recently opened up about why he left the successful series before its conclusion.

Harry HaddenPaton stars as Bertie Pelham Laura Carmichael as Lady Edith Tuppence Middleton as Lucy Smith. Harry Hadden-Paton stars as Bertie Pelham, Laura ...

These days there is space for 42 people to take over the entire villa, spreading across the three distinct houses flecked across the grounds. The property in question is Villa Rocabella, a Belle Epoque mansion in Le Pradet, about an hour west of St. Tropez—and you can stay here. Set in three hectares of meticulous grounds, this thoroughly Mediterranean house was actually designed by a Danish architect, Hans-Georg Tersling, in the late 19th century.

The Crawley family are back, this time with a film that takes place at their famed "Downton Abbey" home as well as the French Riviera in the second movie ...

Asked about whether there would be more "Downton Abbey" in the future, writer Julian Fellowes said: "I mean, I've said goodbye to these characters so many times. It went on for six seasons and gained a huge following in Britain and the United States. At the same time back in Britain, a film crew is setting up a movie production at Downton Abbey, delighting the staff but not impressing certain family members.

The second – and hopefully last – film spun off from Julian Fellowes's successful TV series is as hammy, silly, and undeniably entertaining as ever.

While this is going down, it emerges that the Dowager Countess has been left a villa in the south of France in the will of an ageing French aristocrat with whom she had a dalliance in the previous century. And as ever, there is something intriguing about the way Maggie Smith, when she has to deliver emotional lines – as she occasionally does – sounds less and less posh. Screenwriter Julian Fellowes’s creation has lurched defiantly up from its deathbed for another Charleston around the sick-room and I have to admit – like someone with an empty tube of Pringles in their hand that was full 10 minutes ago – that I did find this film entertaining; more outrageously silly and hammy and artlessly snobby than ever, with some Acorn Antiques-style revelations of paternity shenanigans and gorgeous tailoring for the gentlemen.

The good news keeps coming: Not only has Violet Crawley (Maggie Smith) inherited a villa in the South of France, but a film crew is coming to make a movie at ...

Carson is the only one who refuses to swap his uniform for linen, and his sweat mixes with a humorous insistence that he knows better than the French, and he must explain this to the staff out there. It’s an opportunity for broad, gentle comedy as well as a brief insight into the psyche of a woman under threat: The talkies are approaching, and the production is in danger. The script even goes so far as to make a few veiled references to the pandemic, suggesting that the Downton residents are not the only ones who have lost loved ones and had a hard time. “I’d rather earn my living down a mine.” More poignant moments tug at the heartstrings effectively, and are swiftly followed by smiles: This is a film designed to cheer people up. And on the subject of acting? And so the wishes of many a familiar character are granted over the course of two hours — along with plenty of drama.

Half the cast head to France, while the rest host Hollywood guests in this crowd-pleasing reunion, centering Mary as matriarch in charge.

So full of life was this character that they should have been struck by lightning or eaten by a shark — something suitably dramatic — or else ambled ghost-like through a ball (the way the former film really ought to have ended, à la Visconti’s “The Leopard”) as the world makes way for a new era. Nothing too upsetting is permitted to happen in a “Downton Abbey” sequel, lest it tarnish fans’ affection for what has come before, and yet, it’s time to say goodbye to a beloved cast member. It’s a clever idea to bring antique klieg lights and hand-cranked cameras into what is effectively a great big film set already, transformed with every episode by production designer Donal Woods and costume designer Anna Mary Scott Robbins. It leads one to consider how the hit series has impacted its own historic locations, turning Highclere Castle (the “real” Downton Abbey), the town of Bampton and such into tourist destinations. “They can’t expect us to deal with cinema people,” he drawls, pronouncing it “kinema” with all the antipathy of someone who’d never partake of anything so common as a motion picture. On TV, on the other hand, once a small-screen world has been established, it’s designed to remain open-ended from episode to episode and season to season, obliging audiences to tune in for updates so long as it stays on air, before being unceremoniously canceled without closure. In between, a good deal happens: Babies are born and paternities questioned, long-simmering romances clinched and fresh ones set to bloom; an excursion takes a fraction of the family to France while a film crew keeps the rest of them busy back home.

We pick up from where the first, 2019 film left off, with the picturesque wedding between socialist-chauffeur-turned-conflicted-posh-person Tom Branson (Allen ...

In stark contrast, A New Era seems frightened to make audiences feel anything at all. The South of France yields plenty of chances for Jim Carter’s delightfully curmudgeonly butler Carson to complain about the French and extol the virtues of talking “loudly and slowly to foreigners”. But it isn’t just the unfamiliar terrain that is unnerving. When Lord Grantham (Hugh Bonneville) realises that the “idyllic interlude” his mother enjoyed with the owner of the villa took place around – uh oh!

The actress, 43, was sure to catch the eye as she slipped into a bold red gown at the Downton Abbey: A New Era premiere at Cineworld Leicester Square on ...

The further the '20s went along, the more the world was changing in so many ways. We take that further. Speaking about the project, Julian shared: 'It's really a new era. Isn’t it sensational? Lady in red: Claire Danes was sure to catch the eye as she slipped into a bold red gown at the Downton Abbey: A New Era premiere at Cineworld Leicester Square on Monday night Claire Danes was sure to catch the eye as she slipped into a bold red gown at the Downton Abbey: A New Era premiere at Cineworld Leicester Square on Monday night.

The highly-anticipated cinematic return of the period drama will see the beloved characters go on a grand journey to the South of France.

The characters will see the outside world coming into Downton as a silent film star, played by Dominic West, comes to shoot a movie at the stately home. Downton Abbey began life as a TV series, airing on ITV from 2010 to 2015 and following the fortunes of the aristocratic Crawley family and their downstairs servants at a Yorkshire country estate. The highly-anticipated cinematic return of the period drama will see the beloved characters go on a grand journey to the South of France to uncover the mystery of the Dowager Countess’ newly inherited villa as they try to escape a film crew at Downton.

The Crawley clan head to the south of France in the latest instalment of the Downton Abbey saga, where – after a brief hint of potential conflict is rapidly ...

They’re the lumbering interlopers, admits Tesson at one point, and it gradually emerges that they’re being watched every step of the way by the animals they’re on a quest to observe. In The Velvet Queen, French writer Sylvain Tesson joins wildlife photographer and filmmaker Vincent Munier on an epic trek through the Tibet Plateau to try and catch a rare glimpse of snow leopards in their natural habitat. Set in an arts-oriented youth centre in Sidi Moumen – an economically deprived suburb of Casablanca likened by one of the attending kids to the Bronx, the tough New York neighbourhood from which hip-hop emerged in the 1970s – the film revolves initially around the arrival of Anas (Anas Basbousi), a former rapper whose streetwise style doesn’t go down well with centre’s administrators.

In the first Downton Abbey film, released in 2019, it was revealed that Violet Crawley (Maggie Smith) – a steady, ever-sniping presence through 47 episodes and ...

But the scenes are played with such bouncy bonhomie (there’s a fine supporting turn from Alex Macqueen as a pernickety sound engineer) that their glaring derivativeness doesn’t rankle as it might have. Scenes are short and conversations often functional, imparting information with a series of loud clunks. “I’d be better off out of it, if this is what we’ve come to,” splutters Jim Carter’s Mr Carson – so off he tramps on the French subplot. In the first Downton Abbey film, released in 2019, it was revealed that Violet Crawley (Maggie Smith) – a steady, ever-sniping presence through 47 episodes and five Christmas specials of the globally popular luxury soap opera – was, for nonspecific medical reasons, not long for this world. The Marquis’s unimpressed widow (Nathalie Baye) is planning to take the Crawleys to court before moving out, so Grantham leads an enormous deputation to the French Riviera to smooth things over. Does it signal an end to the Downton Abbey story entirely?