Streaming on HBO channels and on DVD - THE GILDED AGE (Julian Fellowes, USA, 2022)

 

Agnes Von Rhijn (Christine Baranski), Bertha Russell (Carrie Coon)

You have to give credit to Julian Fellowes. After six series and two movies devoted to the British aristocracy he has moved on. Some said the the series Jumped the Shark way back in about the third season but, as the feature length spinoffs showed, punters couldn't get enough.

Fellowes next stop is New York in the 1890s and the tension between the rich, represented most notably by Agnes Von Rhijn, and the nouveau riche represented by Bertha Russell. Agnes is a widow, supporting her impecunious spinster sister Ada Brook and hoping for good marriages for her son Oscar (a closet gay) and her niece Marian Brook. 

 

Both  the Van Rhijn and the Russell households have an array of servants, many of them with secrets that are going to take years (seasons) to uncover. It’s very familiar territory and it’s done with a panache that seems to accompany anything that Fellowes has done from Gosford Park onwards.

 

So while waiting for series two to emerge I pondered equivalences.

 

As mentioned there is an acerbic witty quality to Agnes Von Rhijn (Christine Baranski) that clearly matches up with Maggie Smith’s grandmother Violet Crawley. Each is adept at tossing off vicious bon mots and asserting class superiority. "My dear I may be many things but I am never wrong." has probably been uttered by both.

 

George Russell (Morgan Spector)

While Google tells me that the Russells are based on the Vanderbilts, I think George Russell (Morgan Spector) surely has more than a touch John D Rockefeller. “Grandfather was never charged with a crime” said one of Rockefeller’s grandsons in a TV series devoted to the development of American capitalism. Maybe so but reining in what Rockefeller did  to so-called compete with other business, formed the basis of today’s US competition and anti-trust law. George Russell has no qualms in destroying his business enemies – everyone from a fellow railroad operator who refuses to sell out to him, to his stenographer who betrays him for money. He’s a tougher egg than Robert Crawley the lord of Downton Abbey and a business naif mostly concerned with preserving his estates in the face of declining revenues. “There’s this fellow called Ponzi in America. Maybe I should invest with him” said Robert at one stage.

 

There are three butlers to consider. Carson is the unflappable adviser to the Crawley family and a stickler for protocol. He would never do what Bannister, Mrs Von Rhijn’s butler, does when he secretly accepts $100 from the despised Russells to advise and supervise a dinner which will be one of their stepping stones into the New York 400. In so doing he manages to get up the nose of Bruce, the Russell’s butler who doesn’t know the etiquette associated with English table layouts. “ The English never eat their salad separately and thus do not require a separate knife and fork”. Bannister is worldly and far more tolerant than Carson a man who knew his place and lauded old-fashioned virtues such as total obeisance to the ruling class. 

Ada Brook (Louise Jacobson), Peggy Scott (Denée Benton)

 

Bannister and Carson are both however stout defenders of other staff when unfairly attacked. Bannister is most keen to let the staff know whenever any racial slight occurs towards Miss Scott, the young black woman who lucks into a job as Mrs von Rhijn’s secretary. Miss Scott is the equivalent of Tom Branson the interloper Irishman who sweeps one of the Crawley daughters off her feet.

 

The closet gay characters are in different classes. The valet Barrow in Downton runs parallel to that of Oscar, who is on the hunt for a pliant rich wife and has his eye on Gladys Russell who will inherit fabulous wealth. I fear a sticky ending…

Berttha Russell (Carrie Coon), Donna Murphy (Caroline Astor)

 

Finally one big difference that leads to the best joke of the season. The Russells have a French chef who talks like an American actor doing an Inspector Clouseau accent. There was no equivalent in Downton, just Mrs Patmore the no-nonsense cook. But to succeed in New York society in The Gilded Age  a French chef is a requirement and Bertha Russell has found one. He  feigns incredulity when asked to cook an English style meal for the visit of Ward McAllister the gatekeeper to the New York’s most esteemed member of society Mrs Astor, but trouble is afoot. I can say no more…