‘Downton Abbey’ creator Julian Fellowes reflects on beloved historical drama

Read the Full Transcript

• Lisa Desjardins:

  Downton Abbey, the beloved historical drama of charm and wit, is coming to an end. At its peak, it drew more than 13 million viewers, the most watched drama in PBS history, and it's going out with some flair.

  The movie Downton Abbey Grand Finale is out in theaters now. Stephanie Sy spoke with Downton Abbey creator Lord Julian Fellowes. He's also the creator of the HBO series the "Gilded Age" and an Academy Award winning writer for "Gosford Park." It's part of our arts and culture series Canvas.

• Stephanie Sy:

  Julian Fellowes, you know, since Downton Abbey first aired in the U.S. on PBS, it really feels like you and the Crawleys are part of the PBS family. So it's so good to have you on the PBS NewsHour.

  Lord Julian Fellowes, Creator, "Downton Abbey": Well, it's very nice to be here. And of course, you can imagine after 16 years, I shall also feel rather strange when I'm separated from the Crawleys.

• Stephanie Sy:

  Well, let's get into the grand finale of the Crawleys, hopefully without spoiling the movie, because it begins with Lady Mary looking gorgeous as always, but shortly after getting kicked out of a party, she's divorced and now is still stain on the Crawley name.

• Woman:

  I'll go. I'm very sorry, Lady Petersfield. I shouldn't have come.

• Stephanie Sy:

  Why did you choose that as one of the central conflicts of this final chapter?

• Julian Fellowes:

  For me, the acceptance of divorce is really about accepting that the Victorian age is finished and that they have moved on to a new world. And that, I think, is an important step for the Crawley family, but also as it was for everyone, really, that they had been sort of running on Victorian values, and yet now at last, they had to accept that times had changed and the world was a different place.

• Man:

  Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to 1930.

• Stephanie Sy:

  It seems like the film places a lot of emphasis on family loyalty and love. Grudges are overlooked. They kind of get past them. Why was that important to you?

• Julian Fellowes:

  Well, I think that family is about loyalty and I think the show is about two things, really. One is it's about family, the power of family and so on. And the other is about accepting change and

  And the fact is that if you live through a period of change, and all periods are periods of change, then you must learn to change with it and to get on with it and to move into the new world. And if you refuse to do that, then you're stuffed. And that's really what I feel the show is about.

  It's true that the family. I mean, I don't know that they approve of Mary getting divorced, but nevertheless, when the chips are down, they are loyal to each other, and that's important.

• Stephanie Sy (voice-over):

  One such loyal family member, played by the late Maggie Smith, was Violet Crawley, the tough and dry matriarch known for her scene stealing zingers.

• Woman:

  There's nothing simpler than avoiding people you don't like, avoiding one's friends. That's the real test . Stephanie Sy: With the death of Maggie Smith last year, Julian, did it feel like you had a vacuum to fill?

• Julian Fellowes:

  You know, when you work together, you pick up how the other one works. And she knew how to say what I'd written and I knew how to write what she'd say. And together it was quite a strong partnership, I don't think. You know, it wasn't a great friendship. We didn't take a house by the sea together and sit there eating supper in the late night. That wasn't it at all. It was that we knew how to work together.

  And I feel very blessed having enjoyed that for as long as I did with Maggie and not having to explain things, you know, not having to explain why this line is funny. She just always understood the people I wrote. And that was something.

• Stephanie Sy:

  Besides the dame Maggie Smith, all along, you've had an ensemble cast of an extremely high caliber, not to mention cameos from the likes of Shirley MacLaine and Paul Giamatti.

• Man:

  Perhaps I'll move here. Sure. I'd be more English than Robert in a trice.

• Stephanie Sy:

  How much did you interact with the actors in the process, and do they have input into what happens to their characters?

• Julian Fellowes:

  You gradually come to the point when you're writing for a performance you've already seen, and so you're not guessing how they're going to be acting. You know how they're going to be acting.

• Man:

  What's that?

• Woman:

  I don't know. The family upstairs.

• Man:

  The family upstairs.

• Julian Fellowes:

  And the longer the show goes on, and went on quite a long time, you gradually understand which actors can make you cry, which actors are very funny. Which actors are both, which, of course, Maggie was.

  And you start, in a way, if you like, to write for that. And in that sense, I feel that the characters were created by me writing and the actors together to make these people happen. And I enjoyed that very much. And I loved the cast. They worked together very well. They were a very strong ensemble.

  I think there were a lot of very good friendships that came together and I think will outlast the show, you know, which is just as it should be.

• Stephanie Sy:

  The theme of change, which you mentioned earlier, bearing down on tradition in good ways and bad, has been there, as you said, since the series started. And by the end, we have not only a divorced woman in high society, but a former servant who ends up in a gay relationship with a Hollywood actor.

• Man:

  I suppose you think Lady Mary's lost her moral compass, Mr. Carson?

• Woman:

  Perhaps we should all have a different compass these days.

• Stephanie Sy:

  When you conceived of the Crawleys, Julian, did you envision you would be making these cultural, maybe even moral statements?

• Julian Fellowes:

  I think the statements are cultural. With the gay character of Thomas, I wanted to remind people of how tough it was, you know, I mean, we had letters from people saying. Are you seriously saying that homosexuality was illegal in 1912?

  Well, it was illegal in my day, in the early 60s. I remember when it became legal. And one of my brother's godfathers was a gay peer, which was quite wild in those days, and he lived with his other half in a house near Sloane Square.

  And I remember it well. I used to go there as a child all the time. So I think, to some extent, I had witnessed how hard all this was, and now I had the chance to put it into my own writing, you know, which is one of the great luxuries, of course, of being a writer.

• Stephanie Sy:

  You yourself, I understand, Julian, came from an aristocratic class that would be foreign to most of us Americans. I don't know if you ever had a Crawley kind of life, but there is a sense of longing I sense in the Downton story. I wonder if that's your longings in any way that you're expressing.

• Julian Fellowes:

  Well, it's quite an interesting question, really, and I'm not sure I'm absolutely clear about the answer. I come from a much more modest family than the Crawleys, and certainly the great days of my forebears was way back in the 19th century, so we don't have to waste too much time on that.

  But I think there was a sort of order in the world that seems to be missing at the moment. I don't know that I long for a Victorian way of life and all of that stuff. I don't think I do. But I do long for a world of order and good manners and where people are pleasant to each other and everyone stops getting so angry about everything. I suppose that is true. Yes.

• Stephanie Sy:

  That is Julian Fellowes, thank you so much for joining us.

• Julian Fellowes:

  Thank you for having me.

Improved audio player available on our mobile page