‘Downton Abbey’ Was Originally Going To Be a Classic Crime Movie Spin-Off

The Big Picture

• Downton Abbey began as a potential spinoff of Gosford Park but went in a different direction, with a different time period and tone.
• Downton offered a more lenient and just world compared to the rigid social code depicted in Gosford Park.
• Downton Abbey: A New Era brings Julian Fellowes full circle back to Gosford Park, with a major subplot exploring the clash between the British upper class and the movie industry.

Downton Abbey is one of the most beloved TV shows of the 2010s. At the peak of its popularity, it was spoken of in the same exalted breath as shows like Mad Men. Downton tells the stories of the aristocratic Crawley family, as well as the employees who make up their household staff, all of whom dwell in the titular estate during the early decades of the 20th century. It was created by Julian Fellowes, and many fans of Downton have since followed Fellowes to his newest show, The Gilded Age. If you haven’t yet, you should also follow Fellowes work backwards through time, to Gosford Park, the movie which not only ignited Fellowes’ career, but was the original inspiration for Downton. In fact, Downton was originally going to be a Gosford Park spinoff. It’s not clear what that version of the show might have been like, because, while Gosford Park was also an examination of class relations in a sprawling British estate, it was, in addition to that, a classic country house murder mystery.

‘Gosford Park’ Was a Late-Career Masterpiece From Robert Altman

Robert Altman received a lifetime achievement Academy Award, in recognition of a long and legendary career stretching back into the early 1970s. But over that time, interest in his work had sharp peaks and valleys. Gosford Park, which Altman directed only a few years before he died, was one of several of his “comeback” movies, coming at the end of a late-90s lull. It went on to be one of his most successful films. Gosford Park was Altman’s second-highest grossing film, after M*A*S*H, and it was his only film to be nominated for a Best Picture Oscar other than Nashville.

It’s easy to see why audiences and critics responded to Gosford Park. The movie is absolutely brimming. It takes place at a family gathering, a “shooting party” hosted by Sir William McCordle, a wealthy gun-loving industrialist (Michael Gambon) and his aristocratic wife Lady Sylvia (Kristen Scott Thomas). The gathering draws in many members of his money-grubbing family, and, sets the household staff into a frenzy of high-pressure activity. Complicating the class dynamic is the attendance of a Hollywood producer who is visiting to do research for his next film. The movie introduces us to a parade of sharply observed characters, and the cast is stacked with ringers (also including Clive Owen, Ryan Phillipe, and Helen Mirren). The movie doesn’t even reveal that it will take the form of a mystery until nearly an hour has gone by – at first it seems like it will simply be a wry and riveting social drama. When it first clicks that the movie will be a murder mystery on top of everything else, you experience a real moment of Treat Overload.

A lot of the credit for that goes to Julian Fellowes, who wrote the script. Fellowes was relatively unheard of as a writer before Gosford Park, and actually was much better known as a character actor on British television. However, he had made the decision to pivot into writing, and he’d worked with actor Bob Balaban, who had developed the idea for the movie with Altman (who plays the character of Hollywood producer Morris Weissman). Fellowes also had some tangled family connections to the nobility that made him a valuable source of authenticity, especially to Altman, who rarely made films about non-Americans. During the shoot, Fellowes was on set to insure the production got all the details right. The film was nominated for seven Academy Awards, but only Fellowes won, for Best Original Screenplay.

‘Downton Abbey’ Started as a ‘Gosford Park’ Spinoff, But It Went in a Different Direction

Gosford Park was an opportunity that came out of the blue, but it established Fellowes’ career as a writer. Several years later, another opportunity arose, as he was approached by television producer Gareth Neame about going “back into ‘Gosford Park territory.” Though it is often repeated that Downton Abbey began as a Gosford Park spinoff, this isn’t an angle that Fellowes has discussed in much detail, and the source for this information is an interview Fellowes gave as part of a special feature for Season 3. However, there’s pretty clearly at least one holdover from the transition from spinoff to original material. In Gosford Park, Maggie Smith plays the Countess of Trentham, while in Downton Abbey, she plays the Dowager Countess of Grantham. Both characters are fountains of defiantly snobbish one-liners, and it seems likely that the character was ported over from the film to the show, with Smith in mind.

Otherwise, Downton Abbey takes place a decade or so before Gosford Park, with an entirely new set of characters, and a noticeably different tone. Fellowes has noted this himself, referring to Gosford Park as “a more bitter vision” than his later work, and Downton as “Gos­ford’s warmer and cuddlier child,” Critics also noted the difference in tone, often with disapproval. As Downton Abbey pushed into later seasons, it began to draw the criticism that it was nostalgic for a time when the class structure was more rigid. This charge was repeated so many times that Fellowes felt the need to address the Downton Abbey “backlash.” Whether you agree with the specific charge of “nostalgia” it seems hard to disagree that the world of Downton Abbey is one with less severe consequences than the world of Gosford Park (unless your character is played by an actor who wants to leave the show). The turning point of Gosford Park is not the murder, it’s the ruthless sacking of Elsie, the head house-maid, over a moment’s indiscretion. After Elsie accidentally blurts out her improper affection for Sir William, she knows she’s done. This is a world where the social code doesn’t allow any flexibility.

Downton Abbey, as early as the pilot, establishes that, even though it takes place many years earlier, its universe has more room for lenience. The most dramatic story in the show’s first episode is the arrival at Downton of John Bates (Brendan Coyle). Bates has been hired to serve as valet to Lord Robert Crawley (Hugh Bonneville), the family patriarch. He and Lord Robert had served in the military together, during the Boer War. However, Bates was injured in battle, and now uses a cane. Due to the prejudices of the time, the rest of the household staff think this makes Bates unsuited for the job, and Lord Robert is under a lot of pressure to fire him. Despite his personal respect for the man, Sir Robert does bow to custom, and fires Bates. It appears that the episode will end on this downer note, but then, at the last minute, Sir Robert has a change of heart, chases down the car carrying Bates away, and rehires him, because “it isn’t right.” The world of Downton Abbey is one where justice prevails.

‘Downton Abbey: A New Era’ Returns to ‘Gosford Park’s Film Industry Mileu

Downton Abbey had its finale in 2016, there were two motion pictures that returned to the world of the Crawleys, the second of which, Downton Abbey: A New Era, came out in 2022. The movie exaggerates some of Downton Abbey’s most contentious flaws, dialing the “warm and cuddly” vibes of the TV show to the point where they become uncanny. But, interestingly, it brings Fellowes full circle back to Gosford Park. Both movies contain a major subplot about the culture clash between the stodgy British upper class, and the free-spirited artists of the movie business. After Julian Fellowes was brought onto write Gosford Park, Robert Altman threw him a curveball: for whimsical reasons we may never understand, Altman told Fellowes that the party that makes up the entirety of the plot would have to include, as a guest, the real-life 1930s Welsh movie star Ivor Novello. Fellowes had no choice but to make this idea work, and he was able to integrate Novello into the script with wonderful complexity.

Novello is played by Jeremy Northam as a man who has grown amiably weary of his own celebrity. His interactions with the rest of the cast have a moving depth to them. The McCordles treat him like hired help, but he tolerates their treatment because, as a posh actor, he “impersonates these people for a living.” The Countess of Trentham professes to hold his profession in aloof contempt – but somehow she knows the box office report on his latest film. The staff are thrilled to have a movie star as a guest, but when he sings, they can only listen to him from outside the door. The presence of Hollywood illuminates and heightens the contradictions in this uptight society.

It’s a little different in Downton: A New Era. When a film crew comes to shoot at Downton Abbey, the clichés are more in force. The wild and crazy movie people bring their modern ways to the baffled and frightened aristocrats who live forever in the past. Their presence doesn’t heighten the tensions, it brings resolution and catharsis. There is one scene in particular that is a perfect embodiment of the fantasy the Downton franchise offered. In need of background actors, the visiting filmmakers cast the “downstairs” staff. They all play aristocrats, seated around the Downton family table at which they normally serve. The Crawleys beam with joy as they watch the filming.

Of course, it’s unreasonable to expect a TV show, even a very good one, to maintain the high level of quality as a great film. Gosford Park was stuffed with movie stars, even in small roles. That’s not possible to maintain over the life of a series. And that’s just one type of creative abundance that can only be achieved in the short, concentrated burst of a film production. To expect a show to deliver that, week in, week out, would be like demanding caviar for breakfast every day. Who do you think you are, the King of England?

Downton Abbey is streaming on Peacock in the U.S. Watch Now