The Gilded Age: Downton Abbey’s little sister, but in New York

New York, 1882. Following the death of her father, Marian Brook leaves Pennsylvania and wants to escape the glitches by going to the Big Apple. She finds her rich aunts in New York, and will have to apprehend a new world, while the United States is living a “golden period” (hence the title of the series, The Gilded Age), after recovering from the Civil War. Everyone wants to live the American dream, and the opportunities are numerous, to the great detriment of members of American high society, who take a dim view of the arrival of these new rich, who have been able to make their fortune thanks to industrial development. . A real class struggle is taking place, and by living with her aunts, Marian will have to have some class…

Take a lot of Downton Abbey, obviously, a bit of The Bridgerton Chronicle also, mix all that up, move the result from England to New York, and you get The Gilded Age, the new series imagined by Julian Fellowes, produced by HBO, and which will be released on Tuesday January 25 in US + 24 on OCS. We can therefore expect to find all the ingredients that have made the success of Downton Abbey, his most famous creation, with power struggles, legacy worries, scandals in every corner and reputations that are made to the rhythm of gossip. But always with tenderness and humor. After the British palaces, it is therefore in the demented grandeur of New York, and more precisely of the Manhattan district, that the intrigues will unfold, and be carried by a cast as flashy as the sumptuous period outfits imagined by the teams of The Gilded Age. Basically, each episode is a bit like a 19th century fashion week…

Sex and the City of New York

We therefore find Louisa Jacobson in the main role of Marian Brook. And if his name means nothing to you, that of his mother should not be unknown to you, since it is simply Meryl Streep. We therefore imagine that she received valuable advice from him, but also from his comrades on the set of The Gilded Age. Because the new series signed HBO rolled out the red carpet, bringing together neither more nor less than Cynthia Nixon (eternal Miranda in Sex and the City), Christine Baranski (The Good Wife, The Good Fight) as her aunts, but also Carrie Coon (The Leftovers, Avengers) in the role of the new neighbor that Marian’s tatas will quickly judge (and hate, obviously). In short, for this new series in New York, the atmosphere will not be very Friends, as seen in the trailer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wJjdzbvZa4

The corsets and crinoline dresses are out, the looks are inquisitive, the social pressure is higher than the Empire State Building, and the discussions of the servants always as tasty, making it possible to laugh at the setbacks of the owners of the superb residences present in The Gilded Age. Because unlike Downton Abbey, the story will take place this time within several families who do not lack ambition, as indicated at the microphone of France Info Julian Felllowes, when indicating what influenced him for the creation of his new series:

“It was the moment when America took charge of its destiny. And stopped thinking that it had to let go of the European influence on its way of life. If you walk around New York, the most impressive thing is that is that there are a lot of buildings left from that period. You see how these people saw themselves. They thought they were giants, they built buildings for giants”

And there’s no doubt that everyone will take malicious pleasure in crashing into the living rooms of these New York families every Tuesday, for a first season of The Gilded Age consisting of nine episodes, to be enjoyed on OCS in US+24. Welcome to New York !