Downton Abbey Finale: "If you're turning American on me, I'll go downstairs."

Exceeding all my wildest hopes and expectations, the final episode of Downton Abbey came ripping across my television screen.  With a powerful finish to the season that was sexy, dramatic, touching, and surprising, and which cast class gulfs into very sharp relief, it was as if the producers of this series set out to make my Downton dreams come true. (Not surprisingly, we also learn this week in the news that there will be a third series, so I am revving up for more Downton dreams already).

SPOILERS WARNING -- for Series (Season) 2 of Downton Abbey, Final Episode. Please beware and stop reading now if you don't want to know how things end.

Of the myriad aspects of the world of Granthams, perhaps the best and most continually interesting is the interplay of class on class. In this last episode, several story lines dealt head on with the shattering of social barriers after WWI.

And none did it better than the storyline of maid Ethel's "bastard" baby. Would she give her fatherless baby to the dead man's parents to raise in the upper reaches of society? This could be a hard story to sell to a modern audience which would understandably be thinking: "of course that baby should stay with its mother." But Downton Abbey does a great job of making this seem like the dilemma it would most certainly have been. The benefits to that child of being raised with money, position and name -- versus living in poverty with an unwed mother in 1919 or 1920 are substantial beyond our ability to really imagine. It appears by the end of this episode that Ethel will keep her child, citing the shocking idea that a child is best off with its mother.

Also dancing around class divisions, Sybil's continuing attachment to the chauffeur and desire to marry him is a show stopper early on.  The scene where Sybil declares to her family that she will marry Branson was extraordinarily done, full of wonderful acting. Even though by modern standards, this may not be earth-shattering stuff, Lord and Lady Grantham sell it as such. You can really feel the level of abomination that is felt by both the Granthams and by the people below stairs by this attachment. Mr. Carson's vehement: "have you no shame?" to Branson is tremendous. Neither side of the divide feels it easy or desirable to jump across that gulf.

I also really appreciate that here, Lord Grantham finally draws a line to his liberality. He is a character that continually surprises with his ability to be big and forgiving, respectful of subordinates, and open in his views, almost to the point that he doesn't feel real. He needed to take strong exception to Sybil's plans in order to be believable as an aristocrat. I'm glad he did. And when, for once, it is his American-born wife, Lady Grantham, who expresses a softer, more understanding sentiment toward her daughter, he has the great line: "If you're turning American on me, I'll go downstairs."

Speaking of great one-liners, the Dowager Countess Violet (Maggie Smith) can't be outdone and has a very nice one to Lady Edith who is moping about her sister's good luck in love and her own forlorn state. Says Violet: "Don't be defeatist dear; its very middle class."

Meanwhile, two of the most popular couples on the show: Mary & Matthew and Anna & Bates both have excitingly sexy moments.

Mary and Matthew share a dance, a declaration of feelings and even a kiss in a very romantic moment in a darkened downstairs hall. I'd forgotten how much I like the two of them together. It is all wonderful until Matthew's lovely fiance Lavinia spoils it by showing up and then later being noble about it all, and then later still, dying. (I knew someone would have to die of the Spanish flu and I am glad it wasn't Cora). It was right and proper for Lavinia to remove herself in this way, though this will not appear to make things any better for Matthew at present as he is now torn up by grief and guilt. We'll have to wait till next season to see if he can overcome those feelings before Mary marries the icky Richard.

Even better than Mary and Matthew kissing, has to be Bates and Anna getting married! This is almost too much; I couldn't have hoped for seeing that -- let alone seeing them together in a bed. Oh yeah. What? Bates being hauled away on a murder charge related to his ex-wife's suicide at the end. I'm OK with that. We certainly saw it coming and at least he got to have one night with Anna first....

This is the episode that just kept on giving. As if Mary & Matthew and Anna & Bates weren't enough, we get Lord Grantham and new maid Jane in some serious embraces -- are you kidding me! Can't believe they almost got down and dirty. They somehow make this cliche idea unbelievably touching. It doesn't feel like a cliche when it comes to Lord Grantham because he is so "not like that". Their scenes are hot and also very sad. Especially later as she tells him goodbye:

"Will you be happy?"
"I have no right to be unhappy. Which is almost the same."

So glad she left and they didn't get caught together. It can just be a slightly evil, but meaningful and tender relationship -- a moment of romantic excitement but not more. And am even more glad that all seems to be well again between he and Cora because they really are a great pair. LG deserves a bit of excitement; he's been such a great character this season, almost unseating Bates for the title of the unexpectedly appealing and surprisingly sexy heartthrob.

And to just bring everything round we have Thomas being helpful and obliging, and O'Brien being penitent -- though neither without ulterior motives I expect.

And by the end, Lord Grantham gives his blessing to Sybil and Branson, while Violet's words still ring in my ears:

"The aristocracy has not survived by its intransigence."

Lark Rise to Candleford a Lovely English Little House on the Prairie

Brendan Coyle and Claudie Blakely. Fabulous actors who play Robert and Emma Timmins so invitingly -- the kind of married couple that makes marriage look attractive :)

Lark Rise to Candleford, is a tv series based on the book trilogy penned about her growing up years by Flora Thompson. (A word about the title: 'Lark Rise' is the name of the small hamlet our narrator is from and 'Candleford' the larger and more refined market town up the road to which she moves to take on work at the post office).

Always one to see parallels -- I can't help it -- I am reminded of the American tv show based loosely on Laura Ingalls Wilder's coming of age. The differences in setting are of course profound; comparing the American prairie frontier with the Oxfordshire countryside is not something I mean to do, though the time period, as the world shifts into a new age and our characters are a bit subject to it and a bit insulated from it, are quite similar.

The fresh optimistic approach and the strong compelling solid central families (the Ingalls and Timmins) are another parallel. As is the past remembered through the eyes of a smart, good and driven daughter. Lark Rise to Candleford is more subtle and nuanced than LHOTP and written to a more grown up audience, but both have similar pattern of story development each episode. There are challenges and sometimes sensitive topics, but things are almost always gently resolved by the end of the show. Often with strong moral themes prevailing and good carrying the day.

I was taken with Coyle and Blakely in episode 5 of season 1 when I saw it recently. Robert is a good pillar of the community hard working man with deep skill and passionate ability to work on better things. In this episode Timmins, while doing a routine masonry job for pay, gets distracted by the blank keystone above the door and begins to spend all his spare time carving it.

His wife is in turmoil over lack of money, not knowing what he's been spending his time on but knowing it is not bringing in wages. She is stressed about feeding their large family and she spreads her torment to him.

"Why did you marry me? Why does a woman choose a man for what he is!? His passions and strengths?  - and then one by one take these things away from him." Coyle's performance here is beautiful.

By he's not an ordinary man and she's not an ordinary woman ... because he can verbalize this frustration and manage to do it with love as well as distress and she can hear him, understand and relent. Claudie and Brendan give so much sympathy to their characters you feel their pain and love and see both their positions. Wonderful. And because this is Lark Rise, good things happen for them :) The hard work and attention to artistic quality pay off financially as well as intrinsically when the lord of the manor house sees his talent and gives Timmins work repairing sculptures. Our couple endures and rejoices together and the moral of "following your bliss" is a strong happy message.

Higgins and Thornton of North & South -- One of the Best Male Relationships Ever.

Having nothing to do with how very handsome they both are, I have to say that Nicholas Higgins and John Thornton of North & South represent one of the best male relationships to develop on screen.

North & South is another one of these gorgeous English productions that many people are unaware of. This is not to be confused with the Kirstie Alley TV miniseries which came out in the 1980s and dealt with the American Civil War. I'm talking about the screen adaptation of Elizabeth Gaskell's novel of the same name. For those who don't know Elizabeth Gaskell, she writes of an early industrial time in England that falls in between the Regency that Jane Austen fans know well and the Victorian age of authors such as Dickens and the Brontes. Her novels are notable for depicting this instrumental time in the infancy of industrialization as the backdrop to plots of intricate character and romance. Her style is earthier than Austen but not so gritty or grisly as Dickens. Yes, there's a fairly high death count in her books, but its usually from disease and old age and not so much from murder.  :)

The division between the north and south is found in the eyes of our heroine Margaret Hale, who leaves a pastoral country society of southern English gentility when her father, a vicar, has a crisis of faith that propels him to leave his church. He moves his family to the sooty dank northern mill town of Milton where Margaret flounders to find a place for herself amid an entirely different lifestyle than the one she knew. Her story, especially her relationship with John Thornton, who runs a cotton mill, is the driving plot of the book, but the book and the 2004 television adaption are enriched by many other fascinating relationships that are almost as striking as hers with Thornton, such as Thornton's relationship with his mother, Margaret's relationship with the working class Higgins family, and, my favorite, Higgins' and Thornton's relationship.

Thornton is a mill owner, Nicholas Higgins a union leader. They start out as enemies on either side of a strike - their relationship somewhere between hatred and misunderstanding. After the strike fails and events conspire to make Higgins really need a job, the men meet in this scene and work out a tentative agreement for Higgins to work in Thornton's mill.

Thornton has probably never walked down this street before and it inspires both disgust and compassion. Notice the look on Higgins' face as he ushers Thornton into his tiny home; how his glance sweeps the street wondering what the neighbors might think. They are mistrustful of each other and each is trying to assert who he is. ("Work is work. I'll come. And what's more I'll thank you for it and that's a good deal from me.") They want to work together for different reasons but both rooted in the idea that Margaret can see what is best in them and they want to rise to it.  They both care deeply about Margaret -- but in different ways.

A grudging respect begins to develop between the two strong men as Thornton realizes that Higgins is exactly the kind of man he admires; he works hard, supports his family and even another man's family. He is honest and fair as well as intelligent.

Meanwhile Higgins also realizes that Thornton has concerns that run deeper than simply keeping the worker down and turning a profit and the two begin to forge a relationship that is really touching.

In my favorite scene (which I can't find a short clip of), Thornton finds Higgins working late and starts to get angry with him, thinking he's up to something and wants overtime. But Higgins says he just wanted to finish the day's work, because if Thornton goes under Higgins wont have a job. By chatting, they together realize the need for workers and their families to have fit meals. When Thornton voices an opinion that workers should eat well, Higgins is amused. "Careful. Someone will report you to the masters union for that kind of talk."

But Thornton's dander is up. "If men eat well they work well. And that will please masters too unless they're idiots. Which some of 'em are."

The two begin to discuss how a meal program at the mill might work and Higgins starts spewing out ideas. Thornton is impressed.

"You did bring your brains with you to work today didn't you?"
"Well I try to keep them hidden but I can't do without them altogether."

They both have a tongue in check impishness with each other. They understand one another and realize that their goals are actually quite well aligned.

By the end of the film Higgins calls Thornton by his name, not "master" and also, so perceptively and slyly finds a way to reveal the truth about a key piece of information that is keeping Margaret and Thornton apart.

Some of this production does not follow the book. But North & South is a perfect illustration of how an excellent screen adaptation can depart from a book in plot point but follow it in spirit and enhance its story for the screen. Every single choice the screen writer and director make that depart from the book add to the story. That is a remarkable thing for an adaptation to accomplish.


Higgins and Thornton of North & South -- One of the Best Male Relationships Ever.  LostinBritishTV

Downton Abbey's Anna & Bates and the Theory of Reality Fantasy

I have a new theory of fantasy. There are so many extraordinarily attractive people to be found in movies and on TV. These extraordinary people usually get to have exciting adventures, wear great clothes and hang out with other sexy people. For viewers, us regular folk, being attracted to purely fantasy people makes sense. They are perfect and gorgeous and fun to watch. They have lives we don't know or have and will never know or have and, honestly, don't even want to know or have. This is fantasy fantasy and it's nice, too.

But give me a choice between Brad Pitt and Brendan Coyle (Mr. Bates in the amazing television drama Downton Abbey), there is simply no contest. The winner is Mr. Bates. I know a lot of other people agree with me. Why is Mr. Bates and his touching relationship with Anna so deeply attractive?

Because of reality fantasy. Bates is someone we know -- or could know. He is flawed, interesting and compelling. He is both ordinary and extraordinary. His beauty is found partly on his face and partly in his character.  His face might not leap off the screen at you. It would be forgivable to not notice it at all and take him for just a regular person - a character actor. But blink, look again, and you'll see that he's fantasy normal. He is sort of every man, but he is so much better. Once you see it, it takes fire.

It radiates from the intelligent sparkle in his gaze. The depth of history and experience that lurks just below the surface. Oh, and maybe this only applies for Americans, but it resides in his to-die-for accent. It is found in his mischievousness mouth. The slight smile and beautiful curl to the lip line. He can talk. You can see that he can and will talk and say exactly what we want to hear - sometime. It resides in his broad, magnetic style. Once we stop to really see him, we know, instinctively, we want to get to know him better.  He works for a living. He walks with a limp. He is middle aged. He has a past. I don't know if I like him in spite of or because of these things.


Anna. Here is a woman who is beautiful on the surface and underneath. She is blond and young and pretty. But she is in a station in life where she might as well be anything else for all the good her charms will do her. She is past the first flower of youth. She works hard and is happy enough with her place but emptiness and longing are there as well. There is no real excitement in her life as she lives to work and serve. Yes, she is good -- through-and-through -- but she is not a simpery do-gooder. She is someone we like and would want to be friends with. She is someone we are, or have been.

But better.

Anna has spirit and consults her internal compass in deciding what is right or wrong. That internal compass allows her to: (1) drag a dead body from one part of the house to another in order to protect her mistress, (2) work to re-plant false evidence of theft in the room of Mr. Bates' foe after he tried to frame Bates, (3) open the corridor door between the male and female servants' halls when she was forbidden to do so, (4) seek out and conference with Bates' mother behind his back to try and clear his name, (5) cover up for her roommate when said roommate sneaks off for the day. Anna is forthright and unapologetic.

So, here is this lovely, grownup, lonely woman serving others in the house where she will likely live for a long time. The only men in her world are the completely out of reach aristocratic visitors and the servants like Thomas (the gay rogue), William (the shy, green, boy) and Carson (the much older butler). Almost from the moment she smiles a friendly welcome to Bates, we can see that this man, even though damaged goods in many ways, is the best opportunity for her in a long time. Opportunity, that is, for real friendship, shared exasperation with the goings on, and intelligent and thoughtful conversation.

By the time we learn that he is smart, kind, thoughtful, proud and sweet, Anna is already head over heels for Bates. When he walks into the kitchens where she sits alone and says tongue in cheek: "alone at last", we see the effect on her face.

For his part, when Bates comes to Downton Abbey, he is a slightly beaten man. He is deeply thankful for his chance to work. This situation must work out and he has his eye on nothing else. He is not thinking of love or even friendship - just living. Getting through. Making this work. Anna is kind to him and he's glad enough of it, but he isn't thinking about her. He has stopped seeing himself as a man. His disability, his age, and his past which includes war and taking the rap for a crime he didn't do, have put him where many of us are - in a course to the finish with blinders on. Plodding through as best as we can with the challenges life puts in front of us.

However, it doesn't take long for her presence to work on him at a deeper level. Seeing Anna and talking to her, he cannot help but notice how pretty she is. Deep inside he remembers women -- what it meant to be with a woman and it feels good to remember. But his crippled leg puts him in his place. He knows he is an old broken man. Almost against his will Bates begins to want to be young and whole again. I think this is why he looks for the limp-corrector and goes through the ordeal of trying to fix himself. He wants to be complete and even attractive. (He doesn't know, like we do, how very attractive he already is). Although the limp-corrector episode concludes with the idea that Bates must be content with who he is, we're not sure that lesson fully hits home. Instead it is his main cross and carrying it is the thing keeping him from Anna. He believes he doesn't deserve her.

How many of us regular people have lived this story from one side or the other? How many have been trapped in something small longing for something big? Or, have been changed by something big so much to think we don't deserve something small?

Anna and Bates are sexy, compelling and beautiful together because they are the story of life.

Check out Downton Abbey on Masterpiece


Downton Abbey's Anna & Bates and the Theory of Reality Fantasy. LostinBritishTV