Downton Abbey

It’s that time of year again where we American Downton Abbey fans seethe with unspoken jealousy toward our friends in the United Kingdom who officially started the new season of everyone’s favorite costume drama

While we’re obviously not quite as lucky as our friends across the pond (though, really, when are we ever when it comes to entertainment), we aren’t completely without Downton-related goodness . Masterpiece has released a brand-new US trailer promoting the Series 5 premiere.

Happily, this new clip features footage that we didn’t see in the original UK trailer released earlier this Fall, so even though they’re interspersed with snippets from its British counterpart, there’s plenty of new stuff for us to dissect.

The highly anticipated fifth season of global period drama phenomenon Downton Abbey premieres in the UK this weekend, and everyone who is not in Britain has yet another reason to add to their presumably already long list about why they are sad about their current location.

While we Yanks will again be waiting until January to see the latest adventures of the Crawley clan for ourselves - the drama premieres on Masterpiece Classic on January 4 – I wanted to take the chance to get my hopes and dreams for the new series before someone manages to inadvertently spoil me on Twitter. (Trust me, I thought about waiting until December to write this post, and making myself look like a genius. But where’s the fun in that.)

And don’t get me wrong – I’m over the moon that Downton’s returning and I can’t wait to watch the new episodes. So, here are the five things that I’d most like to see in Series 5.

Joyous day! The moment we have all been waiting has arrived – the first official trailer for Downton Abbey Series 5 is here!

And it looks amazing!

Jam-packed with all our favorite characters, and lots of implied drama, the new promo certainly seems to promise a much more drama-filled season than last year’s effort, which was predominantly focused around Mary’s romantic entanglements. It seems obvious that’s also going to be a prominent feature of this series, but there seems to be plenty of other things going on.

Plus, you’ll catch a few glimpses of two major new guest stars Anna Chancellor and Richard E. Grant. It’s all very exciting!

So, take a deep breath, then watch for yourselves below.

We’re ever so slowly inching toward that joyous day when the highly anticipated fifth season of Downton Abbey will arrive, and, as that’s the case we’re finally starting to see bits and pieces of information emerge about what Series 5 is going to look like.

In short: It’s okay to start getting excited now!

A full spread of delightful new images has been released by ITV and Masterpiece, giving us our first look at the new season key art (it’s even a little bit different this time around), as well as snaps featuring almost all of our favorite characters and a glimpse at the suddenly aged but perfectly adorable Crawley children.

Click through and take a look for yourselves!

Thankfully – even if it may seem slow as molasses in January at times - Series 5 of everyone's favorite costume drama Downton Abbey is inching ever closer, and we’ve finally got an official teaser trailer for the new season.

Prepare yourselves.

Since we’re all undergoing fairly severe Downton Abbey withdrawal by this point, most of us will gladly sit through anything we can get that might even be tangentially related to the show. Luckily, getting to watch a fairly lengthy new interview with Joanne Froggatt, who plays everyone’s favorite housemaid-turned-ladies-maid Anna Bates, doesn’t even feel like cheating. So, why not do that?

Buzzfeed editor Jarrett Wieselman sat down with the Emmy-nominated actress recently as part of a special event for the Screen Actors Guild Foundation in Los Angeles, which involved a screening followed by a Q&A session. Happily, it was recorded for those of us who don’t have SAG cards. The two chat for about forty-five minutes on a variety of topics, ranging from Froggatt’s early days as an actress, to her initial reaction to the script for Downton Abbey, to her experiences filming on the set.

And of course, she really digs in to Anna’s character and the responsibility she herself felt in being truthful to the character during her intense – and much darker – scenes this past season.

It’s well worth a watch if you’ve got a few minutes to spare!

Having Downton Abbey withdrawal? Of course you are. We all are. Thankfully, we’ve got a particularly fabulous tidbit to help get us through the (seemingly endless) wait for Series 5.

The Television Academy of Arts & Sciences hosted a special event for its members in Los Angeles on May 3rd which featured appearances by several members of the Downton cast and crew and was streamed live over the internet as it happened. Part Series 4 retrospective, part general show discussion, there’s plenty of fun here for all who love the megahit costume drama.

Stars Joanne Froggatt, Phyllis Logan, Sophie McShera and Robert James-Collier all took part, along with series creator Julian Fellowes and executive producer Gareth Naeme. It was actually pretty fun to watch some members of the cast who may not get in front of the media as frequently get the chance to shine. McShera, for example, is completely adorable, and I promise you’ll be so charmed by James-Collier that you’ll basically forget how much you hate Thomas.

It’s official – literally everyone has made a Downton Abbey parody. Or so it seems.

It’s not enough that long-running pop culture staple The Simpsons already did a version of the show’s opening credits in the style of Downton last year, this time the show has decided to feature the mega-hit costume drama as part of its incredibly violent in-series cartoon The Itchy and Scratchy Show.

Because nothing says posh period costumes and a rigid class structure like buckets of animated violence, right?

Just go ahead and add Minnie Driver to the ever-expanding list of famous people who are gunning for a role on megahit costume drama Downton Abbey. But Driver has something most of those celebs don’t – an audition tape, courtesy of The Ellen DeGeneres Show.

Driver appeared on DeGeneres’ afternoon chat show last week, ostensibly to promote her new NBC series About A Boy, based on the popular 2002 British-American film of the same name. But that’s not the only British topic the pair covered. The two participated in a Downton-themed skit complete with posh period costumes and overly dramatic period names (Lady Gwendymere of West Bedford Applebees for DeGeneres and Countess Penelope of I Can’t Believe It’s Not Buttersworth for Driver).

The catch? Driver wasn’t allowed to see the script for her impromptu “audition” beforehand, and had to perform her lines for the first time off of a teleprompter. Predictably, hilarity ensues – especially when Driver is forced to bark like a dog, make violent arm gestures and try on a variety of accents on the fly.

This clip might not get Driver a job, but it should definitely make Downton fans laugh.

We only finished Downton Abbey Series 4 a couple of days ago here in America, but it seems a pretty safe bet that many people are already experiencing the classic symptoms of withdrawal and sadness that characterizes the deadly dull time that is the hiatus.

Luckily, Downton was renewed for Series 5 well before the season aired here in the US and filming officially got under way this week in England, so we are not completely without diversion at this most crucial of times. The start of production has not brought us much (yet) by way of storyline or character-related details, but Carnival Films, ITV and Masterpiece have announced that the new season will bring with it a handful of new and familiar faces.

Three fabulous and well-known actors will be joining the cast of the mega-hit costume drama when it returns for its fifth season.