CAST OF DOWNTON ABBEY REVEAL FILMING SECRETS

DOWNTON ABBEY SPECIAL: The cast and crew reveal the secrets of filming Downton

By Jessica Fellowes

Last updated at 10:07 PM on 9th September 2011

Pot plants, what Brilliantine did to Carson's hair and why mushrooms were vital for gory battle scenes...

It is authenticity, not just period atmosphere, that has made Downton Abbey such a huge success. Listen carefully and you will hear the actors say ‘nye-ther’ and ‘eye-ther’ rather than ‘nee-ther’ or ‘ee-ther’, an Americanism that didn’t come to these shores until American GIs were based here in the Second World War.

Attention to detail is vital – not least because, as with the first series, eagle eyes will be out there among the millions of viewers trying to spot glitches and historical howlers. Every attempt is made to get the period right.

Dan Stevens, playing Matthew Crawley, recalls having to re-shoot a scene because he hadn’t stood up when Violet, the Dowager Countess, came into a room. He also had to learn to doff his hat on any occasion a woman walked past.

LADIES IN WAITING: Muffled up against the cold in their parkas - and protective hairnets - Michelle Dockery (Lady Mary) and Laura Carmichael (Lady Edith) take a refreshment break between takes

‘We worked hard on my doff,’ he says.

That quest for authenticity began with the grand house used for filming. The country was scoured for the right location, and 30 possible houses inspected, before Highclere Castle in Berkshire, home of the Earl of Carnarvon, was chosen.

The imposing Highclere, built in the mid-19th century, looked the real deal from the outside. The interior was perfect too, largely because its contents were those of an aristocratic family similar to the Grantham clan. Very few props had to be imported to create the right period feel.

‘But we did bring in potted palms,’ says production designer Donal Woods, ‘because they were all the rage back then.’

Working at Highclere, the cast were awed by its grandeur. When Jessica Brown-Findlay, who plays Lady Sybil, first saw the looming house and stood in its vast rooms, she realised what it signified.

MAKING A MEAL OF DINNER TIME: A dining scene may last only a few minutes, but it can take between 10 and 12 hours to film. This is because the director needs to shoot each actor in turn, and that can mean three or four takes per person. Dan Stevens, who plays Matthew Crawley, says he quickly learned not to eat during these scenes. 'If you decide you're going to eat, say, five mouthfuls of chicken, then by the end of the day you've had about 70 and it's cold and congealed'

For the Granthams, it wasn’t about demonstrating how rich they were but about preserving and valuing a home that their family had lived in for generations. ‘Suddenly I could see why they were so protective,’ she says. But there was one problem with Highclere as a location.

Like most great houses today, the public rooms are beautifully maintained but the servants’ quarters no longer exist. So for the below-stairs scenes, Donal had an entire oor of servants’ quarters constructed at Ealing Studios, 60 miles away. That meant scenes above and below stairs were sometimes shot weeks apart, which made for interesting continuity issues.

Even servants need a touch of make-up

Thomas the footman might be filmed leaving the kitchen with a plate of food and not appear in the dining room until a fortnight later! The look of the kitchen, with its grey walls, buff-coloured cupboards and flagstone floor, was the result of research trips to real country houses, notably Harewood House in Leeds.

It had to exude a busy atmosphere compared with the calmness of upstairs. ‘This is the factory end of a beautiful house,’

Donal explains. ‘It’s not a National Trust picture of serenity.’ Its colours were muted and monochrome to emphasise that there were two utterly different worlds within one house. ‘The idea was that when the camera took the viewer from “below stairs”, through the green baize door and into “upstairs”, they’d be hit with a blaze of colour, almost like a slap in the face.’

Strangely, authenticity went so far as to create an unwitting divide in the cast, between those playing upstairs characters and those in downstairs roles. Filming in two different locations added to this, since few of the upstairs actors ever filmed at Ealing, and vice versa. For Zoe Boyle, playing newcomer Lavinia, Matthew’s love interest, Highclere was the place to be.

‘We all stayed in a hotel near the house and there was the feel of a theatre company about it. Maggie Smith was hilarious and had us all in stitches.’

But Siobhan Finneran, as O’Brien, Lady Grantham’s maid, preferred Ealing. ‘I loved all the scenes around the table in the servants’ hall. We all got on very well and there was such a good atmosphere there.’

Finding the clothes to fit the period was a challenge for costume designer Susannah Buxton.

‘They have to be hired, bought or made,’ she explains. ‘And in the same way that the people of that time would re-use pieces for themselves, we re-use them in the show. The jacket Lady Edith wears down on the farm in Series Two was one of her smart jackets from the first series.’

LOOK AT HIM GO! Allen Leech, who plays chauffeur Tom Branson, says the 1920 Renault he has to drive is a nightmare. 'The owner drives it first, then I get in and the gears start clunking. Once a huge piece of metal fell off. It's a hand-crank start and you have to be careful because once it starts spinning you can lose your thumb'

For Anne ‘Nosh’ Oldham, the hair and make-up designer, there was a particular problem because most women of that period did not use make-up. The answer was to use an Armani or Chanel base, which is translucent but gives luminosity for the cameras. ‘We also add a bit of blusher and some lip colour.’

They used Brilliantine hair cream in Jim Carter’s hair, for his role as butler Carson, until he said it made him stick to his pillow at night. But it was with the war-wounded that the make-up department came into its own. A character blinded by poison gas wore special lenses that made his eyes look ‘cloudy’.

Real amputees played soldiers who had lost limbs in battle, but bloody stumps had to be fabricated.

‘We got the best effect with apples, using mushrooms for the exposed bone,’ says Anne. ‘It was all held together with gelatine and stuck on a pop-sock so that the men didn’t have to wear it all day but could put it on when needed.’

The new series of Downton Abbey starts on ITV1 next Sunday, 18 September.

PERFECT SETTINGS

Finding the right locations took the producers all over the country

Highclere in Berkshire (left) and Ealing Studios in West London (right)

1. HIGHCLERE, BERKSHIRE

The grand country seat of the Earls of Carnarvon had the right feel both inside and out for the Granthams’ ancestral home.

2. EALING STUDIOS, WEST LONDON

Most of the scenes below stairs were filmed on purpose-built sets in London – so some actors had to travel back and forth.

Ackenham in Suffolk (left) and Bampton in Oxfordshire (right)

3. ACKENHAM, SUFFOLK

The drama in the trenches was filmed at a location in Ackenham, near Ipswich, built for First and Second World War re-creations.

4. BAMPTON, OXFORDSHIRE

All the village scenes, including the exterior footage of the Crawleys’ house, were shot in the pretty location of Bampton.

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