Julian Fellowes' Belgravia - starts tonight, ITV1

[QueenOfTheAndals]

Anyone planning on watching? I loved Downton so I'm looking forward to this. It might be just the sort of escapist drama featuring posh people in nice frocks that we all need right now!

I watched again tonight. I quite enjoyed it as the action was a bit more sequential - few flashbacks.

I also liked that it focused on the dramas of middle-aged or elderly characters, so something a bit different.

I thought Oliver Trenchard was Sophias son. Tamsin Greig and Harriet Walters make this worth watching as the matriarchs. How does making people guess who Charles Pope really is benefit the Countess because he is still illegitimate?

I don’t think it benefits the countess but she can admit to her son having fathered a child because there was no shame to the man. On the other hand, there will be disgrace to the Trenchard because women having a child out of wedlock brought disgrace to the whole family. Usual double standard.

Oliver Trenchard is Sophia's younger brother.

Ok I've not seen any of this , BUT I like a good costume drama and esp. Tamsin Grieg. Is it worth recording????

@pearlkent

I thought the same. TG looked no older.

PG still seems to be Gene Hunt somehow.

Do like it but the servant bit seems a bit Downton 100 years' earlier

Ref. the servants . Of course it IS meant to be 100 years before DA. is it the plots or the acting that make the servants bit seem bad?

I haven't followed the plot that much as it and the dialogue seem to just be echos of so many other things.

But have been watching the sets, etc..

I think the only difference when TG is meant to be younger is that her hair is a slightly darker more solid shade. (Maybe?)

And apart from the Waterloo scenes isn't it set about 60 - 70 years before the start of DA.

Would think the comparison of the downstairs scenes would be with Victoria.

I meant the format was similar to DA with the servants playing a part in the drama. Could almost see lord Grantham in one lcharacter (dead son's father) ?

I'm not sure of the dates but wasn't Waterloo around 1810 or earlier? I know that Vic. became Queen in 1837 that's roughly 26 years after it.

Correct me if I'm wrong

Was Waterloo 1815 -top of my head

Watchable fluff, but yes some of the acting wasn't that great.

Mmnn Not sure, wasn't it when Nelson died? That was earlier I think woodhill (I'm lazy I can't be bothered to google it !).

Definitely 1815 - did double check

Napoleon facing his Waterloo

Nelson - Trafalgar - 1805

I'm so naive. I thought that the Countess of Brockenhurst, motivated by a mixture of her maternal instincts and her utter (justified) contempt for her nephew and heir, was plotting to find a way to have her son's and Sophia's "marriage" somehow made legal. Then and the Earl could claim their grandson as a legal heir and fuck the nephew over.

Oh and Fellows is a bit of a plagiarist. There were a number of storylines in Downton that were lifted almost directly from the original, far superior, Upstairs Downstairs. As just copying the concept wasn't enough.

I think the plot is to make him the legal heir, but by adopting him.

And somehow sluring who the mother was, without publicy naming her, thinking that the Trenchards would then never acknowledge their connection. Maybe?

It's a bit of a surprise to see James Fleet play a schemer. Usually he's cast as a "nice but dim" type.

We recently rewatched the reboot of Upstairs Downstairs with Keeley Hawes and Ed Stoppard. It is brilliant, SO good. It's such a shame it didn't go on for longer

I'm quite enjoying it. Its perfect escapism at the moment

Yes, god knows we could all use a bit of escapism right now!

DH googled it WAS 1815. Nelson died in 1804 not at Waterloo (oh dear my garbled version of history !!!)

@davros
Was that on a streaming service? I watched it a few years ago when it was broadcast and remember it being quite good.

Nelson died in 1804

1805 - 21st October.