STATE’S HISTORY, FILMED ABROAD, ON WHRO
You’ll never guess where they filmed “Jamestown,” an eight-part miniseries airing on WHRO.
Did the producers — including Gareth Neame and Nigel Merchant of “Downton Abbey” fame — consider creating the eight-part series right here in Virginia? Nope.
They decided that America would be way too expensive.
So off they went to Hungary to film the saga of English settlers who in the 1600s established the first permanent settlement in the Virginia colony. Cast and crew spent five months working on the outskirts of Budapest while no doubt occasionally dining on fine Hungarian goulash.
The filmmakers also considered Canada and South Africa.
The
“Jamestown” series that emerged from the elaborate set in Hungary is compelling television with a cast of splendid
English actors.
It tells the story of
100 or so women — including
Alice (Sophie Rundle), Jocelyn (Naomi Battrick) and Verity (Niamh Walsh) — who arrive in the British colony in 1619, duty bound to marry the men who have paid for their passage to the New World. The fee is the value of 50 pounds of leaf tobacco.
There had been no women in the colony since it was settled 12 years earlier. Alice is heard to say, “To be shipped over the sea to become the wives of men we never before set our eyes on is an extraordinary happening. Can you image how terrifying that was?”
They were told soon after the 144-day voyage from London, “You were brought here as the property of your husbands and you will act accordingly.”
The women find heat, mud, flies and pigs upon reaching the colony.
Frankly, it’s a surprise to see “Jamestown” scheduled to air in the afternoons — 4:30 p.m. on Thursdays, from now until Nov. 22 — on Channel 15.
I find it more suited for prime time and away from the eyes of young children, because at times the series is brutal and violent — unflinching in its depiction of harsh life within the walls of the settlement.
In one scene the colony’s marshal, fed up with the antics of the town drunk, punishes him for “slandering the Virginia Company, lewdness and drunkenness” by nailing his ear to a post.
In another episode, one of the women imported “to make wives for the colony” finds herself locked in the stocks, after which pig slop is dumped on her head. Her crime? Ridiculing her husband — one’s better — in public.
When asked if youngsters might be shocked if they catch a glimpse of the mature programming in the Thursday matinees, WHRO Public Media’s president and CEO Bert Schmidt said, “We’ve been airing our matinee programming for a few years now and have had no complaints about the Masterpiece series, which can include adult themes.”
Donal Woods, who previously worked on “Downton Abbey,” designed and built the Jamestown set in Hungary, creating the look of a settlement on the edge of an untamed wilderness. They used
At times the series is brutal and violent — unflinching in its depiction of harsh life within the walls of the settlement.
traditional techniques that the English settlers of the early 17th century might have used, added producer Gareth Neame in an online interview.
“The producers’ team did an incredible job of re-creating colonial Jamestown. They built an entire plantation in the Hungarian countryside with real tobacco and pigs in pens,” said the editors of the BBC History Magazine on the magazine’s website. The interiors of the buildings are complete, which allowed the producers to do all filming on site. There was no need to march the actors off to a studio to finish filming.
As you might expect, Peter Armstrong and Tracy Perkins at Jamestown Settlement made plans to capitalize on the buzz created by the series. On Nov. 10, the site will open a year-long exhibition, “Tenacity: Women in Jamestown and Early Virginia.”
Viewers this fall are seeing the first 8 episodes of the 16-hour production of “Jamestown.” There is no date yet when the second season will air on Channel 15.
However, PBS will show the second batch of eight episodes via WHRO Passport before they are seen on Channel 15. WHRO Passport allows viewers to watch shows new and old from the PBS library online.
WHRO Passport is available to viewers who become sustaining members of the Channel 15 family. Interested? Go to info@whro.org or call 757-889-9499 to find out how to join.