South Riding (2011) - Cast and characters

Anna Maxwell Martin and David Morrissey

star in adaptation of Winifred Holtby's novel South Riding
Sunday February 20, 2011 on BBC One
(And on PBS Masterpiece in May 2011)

More articles on South Riding, the series:
Telegraph: South Riding: romance and social change in the BBC's new costume drama
Kate Harwood /BBC: South Riding and one of the greatest literary heroines

~ Characters of South Riding ~

Sarah Burton (Anna Maxwell Martin)
Sarah Burton is an ambitious and modern career woman, a headmistress who is determined to show her girls that the future is theirs for the taking. She has returned from London to her place of birth, the South Riding, determined to make a difference and implement change. However, beneath the self-confidence is a flawed and vulnerable heroine, whose ideals will be heavily tested when they come up against the messy reality of life.

Robert Carne (David Morrissey)
Robert Carne is a brooding, troubled gentleman farmer. On the surface, he may appear snobbish, obstructive and backward-looking but he is actually just trying to protect the way of life in the countryside that he so believes in and loves. He is equally protective of his delicate young daughter, Midge, who reminds him constantly of her mother, his beloved wife now lost to him. Carne is a man trapped in the past but the world of the thirties is a rapidly changing place...

Robert & Midge Carne (Katherine McGolpin)
Midge Carne is fourteen and has never been to school. She has been privately educated by a string of governesses who have struggled to control this highly-strung girl. With money tight and Midge clearly in need of company, Robert Carne decides to send his daughter to the local school. It's a serious shock for Midge, being told what to do and forced to socialise with local grocers' daughters! But despite her initial snobbery and fear, Midge forms a deep affection for Miss Burton and increasingly finds school a much needed refuge from her troubled home life.

Alderwoman Beddows (Penelope Wilton)
Mrs Beddows is a strong woman ahead of her times: she is the district's first alderwoman and a formidable and vocal presence on the County Council. Beneath that surface, however, she is as hopelessly romantic as a young girl, privately battling against the disappointments of life.

Lydia Holly (Charlie May-Clark)
Lydia Holly is a teenage girl with huge academic potential but very limiting social circumstances. She lives in a railway carriage in a shanty town known locally as The Shacks with her parents and five siblings. Until now, Lydia's had to stay at home and help her mother raise the children but at last she can take up her scholarship at Kiplington High School. Sarah Burton recognises a gift in Lydia. She knows that education could entirely transform this girl's life but will Lydia ever be able to escape the cycle of poverty that has trapped her family for generations?

Councillor Joe Astell (Douglas Henshall)
Joe Astell is, like Carne, a veteran of the Great War. Unlike Carne it has left him with a deep distaste for its memory and a determination that matches Sarah's to make the world a better place in its aftermath. Born in Glasgow he forged his politics in the shipyards of the Clyde and came to Yorkshire during the Depression to work with the trawlermen of the South Riding. Sarah Burton is exactly the kind of woman he has hoped to meet - passionate, political, free thinking - and Joe can't help but wonder if she might be part of his future.

Councillor Snaith (Peter Firth)
Anthony Snaith is the ultimate politician. Motivated by the desire to do good and to set his mark on Yorkshire, he moves his pieces like an expert tactician, sweeping poverty and ruin off the face of the Riding and bringing order where once chaos reigned. So what if he makes a bit of money into the bargain that enables him to live the life he dreamed off as a boy growing up in the Kingsport slums? Where's the harm? It's not as if it's corrupt, is it now? Snaith will always be sure to keep his hands clean...

Alfred Huggins (John Henshaw)

Alfred Huggins is a man tormented both by earthly desires and by the desire to do good. He is a man of the cloth, whose heart genuinely bleeds for the poor of the South Riding, whose eye will always be caught by a pretty girl, and whose soul will be in torment after. In agonies of lust for young Bessy Warbuckle he exposes himself to blackmail and in a bid to get hold of enough money to pay her off, becomes embroiled in a piece of political corruption that may lead to his ruin...

Mr. Holly (Shaun Dooley)

Mr Holly is a labourer with a love for simple pleasures; a warm curd tart or a warm cuddle from his wife will send him to bed with a smile. Even if he has to share that bed with his wife and most of his six children! He lives in a railway carriage in the local shanty town, The Shacks, but he's happy and reckons they've got the best sea views in the whole of South Riding. Mr Holly's own education was curtailed as a boy because he had to work to support his family. Now he dreams his daughter Lydia will fulfil her potential in a way he never could, but when tragedy strikes, everything they both hoped for is threatened.

Read more on SOUTH RIDING

Character profiles: BBC One

Photos: BBC/Todd Antony

South Riding (2011) - trailer

Anna Maxwell Martin, David Morrissey, Penelope Wilton, and Douglas Henshall are among the cast of SOUTH RIDING, a 3-part series adapted by Andrew Davies from Winifred Holtby's novel.

BBC ONE - February 20 (Part 1 of 3)
PBS - May 1, 8, 15, 2011

"Drama charting the story of Sarah Burton's homecoming to Yorkshire in 1934 after twenty years teaching in London and the Empire. After a fiery interview with a conservative interview panel, outspoken Sarah takes up her first headmistress-ship at Kiplington High School for Girls, determined to demonstrate to her new pupils that the future is theirs for the taking. However, her determination to transform the South Riding brings her into conflict with a local landowner."

There's also a video that features the costumes of South Riding
(offers a preview however the audio and video don't match)

More on SOUTH RIDING

Downton Abbey - Penelope Wilton

Penelope Wilton makes no bones about the reasons why she wanted to work on Downton Abbey. As if the lure of a great script wasn’t enough, the possibility of working with Maggie Smith, an actress she had greatly admired was the icing on a very large cake. “One of the reasons I did this was to work with Maggie Smith’, says Penelope. ‘As a younger actress, (only slightly younger than Maggie) the person I admired more than anyone else on stage and in film, was Maggie Smith and I saw her in everything she did at The National Theatre,” she adds. “I wished I could be like her and now it’s like working with a heroine and one doesn’t have many of those when you grow older,” she laughs. Penelope, like many of her Downton co-stars, is much in demand and is currently filming the BBC’s South Riding, with David Morrissey, Anna Maxwell Martin and Douglas Henshall.

Previously seen in these period dramas...

Mrs. Hamley in Wives and Daughters

Mrs. Gardiner in Pride and Prejudice (2005)

Duchess of Kent in Victoria and Albert

As mother of the future heir to Downton, Isobel finds herself in the unenviable position of having to uproot herself and her son and leave behind her life, home and friends. “Although I am a widow, we live in Manchester and have a happy life, but we come into the story because my son is next in line to inherit Downton Abbey. We are brought to live in a house on the Downton estate so Matthew can learn the ropes,” she explains. “Isobel is not terribly happy about having to move. She had a close group of friends and a life of her own in Manchester. She trained as a nurse during the Boer War and her husband and brother were both doctors and so had a very full life. We discover that her husband specialised in children’s diseases and out of his notes Isobel published a book of his work,’ she explains. “I’ve got a very fulfilled life and this comes as a great interruption to their lives, but there’s nothing they can do about it. And she isn’t about to send him off to Downton alone.”

It is when Isobel and Matthew are introduced to the Grantham household that Isobel realises the enormity of the obstacles ahead and never one to shy away from a battle she steadies herself to face the Dowager Countess. “Isobel comes up against the Dowager, who has ruled the roost at Downton for many years. And although she pretends not to care that her position has been usurped by Lady Grantham, it is obvious that she would actually like to be more involved than she is now and she certainly doesn’t like this new woman coming in.” To make herself useful Isobel offers her services to the local hospital which was set up by Violet’s late husband for the local people on the estate.

“Maggie’s character and mine clash terribly over the hospital as Isobel wants to get involved and put her skills and experience as a nurse to good use. She has lived in the real world and knows a bit about medicine and basically thinks the hospital is stuck in the dark ages. Matthew and Isobel are part of the middle classes, the educated, the lawyers and doctors and as such, even the servants are snooty towards them. They represent change and I suppose present a new threat to their way of life…it’s born out of ignorance really,” explains Penelope. What ensues is a struggle for power between the two women that sees Isobel win small battle after small battle while Violet wins the war of words.

“Julian has written the most wonderful dialogue for both Maggie and I and we were in fits of laughter delivering these snippy lines to each other,” she admits. One of the downsides of filming this period in history is that the ladies wore no make-up and spent their time in corsets. Isobel Crawley was no exception. “When you are older you need a bit of make-up but they didn’t wear it in those days so we only had the very barest of make-up bases but I do wear a wig because they had a lot of hair then, which took quite a while to put on. And of course the corsets meant we didn’t eat much lunch on set,’ she laughs. ‘It’s no surprise they had to have maids in those days it must have taken ages to get ready.”

Pack produced by Una Maguire and Victoria Brooks, Milk Publicity!
Photo credits: Nick Briggs, Victoria Brooks

Read more on DOWNTON ABBEY

Penelope - The face that launched a feature
"Can You Place the Face?"

Downton Abbey - Maggie Smith

The incomparable Maggie Smith heads up the cast for Downton Abbey and chats about her role [created especially with her in mind by screenwriter Julian Fellowes].

On ITV1 - starting September 26, 2010

“I am just surprised to be doing anything at my age actually. When you think of where I am now and where I’ve come from, I am very pleased and very grateful to be standing up and delivering Julian’s great lines.”

She herself says of acting that it is more than a job, “I love it; it never crossed my mind to be anything else…I’m privileged to do it and I don’t know where I’d be without it.”

“It is very satisfying to play a character such as Violet, and I have a lot of fun with her – Julian is good at those sorts of ladies. This is the third old lady I’ve played for him, so I am getting the hang of it now,” she laughs. She plays Mrs Oldknow in Julian’s film From Time To Time, and Lady Trentham in Gosford Park, (on left) a character inspired by Julian’s great aunt.

“What I think is brilliant is that this is Julian’s original script and not an adaptation of anything and to have these wonderful ideas to work with, that you know are original, is quite simply stunning.” For Fellowes the choice of Maggie to play the Dowager Countess was an easy one. “Maggie Smith has a unique sense of comedy, based on a somewhat ironic view of real life, making it both funnier and more sad. But perhaps her greatest ability, or at least the one that most intrigues me, is how she can convey deep and powerful emotion without a trace of sentimentality,” explains Fellowes.

From the outset of Downton Abbey, Violet is clearly trying to hang onto her position as matriarch of the Crawley family – opinionated, immensely proud, passionately loyal to her son Robert and insufferable to her daughter-in-law Cora (Elizabeth McGovern), whom she has always regarded as a living compromise the family has had to make. When the entail in her late husband’s Will threatens to deprive her grand-daughter Mary (Michelle Dockery), of her rightful inheritance and Cora’s American money, Violet finds herself joining forces with her daughter-in-law. When asked if they are to be friends, Violet replies: “We are allies, my dear. Which can be a great deal more effective.”

When the Dowager Countess and Isobel Crawley (Penelope Wilton from Wives & Daughters), meet at the beginning of episode two, an unexpected battle of wills ensues between the two women. During the course of the series, both characters find themselves humiliated by the other with personal battles lost and won along the way. “I am very cross with Mrs Crawley and her son, because I feel they are kind of going to get away with the Estate and with lots and lots of money - it’s all happened because some family members have gone down in the Titanic and I consider these Crawleys to be common upstarts.”

Off set, the relationship between Maggie and Penelope Wilton couldn’t be in greater contrast. “Mercifully, it’s not the same in real life. We get on very well and often take strolls together around the grounds of Highclere.” In fact Penelope Wilton says that apart from having a great script to work with, one of the key reasons for taking the part was to work with Maggie Smith.

And I can't help but wonder...
how many of the other cast members would affirm the same reason!

Pack produced by Una Maguire and Victoria Brooks, Milk Publicity!
Photo credits: Nick Briggs, Victoria Brooks

More details posted here: Downton Abbey

South Riding (2011)

Anna Maxwell Martin

David Morrissey

Anna Maxwell Martin and David Morrissey lead the cast in Andrew Davies' new three-part adaptation of South Riding, based on novel by Winifred Holtby, for BBC One. To be directed by Diarmuid Lawrence

BBC ONE (February 20, 2011)

PBS Masterpiece: May 1, 8, 15, 2011

Writer Andrew Davies says: "What appealed to me most about South Riding is how fresh and relevant it feels, even though it was written and set in the Thirties. It's a terrific love story but it's also a portrait of a whole community in turmoil, with the country in recession, and bitter struggles between the advocates of change, like our heroine Sarah the new forward-thinking headmistress, and the forces of conservatism embodied in Robert Carne.
"It's also full of rich comedy, with some wonderful minor characters, splendidly cast. I feel as if we've rediscovered a forgotten masterpiece."

Meet the Characters of South Riding

Links:
Trailer
Interviews with Anna Maxwell Martin and David Morrissey
Review of pre-screening of series
Read more about author Winifred Holtby
Telegraph: South Riding: romance and social change in the BBC's new costume drama
Kate Harwood /BBC: South Riding and one of the greatest literary heroines
BBC One: Official site
IMDb

Ben Stephenson, BBC Controller, says: "Following on from Small Island and A Passionate Woman we continue to reappraise the BBC's approach to period drama – there are no cosy clichés here – this little-known novel paints a raw and real portrait of a rural community bustling with humanity and humour."

In the long aftermath of the First World War, Sarah Burton (Anna Maxwell Martin), comes home from London to Yorkshire. Having lost her chance of marriage and motherhood with her fiancé's death in the trenches, Sarah has become a very modern career woman, one of the "surplus two million" identified by the Daily Mail in 1920 as women who were unlikely to marry since their generation of men had been wiped out by war.

Now in her thirties, Sarah has come home to take up the position of headmistress at a struggling Yorkshire high school for girls. She is the very image of a modern woman, much more recognisable to her sisters in 2010 than she would have been to her contemporaries in 1935, full of ambition, passion and fire to take her life into her own hands and live it to the very limit of her strength.

But love has not finished with Sarah Burton – before the end of the story she must choose between the career she has fought for and the man least likely to have won her heart.

As Britain emerges from the Great Depression, Robert Carne (David Morrissey) finds he is an unlikely victim of a financial disaster. His family has farmed the South Riding for hundreds of years and he ought to be able to ride out the agricultural depression, cushioned by generations of family wealth. But Carne is a man haunted by love, and he has spent most of the farm's income over the past 20 years trying to wipe out the guilt he still feels for the woman he believes he destroyed. Past and present collide when Sarah Burton returns to the South Riding and clashes with the handsome haunted gentleman farmer. Their story is only one strand of a rich skein which tells the story of a small town community instantly recognisable to any age and in any part of the country.

Full of humour, pathos and tragedy, South Riding also tells the story of Lydia Holly (Charlie Clark), a 14-year-old girl with a difficult home life whose education is in jeopardy when her mother dies and she slips through society's safety net.

Shaun Dooley is Lydia's feckless father, Mr Holly; Miss Sigglesthwaite (Brid Brennan) is the incompetent science mistress of the high school who struggles to instil order over her pupils; Midge Carne (Katherine McGolpin), is the delicate and troubled daughter of Robert and his ill-starred first wife; Councillor Huggins (John Henshaw), by turns noble and ludicrous, is a methodist preacher much troubled by lustful thoughts who becomes embroiled in a game of political corruption way beyond his understanding.

This 20th-century classic is a rich and panoramic portrait of a Yorkshire community in the Thirties that carries surprising and refreshing echoes of our own time.

Penelope Wilton

Alderman Mrs Beddows (Penelope Wilton), is the county's first woman Alderman whose sensible and competent demeanour belies a girlish heart that has inconveniently fallen in love with an unsuitable man; and Joe Astell (Douglas Henshall), is the Riding's only socialist councillor and rival to Carne for Sarah's affections.

South Riding is a rich, compassionate and humane story of politics in small places and, in the end, the indestructibility of the human spirit.

Made by BBC Drama Production North for BBC One, South Riding is currently filming in Leeds for transmission later this year. Written by Andrew Davies (Bleak House, Sense And Sensibility, Little Dorrit).

The producer is Lisa Osborne (Little Dorrit), the director is Diarmuid Lawrence (Desperate Romantics, Little Dorrit, Emma) and the executive producers are Anne Pivcevic (Sense And Sensibility, Little Dorrit) and Hilary Martin.

A radio dramatization was previously done

with Sarah Lancashire and Philip Glenister

Kate Harwood, BBC Controller, Drama Series and Serials, says: "Published posthumously, South Riding is a rich and brilliant novel full of optimistic hope for the future and we are proud to be bringing Andrew Davies' wonderful adaptation to the screen with such a brilliant cast and team.
"Like all great period drama it shines a light on us and our society while introducing us to a world and characters that I believe the audience can take to their hearts."

This year marks 75 years since Winifred Holtby's death – Holtby died aged 38, in 1935.

Source: BBC Press Office

Brid Brennan

Shaun Dooley

Douglas Henshall

John Henshaw

Charlie Clark and Katherine McGolphin