Further, the LWT hierarchy changed during the production of the first season, and the incomers were less than sympathetic to the series.
Connecting controller to megaseg series#
After a rejection from Granada TV in Manchester, London Weekend Television (LWT) commissioned a first series of 13 episodes with an option for a second.īy the time Upstairs, Downstairs aired, it had gone through almost as any revisions as changes of name (these include Two Little Maids in Town, The Servants’ Hall, and 165 Eaton Place). Obviously, he was a big fan of Noel Coward’s Cavalcade. TV producer John Hawkesworth renamed the show Below Stairs, changed the focus from comedy to drama, and moved the whole shebang to an Edwardian townhouse in London. They first conceived a comedy series, called Behind the Green Baize Door, based on the exploits of a pair of housemaids working in a Victorian country house. The original idea for Upstairs, Downstairs came from Jean Marsh and Eileen Atkins. I understand that other, less “mega” season-based collections recently released in the UK feature both episode commentaries from key figures and more extensive documentaries, but these are not available for Region One at present. Unforgivably, there are no captions to identify the interviewees or their roles. It also includes a bonus documentary, the affectionate but far from revelatory “ Upstairs, Downstairs Remembered: The 25th Anniversary Special” (in which the biggest secret shared is Simon Williams’ explanation that his character, the perpetual loser James Bellamy, seldom smiled because of the adhesive used to attach his handlebar moustache).
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Upstairs, Downstairs – Collector’s Edition Megaset: The Complete Series Plus Thomas and Sarah brings together all five seasons (68 episodes), plus 13 episodes of the inferior spin-off Thomas and Sarah. And Nicola Pagett, who played Anna, had established her credentials as Elizabeth Bellamy in London Weekend Television’s Upstairs, Downstairs, a series inspired by the success of The Forsyte Saga.
Eric Porter, who played Karenin, had been the figurehead of the BBC’s superb 1967 adaptation of John Galsworthy’s The Forsyte Saga. In many ways, however, Anna Karenina was the culmination of a process that had begun 10 years earlier. The BBC was long known for excellence in historical drama, and throwing yourself under a train must have seemed an entirely appropriate response to the state of the nation. And the BBC was presenting a critically acclaimed adaptation of Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina. Margaret Thatcher had her cold steel gaze fixed firmly on the exposed throat of the Labour Party’s Prime Minister, James Callaghan. The Sex Pistols were burning down Buckingham Palace. The number of people out of work had reached 1,600,000 and was climbing steadily. In 1977, the UK was in debt to the International Monetary Fund and committed to making harsh cuts in public spending. Meg Wynn Owen, “ Upstairs, Downstairs Remembered: The 25th Anniversary Special” And you can re-look at one episode, or five, and still find new things in it, and still enjoy the familiar. It’s like a book you can re-read, a classic book.
I do believe a great strength of Upstairs, Downstairs is that you can dip into it again and again.
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