The REAL Dowager of Downton Abbey

The real dowager of Downton Abbey is not the one portrayed by Dame Maggie Smith  (above) but a humble kitchen maid from Hove who left school at 14, went into service, married a milkman and didn't receive any further education until her mid-50s when her children left home and she decided to attend the University of the Third Age to 'better herself', studying for and taking English O Levels and A levels. She began to write about her experiences in service in the 1920s and 30s, something few individuals of similar humble origins had ever thought to do, assuming no one would be interested in their humble and, to them, humdrum lives, even if they possessed the creative urge. Notwithstanding the working classes were very much brought up to respect their 'elders and betters' in those days and accept that they were not supposed to 'get ideas above their station' in life. Not this former kitchen maid, who had always been a spirited girl with a mind of her own.

Much to her surprise her books were a hit and she became a housewife superstar, almost akin to a British real life Dame Edna Everage! Older readers may remember the familiar features of Margaret Powell who was seldom off the TV in the 1970s, and made regular appearances on Housewive's Choice. 

Jean Marsh and Eileen Atkins openly credited her book 'Below Stairs' as being the inspiration for their hit series 'Upstairs Downstairs' in the 1970s and now Julian Fellows (creator of Downtown Abbey) has credited both Margaret Powell as well as Upstairs Downstairs as being the inspiration for Downton Abbey, which is essentially 'Upstairs Downstairs' transplanted to a country house! And while Willy Russell does not credit Margaret Powell as the inspiration for his hit play and film 'Educating Rita', it is highly probable that she was.

After her initial success with 'Below Stairs' in 1968 there was no stopping Margaret Powell and the books poured out of her; 'Climbing the Stairs', 'The Treasure Upstairs' 'My Mother and I', 'Albert, My Consort', 'Margaret Powell's London Season', 'Margaret Powell's Cookery Book', 'Margaret Powell Down Under', 'Margaret Powell in America', 'Margaret Powell's 'Sweetmaking for Children' all followed and Margaret was in endless demand for interviews, openings and all manner of other excuses to don a party frock rather than a maid's pinny. 

My favourite of her books is 'Albert, My Consort',  the touching story of her long marriage to Albert the milkman, a disarmingly honest account of married life and all its ups and downs through wartime and beyond. I also enjoyed 'My Mother and I' where she interviews her indomitable mother about HER life in service, dating from late Victorian times! I have re-read both books recently and they paint a vivid picture of Hove in the early twentieth century. Hard to believe compared to the Hove of today.

Critics scorned Margaret's writing style as somewhat 'coarse' but they couldn't deter Margaret's millions of fans who lapped up her charming and witty candor and relished every detail of domestic life and servant's eye view she furnished. And she had a way with words all her own, so no one could accuse her of not having forged her own distinctive style. I first came across 'Below Stairs' in my grandmother's house when I was about ten and asked if I could borrow it. I quickly became hooked and before I knew it, had ordered every last Margaret Powell from the library and read it. Some of her books such as 'Climbing the Stairs' remain in print to this day, over forty years after she first wrote them. Most authors would be happy with that kind of shelf life.

Margaret's life even inspired a successful sit-com 'Beryl's Lot' which ran from 1973-77 featuring 'Beryl Humphries', a Battersea milkman's wife and mother of three, who decides as her 40th birthday approaches that she needs to broaden her horizons, which she accomplishes by enrolling on a philosophy course at night school. The series dealt with how Beryl's new ideas, attitudes and outlook affected her family, friends and neighbours.

Last week I listened as a Brighton taxi driver on Sussex radio related fond memories of picking Margaret up from her favourite pub and driving her home after her Sunday afternoon tipple each week, regular as clockwork, but always as nice as pie and 'merry', rather than drunk. Always 'a real lady' (well she'd observed enough of them during her life!) She liked to let her hair down, did Margaret, even in her 70s, but shy as she wasn't, she never let her fame go to her head. Celebrities of today could learn a lot.

Here's the characterful Margaret being interviewed by Russell Harty.  Note how the original Brighton accent has a hint of cockney about it, something noticeable in my mother's elderly Brighton relations.

Under the Bonnet of the Bonnet Drama

This year sees the 40th anniversary of the BBC's biggest international success story - The Onedin Line, the first series they sold worldwide and which is still big in the former Yugoslavia and selling as a DVD box set 40 years later.

Following the fortunes of a mid-19th century Liverpool shipping dynasty as steam ships aka 'floating kettles' begin to overtake sailing ships, this mix of pithy social commentary with riveting storyline devised by former real-life seaman Cyril Abraham kept viewers hooked for ten years from 1971 and formed the seminal Sunday night backdrop of my early childhood with its unforgettable theme tune of Khatchaturian's 'Spartacus'. Watching a couple of series again recently, it has lost none of its power to mesmerise, even if the stock storm footage and sets seem a little more obvious to the more sophisticated eye (and television set).

Prior to The Onedin Line, vicars were previously shocked when entire congregations stayed in to watch The Forsyte Saga every Sunday night in the late 60s and even altered their service patterns to fit in with it.

Since then, Poldark, Upstairs Downstairs, various Dickens, Austen and Conan Doyle adaptations and a myriad of other costume dramas, epic and not so epic, have all taken their turn to enthral us with their vanished values and worlds in our increasingly cynical and moral compassless times.

I for one have relished them all except for some appalling and highly unnecessary remakes of The Forsyte Saga, Pride and Prejudice, Bleak House and David Copperfield, among others.
In fact the one thing which annoys me most about costume dramas are the constant re-makes of the same dozen or so most popular titles when there are so many classic books out there which have never even been adapted. George Eliot for example has often been considered too challenging but when the risk was taken and 'Middlemarch' was produced, it was a triumph! Ditto Elizabeth Gaskell's 'Cranford' though perhaps Anthony Trollope is a slightly more acquired taste with his political 'The Way We Live Now' but I feel sure his work would have built a significant following had they taken a risk with more of his books.
'Lark Rise to Candleford' took the novel approach of using up the material from Flora Thompson's original book fairly quickly and then writing lots of new stories using the same characters to spin out half a dozen series. With mixed results I may say, though it still proved as addictive as crack cocaine and a runaway success commercially.

'Downton Abbey' albeit not based on a classic but written by the very much still alive, Julian Fellowes, has proven that our appetite for period drama remains as voracious as ever, critical as we may be that historical details are not as scrupulously poured over as in the past to leave the odd TV aerial in shot in 1913. We may prefer a classless society in real life, but that doesn't necessarily make for good or textural telly.

Another function such dramas undoubtedly serve is to remind us of our Britishness in a modern world where our national identity is increasingly blurred. Which is not to condone the less desirable aspects we have shed, more acknowledge that plenty was also lost which was worth retaining and celebrating such as good manners, concern for one another, community, backbone, moral turpitude and having both a love and a duty to one's country. And as the writer Julian Fellowes points out, not all Lords of the Manor were obnoxious users of the peasantry, many were good and benevolent employers who provided work for the majority of their villages and sponsored welfare and education for the children of their workers, even though this was also in their interests if they wished to run a thriving estate.

The original Upstairs Downstairs and The Onedin Line are notable for how much actual history they wove into their storylines, both social and national, so that viewers were educated as they were alternately affected and entertained by watching their favourite characters go through various difficulties of history and formed more understanding of how their society had evolved.
Studying TV costume drama from the 70s in particular, it seemed that every series had a killer theme tune, dramatic stories, wonderful costumes and memorable characters.

Pundits profess great surprise that the appetite for costume drama remains as unabated as ever But is it really so strange that as old certainties are swept away and challenged, we are more likely to cling on to any vestige of the past and familiar? The past may have been muddy, cold, smelly and often hungry with raging toothache in real life, but the costumes are still wonderful, the architecture beautiful, the moral dilemmas not a million miles from our own and we have the luxury of enjoying top notch storytelling in our cosy centrally-heated homes.