Skip to main content

‘Downton Abbey’ could move from the servants’ quarters to the big screen

Get your finest dinner coat ready, Downton Abbey fans. You might have reason to celebrate.

A new, unconfirmed report indicates that the Crawley family might return to the screen in a big way.

Recommended Videos

Following six celebrated seasons on ITV and PBS, Downton Abbey will reportedly receive a big-screen feature that brings back the cast of the award-winning British drama for one last story.

According to The Sun, series writer and creator Julian Fellowes will reteam with show producer Carnival Films to make the film, with cameras expected to begin rolling in September. However, there’s been no official confirmation of the film at this point, so the report should be taken as a rumor — albeit one that will certainly cause some excitement for fans of the series more than a year after the final episode aired.

The outlet reports that “film bosses have requested the services of crew members and accountants to work on the picture,” according to an anonymous source. The source adds, “A budget has been set and now it’s a case of getting everything in place to start shooting.”

“It would take something big to stop the project from happening now,” according to the outlet’s unidentified source.

While that’s all well and good for Downton fans, the cast of the series has been more than skeptical about the prospects of a movie based on the show. Maggie Smith, who was nominated for five Primetime Emmy Awards and won three for her role as the Dowager Countess of Grantham in the series, recently said it would be “squeezing it dry” to make a Downton Abbey movie and expressed some uncertainty about returning to the role.

However, Fellowes seemed more than up to the task of bringing the Crawley family to theaters.

“There is an audience for a film,” he told Indie Wire in May 2016. “I’d structure a narrative with lots of things happening, but we would need a kind of unity to make a feature, which is a challenge for me. It would be a bigger canvas: A riot could be a real riot, the ball a real ball. I would like that, I think it would be fun.”

Over the course of its six-season run, Downton Abbey earned 12 Primetime Emmy Awards and the most nominations of any non-U.S. series. By its third season, it was widely regarded as the most-watched international series on television.  The final episode aired December 25, 2015.

Rick Marshall
Former Contributing Editor, Entertainment
A veteran journalist with more than two decades of experience covering local and national news, arts and entertainment, and…
3 action movies on Netflix you need to watch in June 2025
Four men sit down against a fence and stare.

What's populating the action genre on Netflix? Sicario: Day of the Soldado, the sequel to Denis Villeneuve's Sicario, is being featured on the action homepage. While not as effective as its predecessor, Day of the Soldado features another terrific performance from Benicio del Toro as Alejandro Gillick. 

Add Soldado to your Netflix queue this month. But first, stream one of our three recommendations below. Our picks include a crime thriller from one of Boston's most famous figures, a feature film adaptation of an espionage TV show, and a Mount Rushmore buddy comedy. 

Read more
James Gunn reveals significant DC updates involving Wonder Woman and Justice League
Wonder Woman running through the trenches.

James Gunn is methodically adding more characters to the new DC Universe. One of those superheroes is Wonder Woman. No plans have been announced regarding Diana Prince ... until now.

In an interview with EW, Gunn revealed that a Wonder Woman movie is in development and "being written right now." The movie is in addition to the previously announced Paradise Lost, an HBO series about the Amazonian warriors on the female island of Themyscira before the birth of Wonder Woman.

Read more
If you have to watch one Disney+ movie this June 2025, stream this one
Johnny Depp as Jack Sparrow with Orlando Bloom's Will Turner in Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl.

Unlike most major studios, Disney has worked hard for many decades to establish a brand that makes sense to audiences around the world. When you see a Disney movie, you're supposed to be able to know it even without the logo in front of it.

That's definitely true in animation, but even some of their live-action movies have this same sheen. Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl, for instance, is a Disney movie through and through. Here are three reasons you should watch (or rewatch) it on Disney+:

Read more