0:00:02 > 0:00:04These days, there's a new twist on the old refrain -
0:00:04 > 0:00:07"You just can't get the staff...
0:00:07 > 0:00:08"off the screen".
0:00:08 > 0:00:10'I think it's a really good question -
0:00:10 > 0:00:12'Why are we still so interested'
0:00:12 > 0:00:14in this whole world of the domestic servant?
0:00:14 > 0:00:18As the cutbacks kicked in, perhaps we've been consoling ourselves
0:00:18 > 0:00:22with tales of master and servant, kitchen maids and cooks.
0:00:22 > 0:00:24'It's an obvious, simple idea -
0:00:24 > 0:00:29The conflict between up and down. And yet, no fisticuffs.
0:00:29 > 0:00:34From Forsyte fever in the Swinging Sixties to Downton Abbey in downturn Britain,
0:00:34 > 0:00:38why do we keep returning to this Upstairs Downstairs world?
0:00:38 > 0:00:44It's escapism, it's nostalgia, it's perhaps how we wish life was now.
0:00:44 > 0:00:49I suppose we romanticise it and think, it must have been so wonderful
0:00:49 > 0:00:52and you were taken care of from the cradle to the grave.
0:00:52 > 0:00:56But is it just escapism or is there a message for modern Britain?
0:00:56 > 0:01:00There is something attractive about a world where everyone knew the rules.
0:01:00 > 0:01:03I think we all have a sense that nobody knows the rules.
0:01:03 > 0:01:06And are we right to look back longingly?
0:01:06 > 0:01:08Was the period a golden age?
0:01:08 > 0:01:13Well, it depends whether you were holding the gold or you were scrubbing it clean.
0:01:18 > 0:01:262010 saw an unusual event in television drama, as the BBC brought back a classic ITV show
0:01:26 > 0:01:29and the cameras returned to 165 Eaton Place.
0:01:30 > 0:01:36I don't think it was a really big surprise that Upstairs Downstairs was being revived, retooled.
0:01:36 > 0:01:39The past is now television's favourite place
0:01:39 > 0:01:41to go and look for future successes.
0:01:41 > 0:01:46And this is a narrative that can be very easily updated.
0:01:46 > 0:01:47This is for you.
0:01:52 > 0:01:55The new one is set in 1936,
0:01:55 > 0:01:58so that's six years after we finished.
0:01:58 > 0:02:03And so, everything is different, except Rose...
0:02:03 > 0:02:08- Welcome home.- ..and the music. Ba da, da dee, da dum.
0:02:13 > 0:02:15Together on screen for the first time
0:02:15 > 0:02:20were the two women who created the original series, more than 40 years ago.
0:02:20 > 0:02:23Eileen Atkins, who should have been in that series,
0:02:23 > 0:02:26and who, because of a commitment she had when it first began,
0:02:26 > 0:02:30never got her chance, will now be at the heart of the story, where she should be.
0:02:30 > 0:02:34So, the two co-creators finally get the places they deserve.
0:02:34 > 0:02:39Sir Hallam needs you to stay on at Eaton Place to ensure the proper running of his home.
0:02:39 > 0:02:45I told him that I would arrange it and no mother likes to disappoint her only child.
0:02:45 > 0:02:50Lady Agnes didn't want a housekeeper. And certainly not me.
0:02:50 > 0:02:54She doubtless thought you were ready to be put out to grass.
0:02:54 > 0:02:58There is a big part of me that didn't want to do anything with it, ever.
0:02:58 > 0:03:02Because, there it was,
0:03:02 > 0:03:06one of the most successful series ever.
0:03:06 > 0:03:08Should we just leave it as it is?
0:03:08 > 0:03:11But, the fact that it was the BBC.
0:03:11 > 0:03:15We have experience, you and I.
0:03:15 > 0:03:18We're what that house requires.
0:03:18 > 0:03:21I trusted Eileen. She trusted me.
0:03:21 > 0:03:26It took a long time, but...now it's happened.
0:03:26 > 0:03:27Action.
0:03:27 > 0:03:32Upstairs Downstairs followed the most talked-about drama of recent times.
0:03:32 > 0:03:38Downton Abbey portrayed the life of a grand Edwardian family and the servants who wait on them.
0:03:38 > 0:03:41It's odd. This is set just 100 years ago,
0:03:41 > 0:03:45yet it seems, in many ways, a remote world.
0:03:45 > 0:03:48You know, it's a time when there were different standards,
0:03:48 > 0:03:51different manners and I think people maybe enjoy looking at that.
0:03:52 > 0:03:57Downton Abbey marked the return of the lush costume drama to commercial television -
0:03:57 > 0:04:01and the return of Julian Fellowes to his favourite subject.
0:04:01 > 0:04:02Well, Downton Abbey
0:04:02 > 0:04:05is another product of my fascination with this
0:04:05 > 0:04:07two-tiered way of life, you know,
0:04:07 > 0:04:11where a single building contained people with such
0:04:11 > 0:04:15different expectations and such different origins and so on.
0:04:15 > 0:04:19The upstairs lot in their costumes, they're so beautiful,
0:04:19 > 0:04:21- every single one of them.- Amazing.
0:04:21 > 0:04:26- Do you know what I mean?- We come into work and I get grease
0:04:26 > 0:04:28put in my hair, get dirt put under my nails.
0:04:28 > 0:04:32I get burns up my arm. I might fancy being a lady up a chaise longue.
0:04:32 > 0:04:36- Yeah, just eating all day, it sounds ace.- Yeah.
0:04:36 > 0:04:40You know, every business contains people who have very different social positions,
0:04:40 > 0:04:43there's nothing odd in that, but they all go home.
0:04:43 > 0:04:48The interesting thing about the servant culture is that they were all in the same home.
0:04:48 > 0:04:51Of course, when you're watching it on television,
0:04:51 > 0:04:53you have the most beautiful settings.
0:04:53 > 0:04:58All one can say is, look at this magnificent castle.
0:04:58 > 0:05:01I mean, wouldn't you want to get inside there and have a look round?
0:05:01 > 0:05:06Especially to delve into the past and find out what our ancestors might have been doing?
0:05:08 > 0:05:12Chances are, at least some of our ancestors were in domestic service.
0:05:12 > 0:05:18Britain's army of maids, cooks and cleaners once numbered millions.
0:05:18 > 0:05:21And the setting for Downton Abbey, Highclere Castle,
0:05:21 > 0:05:24is a perfect example of how the old system worked.
0:05:24 > 0:05:30For 300 years, it has been home to the Earls of Carnarvon, though they did have people in.
0:05:30 > 0:05:31There were
0:05:31 > 0:05:3814-16 footmen, butler, housekeeper. The fifth Earl, for example,
0:05:38 > 0:05:42had an excellent French chef, supported by an Austrian patisserie chef.
0:05:42 > 0:05:45Domestic service was fantastically important.
0:05:45 > 0:05:47It was the scaffolding,
0:05:47 > 0:05:49really, of British social life.
0:05:49 > 0:05:54- Nursery staff. - Nursery staff, which was completely separate, so there would be a nanny,
0:05:54 > 0:05:57a governess, two or three maids to look after them, a nursery footmen...
0:05:57 > 0:06:04By the time you get to the middle and late 19th century, it is the majority employment for women.
0:06:04 > 0:06:11Maids in charge of doing all the family's washing and ironing, 25 gardeners, keepers, underkeepers...
0:06:11 > 0:06:15It's actually very deep in the English psyche, you know, it's about deference
0:06:15 > 0:06:20and belligerence and resentment. And it's about envy.
0:06:22 > 0:06:29It's also about ratings. Television realised early on the power of period drama in turbulent times.
0:06:29 > 0:06:31The Sixties were ushered in by a book
0:06:31 > 0:06:34about a servant that servants weren't supposed to read.
0:06:34 > 0:06:39And as at the pace of change quickened, television turned to the past.
0:06:39 > 0:06:41Here you are in the late Sixties, the heyday
0:06:41 > 0:06:44of Sergeant Pepper, flower-power, hippies,
0:06:44 > 0:06:46the Summer of Love and what not.
0:06:46 > 0:06:51And one of the most popular shows on British television is this idealised vision of Edwardian England.
0:06:51 > 0:06:56In England today, there is no more charming and instructive sight
0:06:56 > 0:06:59than an upper-middle-class family in full plumage.
0:06:59 > 0:07:04This particular family is called Forsyte and they live in Park Lane.
0:07:04 > 0:07:07The Forsyte Saga was the last classic drama made in black-and-white.
0:07:07 > 0:07:11That didn't stop it becoming a huge hit,
0:07:11 > 0:07:13becoming one of those moments when the nation
0:07:13 > 0:07:17were tuned in to watch. It ran for a whopping 26 weeks,
0:07:17 > 0:07:22it was a really slow unfolding of the Galsworthy novels.
0:07:22 > 0:07:25And beautifully portrayed, beautifully acted.
0:07:25 > 0:07:30Galsworthy had written a series of books which could adapt perfectly,
0:07:30 > 0:07:35with a death, a marriage and a drama in every single segment.
0:07:35 > 0:07:38Therefore, it was absolutely perfect television fodder.
0:07:38 > 0:07:41Not a great novel, but wonderful for television.
0:07:41 > 0:07:45But critics saw something else behind the Forsyte phenomenon.
0:07:45 > 0:07:48If nostalgia would become one of the driving forces
0:07:48 > 0:07:52of modern television, was this the start of its golden age?
0:07:52 > 0:07:57After all, the whole world is pining for a lost bourgeoisie
0:07:57 > 0:08:02and there, on the screen, they can see an image of one,
0:08:02 > 0:08:05provided by the BBC.
0:08:05 > 0:08:12In other words, there's an awful lot of people in the 1960s who are middle-aged, middle-class, whatever
0:08:12 > 0:08:18and they're unsettled by a lot of the changes that have come over Britain in the 1950s and 1960s.
0:08:18 > 0:08:23And in the Forsyte saga, they see an older Britain, something that is so reassuring
0:08:23 > 0:08:26because it's a hierarchical, organic world,
0:08:26 > 0:08:32everybody knows their place, there are no trade unions going on strike, there are no former British colonies
0:08:32 > 0:08:36thumbing their nose at the old imperial oppressor. Britain is great.
0:08:36 > 0:08:38That was a key element in its success.
0:08:38 > 0:08:42It's a very reassuring programme, in an age of anxiety.
0:08:42 > 0:08:49Nostalgia, certainly, from the title music onwards and in the shops the claim is that viewers are now
0:08:49 > 0:08:53trying to buy a little nostalgia for themselves, Forsyte Saga-style.
0:08:55 > 0:09:00Even in black and white, the conventions of the genre were in place.
0:09:00 > 0:09:04The early costumes were simply gorgeous, all of the first
0:09:04 > 0:09:0812 episodes, because it was the Edwardian period, which is beautiful -
0:09:08 > 0:09:13tight waists, bustles, the bosoms up high, your hair beautifully dressed.
0:09:13 > 0:09:16I mean, the bit that I was in, all the girls didn't wear bras,
0:09:16 > 0:09:19so that we'd look exactly as one would have done in the '20s.
0:09:19 > 0:09:22I was very naughty, I wore false eyelashes and I shouldn't have done.
0:09:22 > 0:09:26Yet for all the attention to detail, something was missing.
0:09:26 > 0:09:31This servants simply had to serve. And stand. And wait.
0:09:31 > 0:09:33Mr and Mrs Anthony Smythe.
0:09:33 > 0:09:35The gaze is kept the same.
0:09:35 > 0:09:38We are looking at the upper echelons of the society.
0:09:38 > 0:09:42We don't really find out who makes all the cake that these people eat
0:09:42 > 0:09:48and the focus is very much upon the people who get to sit in the comfy seats.
0:09:48 > 0:09:51Mr Forsyte is here, madam, in the drawing room.
0:09:51 > 0:09:53Oh, thank you, could you take these?
0:09:53 > 0:09:58It was a world where money was God, where there was actually an upstairs and a downstairs,
0:09:58 > 0:10:02but we didn't concentrate particularly on the downstairs,
0:10:02 > 0:10:04because the upstairs story was the main story.
0:10:04 > 0:10:10And yet every single part was so good that, even if you had a small part,
0:10:10 > 0:10:14you knew what that part was going to be and you knew it would be small,
0:10:14 > 0:10:18so you wouldn't be crumbling, you'd just be so thrilled to be in The Forsyte Saga.
0:10:18 > 0:10:20If the actors knew their place,
0:10:20 > 0:10:23so, too, did the servants they portrayed.
0:10:23 > 0:10:27For centuries, domestics had been seen, but rarely heard.
0:10:27 > 0:10:30I think it's been a hugely hidden history.
0:10:30 > 0:10:34I think, because, partly, it's been about women.
0:10:34 > 0:10:38I think, too, that it's always been seen as a private matter.
0:10:38 > 0:10:43It's familial and that's one of the reasons why it wasn't really written about very much.
0:10:43 > 0:10:47But as black and white gave way to colour,
0:10:47 > 0:10:53a new series would open the doors on a world The Forsyte Saga had only hinted at.
0:10:56 > 0:11:00The Forsyte Saga was a little bit why Eileen and I wanted to write
0:11:00 > 0:11:04something like Upstairs Downstairs, because, we thought, "That's all
0:11:04 > 0:11:09"very well, but I would quite like to know who washes that blouse?
0:11:09 > 0:11:14"And when all the food goes downstairs that isn't eaten, is the cook angry?"
0:11:16 > 0:11:19Originally, we wrote about downstairs,
0:11:19 > 0:11:24because that was where we came from. We both had chips on our shoulders.
0:11:24 > 0:11:27We didn't really want to give too much airtime to upstairs,
0:11:27 > 0:11:33but we had to serve somebody, the servants had to serve somebody, so it became Downstairs Upstairs.
0:11:35 > 0:11:38From the moment they explained the concept,
0:11:38 > 0:11:42which was to take a London house at the height of the Edwardian season
0:11:42 > 0:11:47and remove the front and see what happened, like a doll's house,
0:11:47 > 0:11:48it just sounded wonderful.
0:11:48 > 0:11:51Yes, it did sound very exciting. Charlotte's right,
0:11:51 > 0:11:55because when you've got dramas that involved
0:11:55 > 0:12:00both sides of the green door, I mean, people would have to watch, wouldn't they, you know?
0:12:00 > 0:12:04LWT didn't think it had a future at all.
0:12:04 > 0:12:08It was stuck away on a graveyard slot, late on a Sunday night,
0:12:08 > 0:12:1410.15, I think, after the news - a place where it was expected to curl up and die.
0:12:14 > 0:12:16No rest for the wicked.
0:12:16 > 0:12:22But Upstairs Downstairs tapped into the great British obsession with social class.
0:12:22 > 0:12:27- You rang, my lady?- Oh, yes, Hudson, close the door, will you?- My lady.
0:12:27 > 0:12:30There's a fascination with a stratification of people and what they were doing
0:12:30 > 0:12:34in that period and it was all fixed that this type of person only did that for their life,
0:12:34 > 0:12:37another one was doing that and how they interacted.
0:12:37 > 0:12:39That's what's the human interest in that story.
0:12:39 > 0:12:44There is this class obsession, but I think it was more...
0:12:44 > 0:12:49I think the English have always had this great sense of history, which unfortunately, I think is dying
0:12:49 > 0:12:56quite rapidly, nowadays, but then, audiences were finding out popular history through drama
0:12:56 > 0:13:00and they were astonished by what these plays showed them.
0:13:00 > 0:13:05- Come on, get up, it's half-past five! - Oh, Alfred, I'll kill you!
0:13:06 > 0:13:07Where am I?
0:13:07 > 0:13:12You're in Mr Bellamy's House, in the servant's quarters, where else?
0:13:12 > 0:13:13And it's time to get up.
0:13:13 > 0:13:17Upstairs Downstairs brought the past to a mass audience,
0:13:17 > 0:13:20but how it realistic was its portrayal of life below stairs?
0:13:20 > 0:13:27It was extremely hard work and I've worked myself
0:13:27 > 0:13:33a day starting at six in the morning and going on to two the next morning.
0:13:33 > 0:13:37That means 20 hours, continuously.
0:13:37 > 0:13:40Mrs was very strict, because she expected to see the whole height
0:13:40 > 0:13:45of the furniture reflected in the parquet floor
0:13:45 > 0:13:50and if... Well, there was many a time where you hear, "Mary!
0:13:50 > 0:13:52"Come here and bring your duster!"
0:13:52 > 0:13:56At Wynyard Park, which is the country house of the Marquess of Londonderry,
0:13:56 > 0:13:59I wore one of those pedometers
0:13:59 > 0:14:05and I clocked 18 miles in one day without going outside the house.
0:14:05 > 0:14:12'Oh, it was hard work, even for Rose, who was the head house parlour maid. So you got up'
0:14:12 > 0:14:17in a very, very cold attic and went down to a very, very hot kitchen
0:14:17 > 0:14:21and you were doing things like cleaning out the grates.
0:14:21 > 0:14:25There's a chapter in Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management,
0:14:25 > 0:14:29I think it's called, "Up at six, black all grates".
0:14:29 > 0:14:33Take these up to the dressing room, give the trousers a final brush before you lay them out.
0:14:33 > 0:14:38Remember, that waistcoat is white and must remain white. Look sharp, the carriage is ordered for 8am.
0:14:38 > 0:14:41'I think there's a ring of truth in Upstairs Downstairs,'
0:14:41 > 0:14:46in so far as it captures a kind of built in deference.
0:14:46 > 0:14:50- Everybody's looking up to somebody else.- The butler
0:14:50 > 0:14:53is at the top, partly because he's male,
0:14:53 > 0:14:55but also because he holds the most senior position.
0:14:56 > 0:14:59Then the housekeeper, then the cook...
0:14:59 > 0:15:02- You've forgotten the footman. - Don't they come after cook?
0:15:02 > 0:15:08Below the butler is the valet, who looks after his Lordship, looking after his clothing,
0:15:08 > 0:15:14brushing them, polishing them, making sure that all the collars are prepared and laying out his clothes.
0:15:15 > 0:15:21Then the menials, there would be the maids, who would be divided into personal maids, household maids...
0:15:21 > 0:15:26Don't forget, a grand woman in Edwardian times would never dress herself.
0:15:26 > 0:15:30She would have her clothes taken off her and then put on her.
0:15:30 > 0:15:32You then have got the senior footman.
0:15:32 > 0:15:37Footmen have a very easy life, perhaps, compared with some, because they're front of house
0:15:37 > 0:15:43and they have to look beautiful and smart and appear at the front door, open the door to everyone.
0:15:43 > 0:15:46Women NEVER opened doors.
0:15:46 > 0:15:50- The lowest of the lowest was the scullery maid, I suppose, wasn't she?- Yes.
0:15:50 > 0:15:53That was the lowest you could get. Poor Emily was scullery, wasn't she?
0:15:53 > 0:15:56- I think so. - She was bullied by everybody.- Yeah.
0:15:56 > 0:15:59You put salt into the sugar jar, that's what you've done!
0:15:59 > 0:16:03- Oh, no, I never. That was never... - All that work for nothing!
0:16:03 > 0:16:06As well as documenting the hard life and the rigid hierarchy,
0:16:06 > 0:16:10these films shed light on the human consequences of the class divide.
0:16:10 > 0:16:14Emily committed suicide. She died for love.
0:16:14 > 0:16:18She was told she couldn't see the servant next door.
0:16:18 > 0:16:20Huh! Emily!
0:16:20 > 0:16:24We took a little Irish girl, very simple and everything, who falls in love with this
0:16:24 > 0:16:31little handsome boy, who's part of another household, and the mistress that he works for, she also wants
0:16:31 > 0:16:38him as her toyboy, so obviously, he goes with her and this breaks the little maid's heart and so on.
0:16:38 > 0:16:43But what it really is about is that you actually didn't have the ability to have any sort of relationship.
0:16:43 > 0:16:45No, the right to romance, you couldn't have a romance.
0:16:45 > 0:16:51The whole area of romance and sex,
0:16:51 > 0:16:54which I am old enough to think belong in the same category,
0:16:54 > 0:17:00is all to do with proximity and obviously, everyone is living cheek-by-jowl.
0:17:00 > 0:17:05There's the physical proximity and, for a dramatist, in a way, that's a dream.
0:17:05 > 0:17:09We have had to consult Sir Geoffrey Dylan and discover what your legal position is.
0:17:09 > 0:17:14If sex between servants was frowned on, relationships between the classes were even more troubling.
0:17:14 > 0:17:17- How could you do this? - Too late for tears now, Marjorie.
0:17:17 > 0:17:20James has involved us in what may well become a major scandal.
0:17:20 > 0:17:24It was not considered appropriate for the son of a big house
0:17:24 > 0:17:29- to marry a housemaid, were there to have been an activity. - Come in, Sarah.
0:17:29 > 0:17:34Maybe the position of the son of the house was such that
0:17:34 > 0:17:39the housemaid weakened and something happened, it caused problems.
0:17:39 > 0:17:41Now listen, Mister,
0:17:41 > 0:17:43I'm not going to be stuck away in some rotten cottage
0:17:43 > 0:17:46with people I've never seen my life before...
0:17:46 > 0:17:51Sarah, everything possible is being done for your welfare and comfort.
0:17:51 > 0:17:54I think you must remember that.
0:17:54 > 0:17:56Sit down, Sarah.
0:17:56 > 0:18:00No class could accommodate pregnancy in an unmarried girl
0:18:00 > 0:18:04and if it happened and if she couldn't get a man to marry her PDQ,
0:18:04 > 0:18:11then her whole life left the road. If she was the daughter of an earl, she would be married off to some
0:18:11 > 0:18:16suspicious foreigner and have to go off and live in Rimini or some ghastly town near Utrecht
0:18:16 > 0:18:23and hardly be seen again. If she was a servant, she'd be desperate to marry anyone who would offer.
0:18:23 > 0:18:27The family would do everything they could to confine the house maid
0:18:27 > 0:18:31somewhere safe, but away, where she would be looked after.
0:18:31 > 0:18:36She'd have her child, the child would probably be adopted and no-one would say a word.
0:18:36 > 0:18:41But if the hours were long and the rules so strict, why would anybody do it?
0:18:41 > 0:18:45It's hard to think about service without remembering
0:18:45 > 0:18:52that it was part of a Christian society and that the ideal of service is there across the board.
0:18:52 > 0:18:57You know, think of the Civil Service, the colonial service, the services,
0:18:57 > 0:19:00as people used to call the army, navy and so on.
0:19:00 > 0:19:03May the Lord bless our endeavours and grant us conciliation
0:19:03 > 0:19:07to that rank in which, in his infinite mercy, he has seen fit to place us.
0:19:07 > 0:19:15It must look, to a post-deferential society, as quite mad to have lived in a time of great deference,
0:19:15 > 0:19:21but in those days, there was a sense of where your place was, a reassurance in that.
0:19:21 > 0:19:27Now, we've completely lost that, which makes it impossible to imagine, "Yes, I'm going to be your butler,
0:19:27 > 0:19:32"I'm going to go your bring a copy of The Times and a boiled egg and a cup of tea in the morning."
0:19:32 > 0:19:36We've moved to a world where nobody does that for anybody else, nobody tells me what to do.
0:19:36 > 0:19:38- Amen.- Amen.
0:19:38 > 0:19:44Upstairs Downstairs captured a conservative time, but whose side were they on?
0:19:44 > 0:19:50Upstairs Downstairs breaks new ground and reflects a kind of Marxist scholarship and the new history
0:19:50 > 0:19:54that looks at history from below and the lives of the oppressed.
0:19:54 > 0:19:58The people who, previously, in films and television, would never have spoken -
0:19:58 > 0:20:02they would have just been extras, circulating around the table -
0:20:02 > 0:20:06but in Upstairs Downstairs, they're at the heart of the drama, so on the one hand,
0:20:06 > 0:20:09it's an oddly radical piece of television and yet, of course,
0:20:09 > 0:20:11it's as conservative as the others.
0:20:11 > 0:20:16This wasn't a drama arguing in favour of the uprising from downstairs,
0:20:16 > 0:20:21of them smashing up upstairs and turning over the furniture in the drawing room.
0:20:21 > 0:20:27It's not If. If Lindsay Anderson had made Upstairs Downstairs, it would have been a very different proposal
0:20:27 > 0:20:31and I think that shows something about the relative conservatism
0:20:31 > 0:20:36of the TV audience, the Sunday night TV audience, particularly.
0:20:36 > 0:20:44We had always seen it as a little bit more political and maybe not quite so many babies and romance,
0:20:44 > 0:20:50but, then, it wouldn't have been Upstairs Downstairs.
0:20:51 > 0:20:55You're watching Upstairs Downstairs, if you can, if there's not a power cut,
0:20:55 > 0:21:00during the days of the three-day week and the miners' strikes of the '70s.
0:21:00 > 0:21:05I mean, this is the perfect reassuring, romantic, patriotic entertainment.
0:21:05 > 0:21:11By the time it ended in 1975, the show had established ITV as a player
0:21:11 > 0:21:17in the cut-throat world of costume drama, by creating not just characters, but archetypes.
0:21:17 > 0:21:23I got on the bus, literally, a few days ago, and a woman stood up for me and said, "Sit down."
0:21:23 > 0:21:25She was Spanish, I think. She said, "I insist.
0:21:25 > 0:21:27"I would always give my seat to Rose.
0:21:27 > 0:21:31"You work so hard." I said, "That's very sweet."
0:21:31 > 0:21:34She said, "I am in service."
0:21:34 > 0:21:36I said, "Where?" She said, "Here, in Chelsea."
0:21:36 > 0:21:38I said, "Oh, really?"
0:21:38 > 0:21:43"Yes, yes, in fact", she said, "We lost our Mrs Bridges."
0:21:43 > 0:21:47I said, "Wait a minute, you lost your cook, you mean?"
0:21:47 > 0:21:50She said, "We always refer to it like that.
0:21:50 > 0:21:52"We are looking for a Mrs Bridges.
0:21:52 > 0:21:56"If we needed a new butler, we'd say
0:21:56 > 0:22:00"we must go to the employment agency and get a new Mr Hudson."
0:22:00 > 0:22:04I thought, "Wow, this is so strange!"
0:22:04 > 0:22:07Upstairs Downstairs marked a turning point.
0:22:07 > 0:22:13Some of the best-loved characters of '70s television would now come from below stairs.
0:22:13 > 0:22:18The success of Upstairs Downstairs meant it was inevitable that other shows of that ilk would follow.
0:22:18 > 0:22:23Now it was easier for commissioners to see that that sort of programme may have had success.
0:22:23 > 0:22:26Upstairs Downstairs itself gets its own spin-off series, Thomas and Sarah.
0:22:26 > 0:22:29Later on down the line, there's The Duchess Of Duke Street.
0:22:31 > 0:22:33Oi!
0:22:33 > 0:22:36Upstairs Downstairs was very much the model for it.
0:22:36 > 0:22:40In fact, if you weren't paying attention too much and just looking
0:22:40 > 0:22:44at the surfaces of these series, it would be quite easy to mistake one for another.
0:22:44 > 0:22:46- Have you been long in service? - Yeah, I have, ma'am.
0:22:46 > 0:22:50My mother took me away from school when I was 12 and put me into service.
0:22:50 > 0:22:53I've done everything, really - scullery maid, kitchen maid,
0:22:53 > 0:22:56scrubbing girl and cook, of course, the last year or two.
0:22:56 > 0:22:59But there is a difference. Whereas 165 Eaton Place had been
0:22:59 > 0:23:03a fictional address, The Duchess Of Duke Street was based on a real person.
0:23:03 > 0:23:10The Duchess of Duke Street plugs into a legendary figure, who ran a hotel on Jermyn St.
0:23:10 > 0:23:15Rosa Lewis, she was a royal mistress, she had all kinds of connections
0:23:15 > 0:23:20with the royal world and yet, she was a rather mouthy
0:23:20 > 0:23:25and vulgar and fantastically indiscreet working-class woman.
0:23:25 > 0:23:33It's a gift of a character, really, played so well by Gemma Jones, with a real steak knife quality.
0:23:33 > 0:23:39I want to get by by working for the best people there is - rich people, lords and ladies who have big houses
0:23:39 > 0:23:44and jewels and lovely clothes and the best food. And I want to see it all and be part of it.
0:23:44 > 0:23:48You know what they say, rub against gold, a bit may stick to you.
0:23:48 > 0:23:53But television would often soften historical fact, to oblige its audience.
0:23:53 > 0:23:55It never told the truth
0:23:55 > 0:24:01because the situation which it was based on was actually much naughtier.
0:24:01 > 0:24:03The young upper-class men
0:24:03 > 0:24:09were allowed to come to her house and really behave quite as they wanted to.
0:24:09 > 0:24:13She was barred from The Ritz, because it was too embarrassing for her to be there.
0:24:13 > 0:24:20She knew everybody there and she would greet them in the most embarrassing and vulgar kind of way -
0:24:20 > 0:24:22"Hello, old cock", this sort of thing.
0:24:22 > 0:24:26The success of shows like Upstairs Downstairs and The Duchess Of Duke Street
0:24:26 > 0:24:29awoke a new interest in the lives of real servants.
0:24:29 > 0:24:36What had once been a secret history now went primetime and some servants even became celebrities.
0:24:36 > 0:24:41It was a time when those women felt able to look back.
0:24:41 > 0:24:47They were in their 70s, a number of them, they were the last generation, often, of live-in servants
0:24:47 > 0:24:51and it became OK to reflect on having been a servant.
0:24:51 > 0:24:55- Mrs Everage...- Dame Edna, thank you!
0:24:55 > 0:24:59I'm terribly sorry. When I was a cook in service,
0:24:59 > 0:25:01the son of the house forged a cheque
0:25:01 > 0:25:03in his father's name.
0:25:03 > 0:25:07He was sent to Australia and they paid him £2 a week to keep him out there.
0:25:07 > 0:25:12- And he got the parlour maid pregnant before he went.- He what?
0:25:12 > 0:25:14He got the parlour maid pregnant before he went.
0:25:14 > 0:25:17Every other Sunday, we used to take her to Hyde Park
0:25:17 > 0:25:20and make her jump off a bench, but it never did any good.
0:25:20 > 0:25:24LAUGHTER
0:25:26 > 0:25:31Most domestic servants had been women, but the dominant figure below stairs was male.
0:25:31 > 0:25:35The butler would become an iconic on-screen figure.
0:25:36 > 0:25:39ALAN WHICKER: There are two dozen ways of folding a napkin,
0:25:39 > 0:25:42but there are only two ways of announcing lunch. The wrong way...
0:25:42 > 0:25:44Grub is up.
0:25:44 > 0:25:46..and the right way.
0:25:46 > 0:25:48Luncheon is served, sir.
0:25:50 > 0:25:53Soon, the butler was ubiquitous - and not just in drama.
0:25:53 > 0:25:56At times, it seemed every television presenter in Britain
0:25:56 > 0:25:59was contractually obliged to give it a go.
0:25:59 > 0:26:02The idea behind In At The Deep End
0:26:02 > 0:26:04was to give us an insight into a world that we wouldn't
0:26:04 > 0:26:07normally be able to get into.
0:26:07 > 0:26:11And our access all areas ticket was we would have a go at the job
0:26:11 > 0:26:15and one of the ones we did was butler.
0:26:15 > 0:26:16You rang, my lord?
0:26:16 > 0:26:18Oh, yes.
0:26:18 > 0:26:23Nearly midday... People playing tennis, I'm sure they're thirsty.
0:26:23 > 0:26:28- Can we have Pimm's out on the balcony here in about half an hour? - With pleasure, my lord.- Thank you.
0:26:28 > 0:26:32The butler's role is to lead the below stairs team
0:26:32 > 0:26:36and to be right-hand man of his master.
0:26:36 > 0:26:43He can pass from below stairs to upstairs, to go and see the family, as and how he chooses.
0:26:43 > 0:26:45He's highly trusted by the family.
0:26:45 > 0:26:50Our first port of call, almost, was Ivor Spencer's School of Butlery.
0:26:50 > 0:26:57He was sort of training up Jeeves-like figures, genuinely and properly, how to be butlers.
0:26:57 > 0:26:59That's the idea. Very good.
0:26:59 > 0:27:02That's the pace. That's the pace to walk around the house, always.
0:27:02 > 0:27:07It was his proud boast in latter years, and actually said on his website,
0:27:07 > 0:27:12"I train butlers, but I did NOT train Paul Burrell."
0:27:14 > 0:27:20- ALL: My lords, ladies and gentlemen, dinner is served.- Perfect.
0:27:20 > 0:27:24He took it so seriously. He said, "Well, of course, Serle, you must understand that there
0:27:24 > 0:27:27"are a certain number of phrases which you must remember".
0:27:27 > 0:27:30Certainly, sir. No problem.
0:27:30 > 0:27:32It's a pleasure.
0:27:32 > 0:27:35Those are the words that will get you the world.
0:27:35 > 0:27:38He holds this extraordinary position.
0:27:38 > 0:27:42He is a presence in the house, more than almost his master.
0:27:42 > 0:27:46We tread a thin line between being respectful,
0:27:46 > 0:27:48but never being subservient.
0:27:49 > 0:27:52We hear and see everything in the household,
0:27:52 > 0:27:59but everything we hear and see, of course, we don't always hear and see.
0:27:59 > 0:28:06It's extremely important that, as a butler, you have loyalty, discretion and honesty.
0:28:08 > 0:28:12When we'd go and interview these butlers, these lofty butlers,
0:28:12 > 0:28:15"I'm going to learn to be a butler in six weeks," they would say, "Oh..."
0:28:15 > 0:28:17It's impossible, actually.
0:28:17 > 0:28:20For six weeks, you couldn't become a butler,
0:28:20 > 0:28:25I'm afraid. It takes two years to train a footman
0:28:25 > 0:28:31and another two years, at least, for him to become a butler,
0:28:31 > 0:28:35to have the knowledge required. I wish you luck.
0:28:35 > 0:28:42Domestic service was probably seen as one of the great apogees of life for the working man or woman.
0:28:42 > 0:28:46If you could get yourself a place in one of the grand houses
0:28:46 > 0:28:53and make your way up, become either a housekeeper or a butler, you had really achieved in life.
0:28:53 > 0:28:59What we used to do was to open it out right at the middle
0:28:59 > 0:29:01and run a line of stitching up there
0:29:01 > 0:29:06and then press it out flat
0:29:06 > 0:29:08with a warm iron.
0:29:08 > 0:29:11The service was so good and so luxury.
0:29:11 > 0:29:18It seems bizarre, but to them, nothing was too good for these unbelievably wealthy people.
0:29:18 > 0:29:25That is how you used to present the newspaper to the gentleman or the lady.
0:29:25 > 0:29:32The ladies, of course, they had a little perfume ironed into the paper.
0:29:32 > 0:29:35They really were spoilt in those days, weren't they?
0:29:35 > 0:29:38Absolutely spoilt. It was the art of gracious living.
0:29:38 > 0:29:42The fifth earl had a house steward butler called Fearnside.
0:29:42 > 0:29:46His valet was Fearnside and his butler was Streatfield.
0:29:46 > 0:29:49Once they joined, they never left.
0:29:49 > 0:29:51And apparently, he was just wonderful to work for.
0:29:51 > 0:29:56You tried to pass the position on to your son or your nephew or cousin,
0:29:56 > 0:29:59so it was quite a tight-knit community.
0:29:59 > 0:30:03With butlers, with housekeepers, with ladies' maids, especially,
0:30:03 > 0:30:09and with valets, in many cases, very strong relationships grew up.
0:30:09 > 0:30:13I think you'd have to ask His Grace whether he'd consider me a friend.
0:30:13 > 0:30:15- You regard him as one?- Oh, yes.
0:30:15 > 0:30:17You couldn't have a valet you didn't like.
0:30:17 > 0:30:20You couldn't undress in the room with somebody you couldn't stand.
0:30:20 > 0:30:22Ever friendly enough to call each other by your Christian names?
0:30:22 > 0:30:24No, of course not!
0:30:25 > 0:30:29That's too ridiculous. It really is.
0:30:30 > 0:30:35The bond between master and servant or mistress and servant is always idealised.
0:30:35 > 0:30:41It's always been idealised and always been complained about.
0:30:41 > 0:30:45There have been complaints about bad servants since service began.
0:30:45 > 0:30:49You can find it even in medieval times, people moaning, "Serfs aren't what they used to be."
0:30:49 > 0:30:55We'll have some port, which, of course, does need rather careful handling.
0:30:55 > 0:30:58- It's '65...- Right. - ..and it's frightfully good.
0:30:58 > 0:31:02We tried to end up with a big event at the end of the film.
0:31:02 > 0:31:07- May I've your name, please? - Princess Du Chemie. - Princess Du Chemie.
0:31:07 > 0:31:11We had a weekend house party at Ragley Hall,
0:31:11 > 0:31:16the home of the Marquis of Hertford.
0:31:16 > 0:31:20- It could be a little colder, but I don't think we can do anything about it now?- I don't think so.
0:31:20 > 0:31:25The aristocrats we were dealing with were utterly charming, but when I was serving the drinks,
0:31:25 > 0:31:33it was quite clear that you were as important to them as the wallpaper.
0:31:33 > 0:31:37My lords, ladies and gentlemen, dinner is served.
0:31:38 > 0:31:45My feelings about that world were that it's amazing that there is still this hierarchy,
0:31:45 > 0:31:52there is still this old-fashioned approach to upstairs and downstairs, them and us, master and servant.
0:31:52 > 0:31:57It's endlessly fascinating to people, and I suppose again, is it because
0:31:57 > 0:32:00we hanker after a way of life which has disappeared?
0:32:00 > 0:32:04Do we quite like the idea of being a part of that, just for a few seconds? I don't know.
0:32:08 > 0:32:13But when you don't mix socially, where could be working and upper classes meet?
0:32:13 > 0:32:15The answer was in the classifieds.
0:32:15 > 0:32:22For the last 125 years, The Lady has been THE place where
0:32:22 > 0:32:28upper crust, Grade One-listed households will advertise
0:32:28 > 0:32:31for all their domestic employment needs.
0:32:31 > 0:32:37We're a place where the domestic class meets the upper class and, as such, we are,
0:32:37 > 0:32:42I think, a very unique institution in this world of upstairs, downstairs.
0:32:42 > 0:32:47We are, in a way, the staircase which connects upstairs and downstairs.
0:32:51 > 0:32:54The Lady provided unwitting inspiration for one of the most
0:32:54 > 0:32:58fondly-remembered dramas of the '80s.
0:32:59 > 0:33:02At the station I was in a terrible rush, late as usual,
0:33:02 > 0:33:08grabbed a magazine from the WH Smiths or wherever,
0:33:08 > 0:33:12and in the back of this mag were lots of adverts for nannies,
0:33:12 > 0:33:17people wanting to be nannies, people looking for nannies,
0:33:17 > 0:33:24and it occurred to me what a very interesting situation being a nanny must be,
0:33:24 > 0:33:29because you're looking after the most precious people in the household,
0:33:29 > 0:33:34but you're not their mother and you're not actually a relative, either.
0:33:34 > 0:33:39You're just a stranger in a house doing a hugely important job.
0:33:42 > 0:33:45If the butler had been the patriarch of the downstairs world,
0:33:45 > 0:33:48here was the strange story of the surrogate mother.
0:33:50 > 0:33:55Nannies were important, but they were also people who separated themselves,
0:33:55 > 0:33:57who didn't see themselves as servants.
0:33:59 > 0:34:02- Yes?- Nurse Gray.
0:34:02 > 0:34:05I've come to commence my duties.
0:34:05 > 0:34:09The entrance which you require is around the side.
0:34:09 > 0:34:14I'm sorry, but I do not intend entering my place of employment through the servants' entrance.
0:34:14 > 0:34:17They felt themselves to be part of the household,
0:34:17 > 0:34:20although they usually dined with the children in the nursery.
0:34:20 > 0:34:26They wouldn't sit down with their employers, so they had this strange twilight existence,
0:34:26 > 0:34:31someone who was kind of semi-genteel, who floated between those two worlds
0:34:31 > 0:34:33and felt at home in neither.
0:34:35 > 0:34:38I've bought the nanny up to see you, my lady.
0:34:38 > 0:34:42- Brought, Dorothy. - Thank you, my lady.
0:34:42 > 0:34:46Poor nanny has to get on well with the mother, primarily,
0:34:46 > 0:34:50which is a tricky area, because you have another female, unrelated to you,
0:34:50 > 0:34:57potentially a threat to your marriage, who is potentially going to take your children's affections.
0:34:57 > 0:35:01So the nanny is, I think, it's a very, very tough gig.
0:35:01 > 0:35:07The first job that Nanny had, she went to, I think, it was Lady Cheddon.
0:35:07 > 0:35:09What did you say your name was again?
0:35:09 > 0:35:12- Barbara- Gray. Really?
0:35:12 > 0:35:15Well, we call all our nannies by our last name here, you see.
0:35:15 > 0:35:17Always have done. it's a sort of thing.
0:35:17 > 0:35:21So if one was to work for us, one would be known as Nanny Cheddon.
0:35:21 > 0:35:24Nannies had to adopt the names of the people they worked for,
0:35:24 > 0:35:28which was like robbing them of their identity, almost.
0:35:28 > 0:35:30Cheerio, old chap.
0:35:30 > 0:35:32Mummy and Daddy going out, Nanny?
0:35:32 > 0:35:34Mummy and Daddy are going away, old chap.
0:35:34 > 0:35:37They won't be away long, just a couple of days.
0:35:37 > 0:35:40We're away all week, Nanny. It's Ascot week.
0:35:40 > 0:35:42She was a strong girl herself.
0:35:42 > 0:35:46She'd not let her children suffer
0:35:46 > 0:35:50through the negligence of the parents.
0:35:50 > 0:35:53They hardly ever saw their mother and father.
0:35:53 > 0:35:55That's an aristocratic idea.
0:35:55 > 0:36:01The aristocracy have always been extremely comfortable with distant, glacial relationships.
0:36:01 > 0:36:04The idea that you should actually touch your children,
0:36:04 > 0:36:10or even see them very often, has been viewed as a kind of perversion by the aristocracy for generations.
0:36:10 > 0:36:15The belief, really, was that your children should sort of occupy
0:36:15 > 0:36:20their own space and develop in their own space, and the modern thing,
0:36:20 > 0:36:23that you've got to be, sort of, staring at your child all the time -
0:36:23 > 0:36:27"Who are your best friends?" and "Let's do the homework now" - I think is quite oppressive.
0:36:27 > 0:36:30Actually, I think it's a very good thing to have a nanny.
0:36:30 > 0:36:34If everyone could afford a nanny, I'd like them to have a nanny,
0:36:34 > 0:36:38simply because I think the mother should be the glamorous, glorious, wonderful person
0:36:38 > 0:36:43they go to with all their troubles, not the strict disciplinarian. The nanny does that.
0:36:43 > 0:36:46The relationship between a child and their nanny was often hugely important.
0:36:46 > 0:36:52So, in the, sort of, memoirs of aristocratic politicians or something,
0:36:52 > 0:36:56you'll often see they're very heavily indebted to them, emotionally.
0:36:56 > 0:37:00Churchill loved his nanny far more than his mother.
0:37:00 > 0:37:04I think a lot of children loved their nannies best.
0:37:04 > 0:37:07There was a huge response to this series.
0:37:07 > 0:37:12I had hundreds of letters from girls saying, "I want to be a nanny.
0:37:12 > 0:37:14"How can I go about being a nanny?"
0:37:15 > 0:37:21I actually got a letter from one of the big nanny schools, Norland's,
0:37:21 > 0:37:26saying, "We're having so many applications since Nanny has been on and thank you
0:37:26 > 0:37:30"so much for thinking up the idea and for doing the show".
0:37:30 > 0:37:35Butlers and footmen floundered, but the nanny would thrive into the '80s -
0:37:35 > 0:37:38and not simply due to the success of the TV series.
0:37:38 > 0:37:44As the women's movement - I don't know what you call it now - advanced
0:37:44 > 0:37:50and, quite properly, they started to have careers in traditionally male areas,
0:37:50 > 0:37:56the penny dropped that this was either a choice of being childless or having help with your children.
0:37:56 > 0:38:04So there was a kind of rethink in this whole thing in our own society, and suddenly day care centres,
0:38:04 > 0:38:11nannies, all of these things became acceptable and from acceptable, they graduated to desirable.
0:38:11 > 0:38:15The nanny was perceived as being the preserve of
0:38:15 > 0:38:18the upper middle classes, a figure of the past, really.
0:38:18 > 0:38:21The Queen had a nanny, Prince Charles had a nanny,
0:38:21 > 0:38:24anybody with a silver spoon in their mouth had a nanny,
0:38:24 > 0:38:26but nobody on your street would have had a nanny.
0:38:26 > 0:38:29That has changed now.
0:38:29 > 0:38:35I think that's to do with people feeling less ashamed and embarrassed,
0:38:35 > 0:38:39less anxious about the idea of not seeing their children very often.
0:38:44 > 0:38:46Nanny was one of a slew of shows that eased us
0:38:46 > 0:38:50into another decade of rapid change, once again looking backwards.
0:38:50 > 0:38:57But if the battle for viewers would be won in the stately homes of England, was this the decisive blow?
0:38:57 > 0:39:01One of the great successes of ITV, of course, is Brideshead Revisited,
0:39:01 > 0:39:02an incredibly lavish,
0:39:02 > 0:39:06beautifully shot piece that looks for all the world like a BBC production and, in fact,
0:39:06 > 0:39:10in many areas of the world, like the States, they do think it's a BBC production.
0:39:10 > 0:39:12Well?
0:39:15 > 0:39:16Well?
0:39:17 > 0:39:19What a place to live in.
0:39:22 > 0:39:26There is a moment when it seems that the British public,
0:39:26 > 0:39:29after years of having watched quite a lot of gritty stuff -
0:39:29 > 0:39:32police dramas, tough television, really -
0:39:32 > 0:39:35are now in the mood for something vast
0:39:35 > 0:39:39and beautifully photographed and full of pictures of stately homes
0:39:39 > 0:39:42and of winsome young men looking dreamily into the middle-distance.
0:39:42 > 0:39:46Yes, yes, can we hear what the thing is about?
0:39:46 > 0:39:48It looks at the world of the aristocrat
0:39:48 > 0:39:54and what seems, on the surface, to be this perfect, idyllic world, one that we'd all aspire to.
0:39:54 > 0:39:56It soon becomes apparent that not all is well.
0:39:56 > 0:40:02I want you to meet Nanny Hawkins. That's what we've come for.
0:40:02 > 0:40:05Evelyn Waugh wrote Brideshead Revisited
0:40:05 > 0:40:09out of a very strong nostalgic instinct that he had
0:40:09 > 0:40:14about an English Catholic aristocracy, that he sensed were fading away
0:40:14 > 0:40:19and probably didn't ever really exist in the way that the book invites us to imagine that they do.
0:40:19 > 0:40:23In the '80s, that idea is sort of back.
0:40:23 > 0:40:29Don't forget, Mrs Thatcher has come in in 1979 and she is, in a sense,
0:40:29 > 0:40:32a kind of Brideshead politician, in that she's the first politician
0:40:32 > 0:40:37in modern history to come in explicitly promising to turn the clock back.
0:40:37 > 0:40:40Where there is discord, may we bring harmony...
0:40:40 > 0:40:45Not forward. She's not Harold Wilson, "I'm going to build a brave new world,"
0:40:45 > 0:40:50she's saying, "The best days were behind us and we can recapture them by going back to them."
0:40:50 > 0:40:56And that, I think, goes hand in hand very nicely with this vogue for nostalgia.
0:40:56 > 0:41:01But for all its talk of Victorian values, the '80s were the nadir of domestic service,
0:41:01 > 0:41:05a brash decade in which the gentleman's gentleman all but disappeared,
0:41:05 > 0:41:08and noblesse oblige became a couple of dirty words.
0:41:08 > 0:41:12Before the war, 30,000 families in Britain could boast a butler.
0:41:12 > 0:41:15Today there are reckoned to be only 70,
0:41:15 > 0:41:18and they're working mostly in royal households or for City institutions.
0:41:18 > 0:41:23Of course, the rot had set in long before Waugh published his iconic novel.
0:41:23 > 0:41:28Death, duties and Labour governments would leave even the Sixth Earl of Carnarvon making cutbacks.
0:41:28 > 0:41:30It was harder to do things in the same way
0:41:30 > 0:41:32as it used to be.
0:41:32 > 0:41:36Costs had gone up a lot, there was inflation, much higher taxation,
0:41:36 > 0:41:39especially in the '60s and '70s,
0:41:39 > 0:41:49so although he still had a cook and a butler and a valet, and very few people cleaning, and a gardener...
0:41:49 > 0:41:50- Chauffeur.- It was down.
0:41:50 > 0:41:55Instead of being 40, 50 people, it was down to less than 10, so there was a big shrinkage.
0:41:55 > 0:41:59The house was quite quiet in those days.
0:41:59 > 0:42:04It seemed the game was up, and hard-pressed aristocrats bit the bullet.
0:42:04 > 0:42:09The stately homes of England threw open their doors to the public, with spectacular results.
0:42:09 > 0:42:14There seems to be an insatiable curiosity about that far off way of life.
0:42:14 > 0:42:19People loved going to see how the other half lived.
0:42:19 > 0:42:24TV was once more on hand to capture the nuances of Britain's shifting class system,
0:42:24 > 0:42:29portraying the plight of the distressed gentry in a string of dramas and sitcoms.
0:42:29 > 0:42:36I think the fallen member of the aristocracy has been a rich vein of comedy.
0:42:36 > 0:42:40If you look at To The Manor Born, in which Penelope Keith's character
0:42:40 > 0:42:45is widowed at the start, and finds herself having to leave the grand house.
0:42:45 > 0:42:49Goodbye, Millie. If there's one thing I've taught you, let it be
0:42:49 > 0:42:53that you don't open tins of instant coffee with the best silver.
0:42:53 > 0:42:59Audrey fforbes-Hamilton, with two small Fs, was displaced from her grand pile
0:42:59 > 0:43:03by this arriviste, played by Peter Bowles, who is Polish, probably Jewish,
0:43:03 > 0:43:06which is an interesting vibe that the story has,
0:43:06 > 0:43:12But he's a frozen-food magnate - he's made his money out of peas and fish fingers,
0:43:12 > 0:43:17which is something that Penelope Keith's character can never quite disguise her contempt for.
0:43:17 > 0:43:20The estate is simply in trust for your lifetime.
0:43:20 > 0:43:24You're responsible for the continuance of its heritage, its traditions and its customs.
0:43:24 > 0:43:27- That includes the Pony Club gymkhana?- Most certainly.
0:43:27 > 0:43:32You have an obligation to the people who live here. It's called noblesse oblige.
0:43:32 > 0:43:36I can't expect you to have heard of that. It's an English expression.
0:43:36 > 0:43:40As the Upstairs Downstairs world became ever more remote,
0:43:40 > 0:43:42television found it harder to take it seriously.
0:43:42 > 0:43:44Your sweet, my lady.
0:43:44 > 0:43:46Oh, thank you.
0:43:46 > 0:43:49So increasingly it was played for laughs.
0:43:49 > 0:43:51Your nuts, my lord.
0:43:55 > 0:43:59Cheeky swine. How am I supposed to open these?
0:43:59 > 0:44:02Your crackers, my lord.
0:44:02 > 0:44:07But perhaps the comic potential of the master-servant relationship had been there from the start.
0:44:07 > 0:44:12Among the funniest books written in the English language are Wodehouse's Jeeves and Wooster.
0:44:12 > 0:44:16Undoubtedly hysterically funny and difficult to bring to television.
0:44:16 > 0:44:18Been tried number of times.
0:44:18 > 0:44:21In the '60s, it was considered the definitive performance
0:44:21 > 0:44:25with Ian Carmichael as Bertie Wooster and Dennis Price as Jeeves.
0:44:25 > 0:44:30I invested him with a sl-slight speech hesitation.
0:44:30 > 0:44:36I knew a man in the army very well, a peer of the realm who was my major
0:44:36 > 0:44:40for a certain while, and he had this hesitation.
0:44:40 > 0:44:45I couldn't call it a stutter, but he seemed absolutely right,
0:44:45 > 0:44:48and I thought this man, although physically was not right for Bertie,
0:44:48 > 0:44:51th-this was a ve-very good idea for him.
0:44:51 > 0:44:53That ca-can't be him, can it, Jeeves?
0:44:53 > 0:44:57He'll be considerably ahead of his appointed time, were it Sir Humphrey, sir.
0:44:57 > 0:44:59Well, people are, you know, Jeeves.
0:44:59 > 0:45:03They le-leap out of bed at some unearthly hour like eight or nine
0:45:03 > 0:45:07and find extra ti-time on their hands and nothing to do with it.
0:45:07 > 0:45:13I had a very good innings with 13 episodes...of Bertie.
0:45:13 > 0:45:17I felt the audience had got used to Bertie getting in a hell of a pickle.
0:45:17 > 0:45:22Along came Jeeves and got him out of it. End of story.
0:45:22 > 0:45:26When it was heard that Fry and Laurie were taking over the roles,
0:45:26 > 0:45:29I think people were a bit surprised,
0:45:29 > 0:45:32worried they wouldn't do it justice, but they got the dialogue,
0:45:32 > 0:45:35they got the style, they got the relationship just right.
0:45:35 > 0:45:38Are you quite comfortable, sir?
0:45:38 > 0:45:42Do you know, Jeeves, I jolly well am, yes. This might catch on.
0:45:42 > 0:45:47In that case, I shall turn to the hotel, sir, and continue with our ironing.
0:45:47 > 0:45:49Jeeves is perfect. He can do no wrong,
0:45:49 > 0:45:52he always has the solution to every problem.
0:45:52 > 0:45:56- What about Bluebottle for the next? - I think not, sir.
0:45:56 > 0:46:03The animal was standing at sixes at last night's call over and has since lengthened to 15-2.
0:46:03 > 0:46:06So it seems likely that something untoward is known.
0:46:06 > 0:46:12The fact that they're stuck in this time warp of late '20s, early '30s, is perfect.
0:46:12 > 0:46:17It's actually a perfect microcosm of what people wanted England of that time to be.
0:46:20 > 0:46:25The conventions of domestic service were satirised less fondly by the sitcom maestros Croft and Perry.
0:46:25 > 0:46:29The inspiration for You Rang, M'Lord?
0:46:29 > 0:46:35came from the fact that my grandfather was a gentleman's gentleman.
0:46:35 > 0:46:40He was a very posh butler to Admiral Sir Thomas Cochrane.
0:46:40 > 0:46:49My dad used to tell me constant stories about his father and the tough, hard life they had.
0:46:49 > 0:46:52Well, they're the upper classes. We have to make allowances.
0:46:52 > 0:46:53You make allowances.
0:46:53 > 0:46:58As far as I'm concerned, their allowances are cut off.
0:46:58 > 0:47:03Their days are numbered. I'm in it for what I can get and I advise you to do the same.
0:47:03 > 0:47:06Here was an unsentimental view of life below stairs.
0:47:06 > 0:47:10The butler was always on the take with the local butcher,
0:47:10 > 0:47:17fishmonger, taking his bit, and there was an enormous amount of corruption.
0:47:17 > 0:47:20Now, my dear friend Rosemary Anne Sisson,
0:47:20 > 0:47:24who wrote Upstairs Downstairs,
0:47:24 > 0:47:30said to me when she first saw the series You Rang M'Lord?, "Oh, Jimmy, it's awful.
0:47:30 > 0:47:33"You were so cruel about those people."
0:47:33 > 0:47:36- Dad, that's stealing.- No, it's not. I'm going to pawn it.
0:47:36 > 0:47:42I said, "Rosemary, it was a tough, tough life. It was corruption from start to finish."
0:47:42 > 0:47:46- You've pawned it?- I wanted a few quid for a week or two.
0:47:46 > 0:47:51Taxi drivers say, "Oh, they were the good old days. You write about the good old days".
0:47:51 > 0:47:53They weren't the good old days at all.
0:47:53 > 0:47:57Do you know what my ambition is? I'm going to walk in that dining room
0:47:57 > 0:48:02where they're all poshed up, drinking port and cracking nuts and going on about the working class,
0:48:02 > 0:48:05and I want to say, "Excuse me, m'lord, thwwwrrtt!"
0:48:07 > 0:48:10The world of deference ended
0:48:10 > 0:48:13because people became more confident in themselves
0:48:13 > 0:48:18and were enabled, and they were given the vote and they were listened to,
0:48:18 > 0:48:24and people's opinions became more and more important and there was also a great change
0:48:24 > 0:48:30in the nature of the working man and woman and his and her role in society.
0:48:30 > 0:48:34I think it was definitely the effect of the wars, the two world wars.
0:48:34 > 0:48:36Women went out to work.
0:48:36 > 0:48:42They went to work in munition factories and they did men's jobs, and I think gradually
0:48:42 > 0:48:50the idea of working in big houses and being talked down to by the lady of the house,
0:48:50 > 0:48:54that went out the window. They didn't want to do that any more.
0:48:54 > 0:48:56And I don't blame them, frankly!
0:48:56 > 0:48:59The other thing was, which most people don't acknowledge,
0:48:59 > 0:49:02is a lot of it was quite boring
0:49:02 > 0:49:04for the upper classes as well.
0:49:04 > 0:49:09I remember my grandmother telling me that you had to dress five times a day,
0:49:09 > 0:49:11by the time you'd got into walking things
0:49:11 > 0:49:17and things for the guns and things for lunch and afternoon dresses and tea gowns and ball gowns...
0:49:17 > 0:49:22Your whole life was spent in your bedroom having your wretched maid unhook you down the back.
0:49:22 > 0:49:27That must have been in the end tiring when they didn't quite know why they were doing it.
0:49:27 > 0:49:31Does domestic service exist nowadays? No, not really.
0:49:31 > 0:49:36- Would you say? Doesn't at all, does it?- No, and also...
0:49:36 > 0:49:38It's all got strange, hasn't it?
0:49:38 > 0:49:43With health and safety, you daren't ask somebody to pick up a duster in case they sneeze.
0:49:45 > 0:49:47Mrs Bridges will kill me!
0:49:47 > 0:49:50Try and get somebody to clean an oven nowadays. Impossible!
0:49:50 > 0:49:55You have now an oven-cleaning service that comes in a van and says "oven clean".
0:49:55 > 0:50:00- They do do it right. - Yes, but you see nobody wants to clean an oven now.
0:50:00 > 0:50:04If you ask somebody who is your cleaning domestic help, "Can you clean an oven?"
0:50:04 > 0:50:09- They say, "I don't do ovens." - That has always been the joke. - Skills have gone.
0:50:09 > 0:50:13Introducing Mable, the robot housemaid...
0:50:13 > 0:50:17How to replace the skills of the domestic servant
0:50:17 > 0:50:20had been one of the great preoccupations of the 20th century.
0:50:20 > 0:50:23Begin the day with able Mabel.
0:50:23 > 0:50:25She'll wake you at your pre-set time.
0:50:27 > 0:50:32She'll bring your morning tea, brewed just how you like it.
0:50:32 > 0:50:34Eventually we found a solution.
0:50:34 > 0:50:38Women could do the work with a few labour-saving devices.
0:50:38 > 0:50:45What you have in the 1920s and 1930s is the kind of development of a cult of the housewife, if you like.
0:50:45 > 0:50:49We always think of the housewife now as something very conservative,
0:50:49 > 0:50:52but then the housewife was seen as modern.
0:50:52 > 0:50:56The housewife was somebody who did stuff for herself, she didn't rely on other people.
0:50:56 > 0:50:59She was a kind of democratic figure.
0:50:59 > 0:51:03She was somebody who had at her fingertips all this new technology that she controlled.
0:51:03 > 0:51:06It was always a bit of a myth, of course.
0:51:06 > 0:51:10It's more of a myth now that housewives have died out.
0:51:10 > 0:51:12Women work and nobody does the housework.
0:51:12 > 0:51:17It was time for television itself to step up to the plates and fill the vacuum.
0:51:17 > 0:51:21Cooking, cleaning, nannying - the traditional servant skills -
0:51:21 > 0:51:22formed the basis
0:51:22 > 0:51:25of the most popular factual programmes of the new century.
0:51:25 > 0:51:27Anthea Turner is the girl next door.
0:51:27 > 0:51:32But living next door to this girl would turn most neighbours green with envy.
0:51:32 > 0:51:34Her sparkling home is perfect in every way.
0:51:34 > 0:51:38Now she's prepared to share the secrets of housekeeping,
0:51:38 > 0:51:43home-making and hostessing with two less-gifted housewives.
0:51:43 > 0:51:50All of those jobs that we see Jean Marsh, Wendy Craig, Pauline Collins doing
0:51:50 > 0:51:56in the fictional TV of the '70s and '80s are performed by real people
0:51:56 > 0:52:00who seem strangely fictional in themselves in our current television.
0:52:00 > 0:52:05Supernanny is a far less convincing character than Wendy Craig in Nanny,
0:52:05 > 0:52:08and yet she seems, Jo Frost, to be a real person.
0:52:08 > 0:52:12We look to these kinds of programmes for inspiration,
0:52:12 > 0:52:15and because we think they'll help us create the perfect house.
0:52:15 > 0:52:19You've got all the things here to deal with the stains.
0:52:19 > 0:52:24I want you to use them and I want you to get rid of these stains here.
0:52:24 > 0:52:27What they reflect is a sense that skills are still very important.
0:52:27 > 0:52:29We don't have domestic servants
0:52:29 > 0:52:33and of course we are working so hard now, we're so harassed,
0:52:33 > 0:52:36but we're under such pressure to have a perfect house
0:52:36 > 0:52:42and to have the world around you that you can only create with the aid of an army of 40 servants.
0:52:43 > 0:52:45- And they're off. - No rest for the wicked.
0:52:45 > 0:52:49Then, just as we began to tire of shows about dusting,
0:52:49 > 0:52:52drama rediscovered the Upstairs Downstairs world,
0:52:52 > 0:52:58Downton Abbey proving its enduring popularity and perhaps continuing relevance.
0:52:58 > 0:53:01There's a sort of curious belief among media folk
0:53:01 > 0:53:06when they talk about the class system as if this is something in the past,
0:53:06 > 0:53:08that it no longer makes any difference.
0:53:08 > 0:53:10Of course, it makes an enormous difference.
0:53:10 > 0:53:15Do The Times first, he only reads that at breakfast. And The Sketch for her Ladyship.
0:53:15 > 0:53:19This was ITV's most successful period drama since Brideshead Revisited,
0:53:19 > 0:53:23even if some critics did dismiss it as toff TV.
0:53:23 > 0:53:30Julian Fellowes is an observer of the snob, and who I think is also one of our leading apologists for snobbery.
0:53:30 > 0:53:34I think he sees it as a kind of virtue in a way,
0:53:34 > 0:53:38and he's a very good-humoured about it and he's funny about it,
0:53:38 > 0:53:44but I think at the heart of his work, there is a sense that actually these are the best sort of people.
0:53:44 > 0:53:50The British upper classes are... either evil
0:53:50 > 0:53:55or ridiculous in all television drama.
0:53:55 > 0:53:59I think this is not only unhealthy but dishonest.
0:53:59 > 0:54:01On Dr Clarkson's recommendation,
0:54:01 > 0:54:05I'm sending you up to London to see an eye specialist at Moorfields.
0:54:05 > 0:54:10Anna will go with you and you'll stay with my sister Rosamund in her new house in Belgrave Square.
0:54:10 > 0:54:14I'm afraid I'm going to have to sit in your presence, my lord.
0:54:14 > 0:54:20One element we have rather lost is the interdependence of the classes.
0:54:20 > 0:54:28That society ran on interdependence, and I think that that has gone from our society.
0:54:28 > 0:54:32For whatever reason, Downton Abbey seemed to resonate through modern Britain,
0:54:32 > 0:54:36with its depiction of an ordered society on the brink of disaster.
0:54:36 > 0:54:42This Edwardian period, which is coming at the end of the Victorian splendour of the British Empire,
0:54:42 > 0:54:46is a time of great indulgence.
0:54:46 > 0:54:53And yet there's always a sense that around the corner something is lurking that will change everything.
0:54:53 > 0:54:54Can I ask for silence?
0:54:57 > 0:55:01Because I very much regret to announce
0:55:01 > 0:55:03that we are at war with Germany.
0:55:03 > 0:55:08Of course, war didn't mean the end of the English aristocracy.
0:55:08 > 0:55:11Take Highclere. Since opening to the public,
0:55:11 > 0:55:16it's played home to Jeeves and Wooster, the orgy scenes in Eyes Wide Shut,
0:55:16 > 0:55:19even the wedding of glamour model Jordan -
0:55:19 > 0:55:23all proof that our old aristocracy can flourish alongside the new.
0:55:23 > 0:55:29It's a bit of escapism, which is very nice when you're facing going to work in an office on Monday.
0:55:29 > 0:55:32People love the idea of all this drama taking place
0:55:32 > 0:55:35in and around a beautiful building and setting as Highclere.
0:55:37 > 0:55:42It's an incredible shock to me to go back to 165 Eaton Place.
0:55:42 > 0:55:44Rose becomes the housekeeper...
0:55:44 > 0:55:47Everybody touch their toes.
0:55:47 > 0:55:49'..and definitely getting tougher...'
0:55:49 > 0:55:51And stand up again.
0:55:52 > 0:55:54You may leave the room.
0:55:54 > 0:55:59..because the servants are tougher to keep under control.
0:56:02 > 0:56:07Once again, the action takes place against a backdrop of momentous national events.
0:56:07 > 0:56:131936 is a highly inflammable year.
0:56:13 > 0:56:15It's absolutely amazing.
0:56:15 > 0:56:21There were three kings, and there were riots in the East End, Mosley blackshirts...
0:56:21 > 0:56:27Quite a lot of nobles were fascists, so it's a fantastic year to start it.
0:56:27 > 0:56:32Yet, as ever, it's the domestic detail that keeps us watching.
0:56:32 > 0:56:39I tried to remember how I learned from Mrs Bridges and Mr Hudson,
0:56:39 > 0:56:45and that I was perfectly capable of doing it, so I'm capable of doing it now.
0:56:45 > 0:56:49And in this Upstairs Downstairs world, there's one final irony -
0:56:49 > 0:56:54it turns out reports of the death of domestic service have been greatly exaggerated.
0:56:54 > 0:56:58The back pages of The Lady are busier than ever.
0:56:58 > 0:57:04Obviously the jobs have changed, because you don't have to blacken grates and empty slops any more.
0:57:04 > 0:57:06But people still want help in the house.
0:57:06 > 0:57:12There's a statistic I think The Economist quoted - there are more people in domestic employment now
0:57:12 > 0:57:15than there were in Edwardian times.
0:57:15 > 0:57:17So this is not a dying world.
0:57:17 > 0:57:19This is a growing world.
0:57:19 > 0:57:23There are many, many domestic servants around now.
0:57:23 > 0:57:26This is an absolutely burgeoning industry.
0:57:26 > 0:57:30But these aren't people of the Mrs Bridges and Rose type.
0:57:30 > 0:57:35I think that it says something about our blinkered attitude
0:57:35 > 0:57:38that we're not willing to entertain a drama about service now
0:57:38 > 0:57:42in which everybody would speak English as a second language,
0:57:42 > 0:57:44they would be new arrivals to this country
0:57:44 > 0:57:49and they would be treated a hell of a lot worse than Mrs Bridges and Rose ever were.
0:57:49 > 0:57:55But who is to say that today's stories won't be entertaining us all in the dramas of tomorrow?
0:57:55 > 0:57:58As long as there are busy people with money,
0:57:58 > 0:58:04they'll get people in to do the things that they need done that they haven't got time to do themselves,
0:58:04 > 0:58:06but again, what's wrong with that?
0:58:27 > 0:58:30Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd