(L to R) Hugh Bonneville, Allen Leech, and Kevin Doyle star in ‘Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale’.
Opening in theaters on September twelfth is the third and remaining film within the ‘Downton Abbey’ franchise entitled ‘Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale’, which was directed by Simon Curtis (‘My Week with Marilyn’).
The movie stars Hugh Bonneville (‘Paddington’), Michelle Dockery (‘The Gents’), Elizabeth McGovern (‘Unusual Individuals’), Allen Leech (‘Bohemian Rhapsody’), Kevin Doyle (‘Good’), Dominic West (‘The Wire’), Alessandro Nivola (‘Kraven the Hunter’), Joely Richardson (‘The Lady with the Dragon Tattoo’), and Paul Giamatti (‘The Holdovers’).
Moviefone lately had the pleasure of talking with Hugh Bonneville. Allen Leech and Kevin Doyle about their work on ‘Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale’, Bonneville’s first response to the ultimate screenplay, ending the franchise, what the sequence has meant to Leech personally, how Doyle’s character has modified because the final movie, and the genius of sequence creator Julian Fellowes.
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Hugh Bonneville stars as Robert Grantham in ‘Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale’, a Focus Options launch. Credit score: Rory Mulvey / © 2025 Focus Options LLC.
Moviefone: To start with, Hugh, what was your first response to studying the ultimate screenplay and was it bittersweet making this film realizing that it might be the final time you’d play this character?
Hugh Bonneville: Effectively, we at all times knew that this was going to be the third and remaining movie. The script went by means of many adjustments throughout its improvement. Julian was batting it backwards and forwards, and the ultimate iteration appeared the suitable one. The place there are such a lot of farewells inside the story, so many components of regime change, if you happen to like, each upstairs and down, with the altering of the guard. It simply felt like a great farewell to our viewers who’ve been the actual driving pressure in sustaining us for thus lengthy.
Allen Leech stars as Tom Branson in ‘Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale’, a Focus Options launch. Credit score: Rory Mulvey / © 2025 Focus Options LLC.
MF: Allen, as an actor, what has it meant to you personally to work with this solid and to be part of this franchise?
Allen Leach: It has been an absolute pleasure and a pleasure to be a part of it, and one thing I do not suppose any of us have anticipated. Actually, for myself and Kevin, with our roles, we have been solely employed for a few episodes. So, it’s extremely surreal after fifteen years and the entire six seasons and three films, to be right here speaking to you about this remaining a part of it. It actually has been such an extremely essential a part of my life and I am very grateful to Julian for together with an Irish character first off, after which additionally not killing him off within the first couple of seasons. So, it has been fantastic and it is one thing I’ll miss terribly and that is solely actually hitting house now as we do these final couple of days of the press tour that I will not get to harass Hugh as a lot as I usually would or Kevin.
(L to R) Kevin Doyle stars as Mr. Molesley and Michael Fox as Andy Parker in ‘Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale’, a Focus Options launch. Credit score: Rory Mulvey / © 2025 Focus Options LLC.
MF: Kevin, are you able to speak about how your character has modified because the final film and the place we discover him when this film begins?
Kevin Doyle: Effectively, he is acquired quite a bit wealthier. He is acquired a pleasant home, he is acquired a beautiful automobile, he is acquired a wonderful spouse. But, dot, dot, dot, there’s quite a lot of anxiousness, there’s quite a lot of strain on him to get these scripts out. He is a little bit of a perfectionist, and nothing has ever fairly proper for him, and so there’s quite a lot of self-imposed strain, and he is discovering it troublesome to dwell with.
(L to R) Producer Liz Trubridge, director Simon Curtis and author/creator/producer Julian Fellowes on the set of ‘Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale’, a Focus Options launch. Credit score: Rory Mulvey / © 2025 Focus Options LLC.
MF: Hugh, are you able to discuss in regards to the genius of Julian Fellows and this unbelievable worldwide phenomenon that he has created?
HB: Effectively, Julian, as an actor by his preliminary commerce, has a great ear for dialogue, clearly. I can keep in mind studying the very first script and discovering all these characters so vivid. They actually sprung into my thoughts’s eye, and I may see every of them nicely, earlier than they have been solid, and so that does not at all times occur. Usually, you could find the characters are interchangeable in a script, however these all had their very own voice, and the narrative had such ahead momentum that, like everybody who then got here to look at the present, I needed to know what occurred subsequent. So, I believe that’s what is a part of the genius of Julian. Not solely does he write nice traces, however he inhabits these characters. He actually cares about them, every of them, and they’re advanced and three dimensional. However all of them come from a spot of inherent goodness or a generosity of spirit, and I believe that is been the underlying tone of the present, that there’s a heat about it. It’s a world of fiction. I imply, some UK journalists used to get a bit uppity that it wasn’t a documentary and wasn’t appropriate in regards to the social injustices of the aristocracy. However however, thousands and thousands of individuals have loved visiting this fictional world and participating in its tales and that they have been common tales. So that is what Julian’s knack has been to create a fast-paced narrative, however with characters with whom you wish to spend time.
(L to R) Allen Leech stars as Tom Branson, Dominic West as Man Dexter and Robert James-Collier as Thomas Barrow in ‘Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale’, a Focus Options launch. Credit score: Rory Mulvey / © 2025 Focus Options LLC.
MF: Lastly, Kevin, what has your expertise been like working with Julian on this franchise?
KD: By way of Julian’s craft, it is astonishing that he is been in a position to maintain twenty odd characters for this size of time, and fairly truthfully, to maintain all these actors blissful as nicely with good storylines and inside this one film, he is needed to wrap it up. Effectively, not a lot wrap up, however he is needed to recommend an ongoing life for twenty odd characters, which is a unprecedented achievement, I believe.
(L to R) Laura Carmichael stars as Girl Edith, Harry Hadden-Paton as Bertie Hexham, Elizabeth McGovern as Cora Grantham, Hugh Bonneville stars as Robert Grantham and Michelle Dockery as Girl Mary in ‘Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale’, a Focus Options launch. Credit score: Rory Mulvey / © 2025 Focus Options LLC.
What’s the plot of ‘Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale’?
The movie follows the Crawley household and the Downton Abbey employees as they enter the Thirties. When Mary (Michelle Dockery) finds herself on the heart of a public scandal brought on by her divorce and the household faces monetary hassle, all the family grapples with the specter of social shame. The Crawleys should embrace change because the employees put together for a brand new chapter with the following era main Downton Abbey into the long run.
Who’s within the solid of ‘Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale’?
‘Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale’ opens in theaters on September twelfth.