Lead role in TV smash was ‘empowering’ for actress
MICHELLE Dockery has said playing a strong female lead in Downton Abbey from a young age helped her feel ‘more powerful’.
The 40-year-old actress was aged 26 when she landed the role of Lady Mary Crawley. Dockery recently reprised the character for the cinematic sequel of the period drama in Downton Abbey: A New Era.
Speaking on the Reign With Josh Smith podcast, she said: “Downton certainly gave me a lot of confidence and I think that also came from the character because she is such a strong and a fantastic character to play and there is a sort of confidence that those women of that time had.
“I think that certainly helped me to feel more powerful definitely. I feel very lucky that Downton gave me that sort of anchoring from a very young age really.”
The actress explained that she was living with three other girls in what felt like a ‘student house’ when she auditioned for the role.
She said she knew Downton would be a ‘big deal’ as Julian Fellowes had created it and the talent already attached to the show included Hugh Bonneville and Dame Maggie Smith.
Dockery said she had been ‘anticipating disappointment’ after her audition as she had missed out on other parts she wanted. She said that when her agent told her she had the part, “I had to take a minute and sit down. You know, when I look back, it was life changing at that moment.”
Downton Abbey ran on ITV from 2010 to 2015, following the fortunes of the aristocratic Crawley family and their downstairs servants at a Yorkshire country estate.
It later returned to the big screen in 2019, with the first film focusing on a royal visit to the Crawley family and Downton staff.
The latest movie sees the beloved characters embark on a grand journey to the South of France to uncover the mystery of the Dowager Countess’ newly inherited villa.