Downton Abbey, Christmas Special (U.S. premiere Feb. 19, 2012) - Spoilers embargoed

Cafe Society
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[QUOTE=Kimstu]
My only guess is that Carson was in fact in London with them for most of the Season but came back to Downton a few days early to get things shipshape before the family returned.
[/QUOTE]

That could be.

I wonder what type of staff their London house would have during the other nine months of the year. Somebody would have to be on hand to keep it from looking like Miss Havisham’s crib and also to keep burglars out, plus his lordship and other members of the family probably made periodic journeys there for business or when staff members were being tried for murder and the like. I wonder if the year rounders would be just a caretaker or a service.

I would imagine that for the skeleton crew left behind at Downton the period of the family’s absence would probably be one of the busiest times of the year as it was probably when they did things like waxing floors, really thorough window washing, painting, general repairs, etc., that would be difficult to do with the family in residence.

[QUOTE=Eve]
Did anyone else find the Servants’ Ball hugely embarrassing and condescending?
[/QUOTE]

It’s interesting doing a comparison-contrast between the servants in WW1 era England and in the era of The Help. Both societies had such a rigid class structure. The southern U.S. based it largely on race instead of title, and a black chauffeur who tried to romance his employer’s daughter would have been lucky to see the sunset, but in both societies it seemed generally accepted by many on both sides that your employers were just intrinsically from-birth your superiors and not just on the economic scale.

Re: Sir Richard’s confusion that the servants not working on Christmas Eve and New Years Day, I thought that this was a fairly common tradition. In fact for some reason I even had it in my head that in some great houses the servants were treated as honored guests at a [catered] party in the dining room, a custom dating back to the Saturnalia. While Downton does part of this, I thought it was common enough that even a commoner like Sir Richard would have some notion of it. Does anybody else recall anything of a tradition like this?

62

I kept expecting to discover it was Anna.

63

Lady and Lord G came and went a lot in Season 1 and Hughes never traveled with them as I remember. In fact Hughes once told Lady G she had used the family’s time away to catch up on doing things for the house that can’t be done when the family is home. And wasn’t that the opening scene of the first episode of Season 1 when they were hustling to uncover the furniture in time for the family’s return? I seem to remember Mrs Hughes and Anna in that opening scene.

I also personally knew the housekeeper/cook/maid of an American family who had different sets of servants for each house. For them the servants usually stayed home and took a breather when the family was away, and then got the house ready when the family was headed back home.

I want to be Violet when I grow up. :smiley:

64

My first vote for Vera’s murderer goes to Richard. But of course he wouldn’t do it himself. He’d hire someone, and pay them highly for their trouble. Maybe that’s why he was so angry at Mary, because he had gone to such extremes to secure her dignity? After all, if found out he could be hanged.

My second vote goes to O’Brien. She was the one who called Vera, and then regretted it. So in her remorse and desperation to save the dignity of the house she poisoned Vera. She had overheard enough to know that Bates would get blamed for it, but she didn’t care because her primary concern was to save the dignity of the house. Maybe she thought it would make up for the harm she had done to Lady G? But then she realized Bates’ trial and conviction hurt the family anyway.

I should know the answer to this but can’t remember; was O’Brien called to testify for the prosecution about what she overheard while eavesdropping?

65

Pre-meditated murder seems like a stretch for O’Brian. The worst thing we’ve seen her do was leave the soap for Cora to slip on, and even that she regretted and tried to go back and fix almost immediately.

Plus Vera was in London, wasn’t she? Bates needed to take a train to see her. It would be pretty tough for O’Brian to disappear long enough to travel there and back without being noticed.

66

Whichever poor working still does the laundry and shines the shoes must have been irked at the fully liveried footmen in their white ties and black patents out pounding the countryside for Isis.

67

Yeah, admittedly my vote for O’Brien as murderess is full of holes. But I think the worst she’s done is to coach Thomas on how to be a better villain. I give O’Brien a lot of credit for helping Thomas learn to be so successfully awful, which has compromised the integrity of the entire house. Even though O’Brien told Thomas that he’s so bad he makes her look “selfless” in comparison.

68

I have no inside information, but my theory is that she went back to Richard asking for more money or something and he had her killed.

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[QUOTE=MsJinx]
One odd thing about Mrs. Hughes’ testimony was the prosecution asking if Mr. Bates threatened or was going to hit Vera. I don’t recall him saying he was going to, just Vera saying go ahead, and I’ll get pictures made. Mrs. Hughes could not see them, just hear them, so there should have been some objection that she did not know if he was poised to strike her or not.
[/QUOTE]

I agree. I was frustrated that the defense didn’t object to any question asked by the prosecution.

[QUOTE=MsJinx]
{snip} In prompting Lord G, the prosecution referred to something that Bates had volunteered about their conversation. Mr. Bates is just too honest for his own good.
[/QUOTE]

As was Lord G. Why didn’t he use the old ploy of saying, “I don’t remember, as I didn’t pay much attention to it” or, “I can’t recall his exact words”? ARGH!

[QUOTE=Sampiro]
{snip} Perhaps that’s why Violet refused to dance [The Black Bottom] with [Thomas].
[/QUOTE]

I got the feeling she didn’t know what he was talking about and misinterpreted his remark. Didn’t he ask her, “What about a ‘Black Bottom’?” To which she replied something along the lines of “I hope not”, thus making their exchange a double entendre. But I’d have to watch the episode again to be sure of the dialog.

[QUOTE=Eve]
I dunno: they dropped the “Crispy Crawley: Is He Is Or Is He Ain’t?” subplot quickly enough.
[/QUOTE]

“Crispy Crawley”!! ! Ha ha ha ha ha! :smiley:

[QUOTE=MsJinx]
Is anyone else concerned about Carson?
[/quote]

Oooh, yes! I hope they don’t kill him off. Jim Carter is the main reason I watch DA.

[QUOTE=MsJinx]
It was kind of sweet when Mary explained the whole Turk mess to her father, and he said it wasn’t the first secret/scandal in the family, something like that. I wonder if he was thinking of his near dalliance with the maid…
[/quote]

I cynically think Julian Fellowes shoe-horned the dalliance in, in order remove Lord G’s ability to take the moral high-ground with Mary when he learned the truth about “The Night of the Dead Turk”.

[QUOTE=MsJinx]
Now that Mary doesn’t need to run away to America…
[/quote]

I think she still does, because of the crapstorm of bad press Sir Richard is about to unload on the Granthams. Although, given how much DA costs to make, I don’t think it’ll have any scenes shot in the USA.

[QUOTE=MsJinx]
I wonder if Cora’s mother will make her appearance at Downton?
[/quote]

Not only this, but it’ll cost less to bring MacLaine to Downton than to send any of the Crawleys to the USA.

[QUOTE=Sampiro]
{snip} I wonder what type of staff their London house would have during the other nine months of the year…plus his lordship and other members of the family probably made periodic journeys there for business…
[/quote]

What I understand, based purely on my reading of novels set in Regency/Victorian/Edwardian Great Britain, is that the London residence was not opened if the lord of the manor came to town by himself. He would stay at his club.

[QUOTE=Sampiro]
Re: Sir Richard’s confusion that the servants not working on Christmas Eve and New Years Day, I thought that this was a fairly common tradition.
[/QUOTE]

It seems to be a common tradition, and I suspect Fellowes was trying to point out how vulgarly nouveau riche Sir Richard is because, not only doesn’t he know about it, he objects to it.

70

Missed the edit window…

[QUOTE=MsJinx]
… I wonder if Cora’s mother will make her appearance at Downton? How else will she have scenes with Violet?
[/QUOTE]

[QUOTE=Toucanna]
Not only this, but it’ll cost less to bring MacLaine to Downton than to send any of the Crawleys to the USA.
[/QUOTE]

My apologies for any confusion.
Oh, and another thing I don’t get. Why did Anna have to open the door to Hepworth’s room when Lady Mary and Lady Rosamund wanted to find out what was going on?

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Hope I didn’t miss someone else posting this already: Print Out Vulture’s Downton Abbey Paper Dolls

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What exactly was the point of moving the trial to Yorkshire? :dubious: There was no dramatic need for Lord Grantham & co to stay close to home; just change a few lines of dialoge so they’re going to London. It’s not like they’d need to build any new sets than they did. You’re a barrister, aren’t you? How did criminal appeals work then? How realistic is the prospect of this ending up in the House of Lords in series 3?

[QUOTE=Toucanna]
…Oh, and another thing I don’t get. Why did Anna have to open the door to Hepworth’s room when Lady Mary and Lady Rosamund wanted to find out what was going on?
[/QUOTE]

How else were they supposed to catch them in the act? :confused:

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As head housemaid, she would probably be the one with the keys to open the doors if they were locked.

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I know there was a general trend of turning stately homes like Downton into things like hotels and schools after WWII (when they weren’t demolished entirely), but did that occur on a smaller scale after WWI as well? I can’t see Sir Richard being charitable enough to turn Haxby into a school, but selling it to a hotelier seems like a definate possibility. Just imagine Dowager Lady Grantham’s reaction to middle-class tourists holidaying next-door to Downton. :wink:

75

Could Vera have been murdered by Bates’ mother?

.

76

Bates’ mother already dead (recall one of the things Vera was after was Bates’ inheritance.)

That would’ve been a good twist though.

77

The housekeeper had the keys; Anna borrowed them from her when The Lady Detectives were on The Case of The Eloping Daughter.

For The Case of the Conniving Ladies Maid, Anna knew where they were kept. And the housekeeper was busy at the party…

78

Ah. I couldn’t remember the timeline.

79

I think Vera Bates committed suicide. I also think both Anna and Bates think the other one did it. That’s why they married so quickly; each was thinking this would prevent them from having to testify against the other. If my theory is correct, I hope the police find the vindictive suicide note soon.

80

Other than Bates’ comment that his visit with Vera was ‘worse than you can imagine’ or whatever he said, we don’t know anything about what happened. He may have talked to Anna about it before he was arrested, but we aren’t privy to that. BTW, what accommodations were there for those two, after their one-night honeymoon in the luxury suite? did they then have to go back to their separate rooms? I don’t recall how long it was between his return and the arrest.