264 The Duchess of Duke Street

First  watched  :  1976

This  was  more  of  a  favourite  of  my  mum  and  sister  which  I  occasionally  caught  without  becoming  particularly  engaged  with  it.

Based  on  a  real-life  personality  The  Duchess  of  Duke  Street   was  the  creation  of  Upstairs  Downstairs  producer  John  Hawkesworth   and  covered  roughly  the  same  period  of  history  as  the  ITV  series. Gemma  Jones  played  the   titular  character  Louisa  Trotter,  a  woman  who  rose  from  being  a  humble  maid  to  the  proprietor  of  a  grand  hotel  through  being  a  mistress  first  to  Edward  Prince  of  Wales  then  a  handsome  aristocrat  played  by  Christopher  Cazenove. For  most  of  the  series  Jones  was  playing  a  character  older  than  herself  and  speaking  in  a  rough  Cockney  accent  which  I  found  quite  offputting.

Two  series  were  made  totalling  31  episodes. Although  it  was  a  career-making  role  for  the  largely  unknown  Jones  she  didn't  take  full  advantage  of  it, disappearing  from  public  life  for  a  decade  and  a  half  to  raise  her  son. When  she  returned  to  acting  in  the  mid-nineties  she  was  welcomed  back  with  open  arms  and  has  been  much  in  demand  as  a  character  address  since,  winning  a  BAFTA  for  her  role  in  the  series  Marvellous  last  year.