About an episode into Downton Abbey Season 2, which I raced through on the PBS website last week before they took it down, it struck me--suddenly yet belatedly--that the Granthams are really just the next iteration of the Forsytes, which sated the reading, listening, and viewing public's voyeurism throughout the 20th Century.
Shortly after landing my first job out of college, one of my coworkers encouraged me to make use of my new Netflix account by renting The Forsyte Saga, a British miniseries about the comings and goings of a grand family and all of their exaggerated drama (i.e., the everything-that-can-go-wrong-does storyline that we see in Downton and, let's be honest, daytime soaps). New to the Netflix thing back then, I dutifully ordered it and made my somewhat painful way through each of the discs in the evenings, eventually hooking even my dad, who generally eschewed tv shows and movies. At the end of it, I thought, moly, that was barely tolerable. The acting was laughable, being done in that stylized, halting, 1960s way and the only thing that got my dad and me through it was sheer wonder at how truly awful it was. We wondered what all the fuss was about.
Well, come to find out, I'd ordered the wrong one. My coworker's review was based on the 2002 version--in living color!--which, coming full circle, I plan to add to my instant queue now that I, along with the rest of the world, have to wait 10-ish months until Downton Season 3. The Forsyte Saga may not compare with Julian Fellowes's production but it cannot be worse that its 1967 BBC made-for-tv predecessor. Which means it will do quite nicely until we find out what the Roaring Twenties bring to Downton.
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