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Released in UK cinemas on Friday, "Downton
Abbey: A New Era" sees the return of the fictitious aristocratic
Crawley family and their servants who run a sprawling estate in
the English countryside in the early 20th century.
"We've been a familiar group for over a decade and for nearly
all of us to be there was remarkable," actor Hugh Bonneville,
who plays patriarch Robert Crawley, told Reuters of filming
during the COVID-19 pandemic at the movie's premiere in London
on Monday.
"I appreciated the job far more than I'd ever done before after
the experience that the world had been going through, and I
think the release now is just a tonic at a time when we need a
bit of escapism at this point. This is pure entertainment," he
said of the film.
The movie begins with Crawley's mother, Lady Violet, played by
veteran Maggie Smith, surprising her family with the news that
she has inherited a villa in the south of France from a man she
met decades earlier.
Led by Crawley, the family travels to France to visit the villa.
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.
"It's a really great script and it's very different. Half the
characters go off to France and the rest of us stay at the house
and the house is invaded by a film crew and actors," said
Michelle Dockery, who plays Lady Mary, the eldest Crawley
daughter.
"It's a really different type of movie for Downton ... and I
think the tie to a new era is very much about the world sort of
moving on and changing and I think it's great to see the
characters sort of adjusting to that," she said
As well as Bonneville, Dockery and Smith, Elizabeth McGovern and
Laura Carmichael reprise their roles as Crawley family members
while Dominic West, Hugh Dancy and Laura Haddock are new
additions to the cast.
"Downton Abbey: A New Era" is the second film to be made from
the series, which first aired in 2011. It went on for six
seasons and gained a huge following in Britain and the United
States.
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. But back and back they come.
So who knows really?"
(Reporting by Sarah Mills; Additional reporting by Marie-Louise
Gumuchian; Writing by Marie-Louise Gumuchian)
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