Review: Upstairs Downstairs on PBS, Masterpiece Theater friends are back

By April MacIntyre Apr 11, 2011, 2:49 GMT

The two actresses came up with the idea for the "Upstairs Downstairs" series about the Bellamy family of 165 Eaton Place in London and their servants. Marsh became Rose Buck.

Old friends are back together in PBS' new “Upstairs Downstairs” as Jean Marsh and Eileen Atkins bring their acting skills back to continue the story of 165 Eaton Place.

The old Bellamy house has aged poorly, and now has enthusiastic new owners ready to spiff it up.  The year is 1936, just before Europe and London are blown up by a World War.

The original series was on BBC, then PBS in the 1970s, and was based on Atkins and Marsh's creative inspiration from “The Forsyte Saga” - a class drama from 1967.

The two actresses came up with the idea for the "Upstairs Downstairs" series about the Bellamy family of 165 Eaton Place in London and their servants.  Marsh became the house servant, Rose Buck.

In the new "Upstairs," Atkins finally can act in frame with Marsh as the eccentric Lady Maud Holland, with monkey and Indian man servant in tow.

It was five seasons (1971 to 1975) that “Upstairs Downstairs” aired in the UK, then PBS brought the series to America as Masterpiece Theatre aired 55 of the episodes, from 1974 to 1977.

The old Bellamy house has been mothballed. Now it is 1936, and Sir Hallam Holland (Ed Stoppard) and his wife, Lady Agnes (Keely Hawes) take charge of the manor and enlist Rose Buck (Marsh) to properly staff the home. 

The curve ball comes by way of the veddy intrepid Mother-in-Law, Lady Maud (Atkins), ready to make her son live up to the family will clause stipulating her son provide her a home.

Maud arrives with a thick-cut marmalade loving monkey and an Indian secretary in Sikh turban. Fresh off the boat from Tangiers, Maud deadpans, "It was full of the British, wintering, and that sours a place like nothing else."

In one key scene in the premiere, the suggestion of Portuguese help is not welcome. This clip was aired back at the television critics' association meeting in Pasadena. I asked Jean Marsh what the inside joke was about the Portuguese for her character, and that comment made by Lady Agnes in the clip. "Well, I've been searching for a butler in normal circumstances, and there aren't any around, but there has been an influx of ...there's always...not unlike America...and at that time, there were a lot of Portuguese who'd only just arrived, I think.  So all I'm saying is there is a lot of Portuguese around, and, of course, we didn't want a foreigner." Ah.

The ending of the pilot episode sees Atkins' Lady Maud and Marsh's Rose Buck sitting together on a park bench, two sides of an antiquated class coin.  "We have experience, you and I," Lady Maud says. "We are what that house requires."

Even if you never saw one of the "Upstairs Downstairs" episodes from the 1970s, this is a wonderfully played out slice of the way things were in England, once upon a time.

"Upstairs Downstairs" airs Sundays beginning April 10 through April 24.

Watch the full episode. See more Masterpiece.