Michelle Dockery Plays Lady Mary
The last series of Downton Abbey began with Lady Mary in a wedding dress. This series begins with her in widow’s weeds. It’s six months after Matthew’s death and she’s still in full mourning.
“Normally three months after someone’s passed away the women would start to change into lilacs and greys and purples but Mary is refusing, even after six months, to change out of anything but black. Everyone around her is trying to bring her out of this dark spell that she’s under. In the first episode there’s an almost fairytale-like quality to things… like a sort of spell that’s been cast over Downton. It’s even shot in that way, very grey and bleak. And it only really begins to thaw when she comes out of mourning.”
The family and staff are all concerned. Several of them try to lift her out of her grief, through parties and trying to get her to meet new people.
“But she can’t move on and I don’t think Mary will for a long time. Matthew’s still very much in her thoughts.”
This stands in stark contrast to Mary’s prevailing mood throughout series three. She was settled and happy and she had a future ahead of her, until her world was turned on its head. But Dockery says that the death of Matthew has opened up new opportunities for her character.
“Initially, when we read the storyline with Matthew’s death we all thought, ‘What will happen now?’ But it has taken things down a completely different avenue. Series four is a complete contrast to series three. And I’m still discovering so many sides to her character. I like how in the first few episodes of series four Mary is retreating to being quite cold again like she was in series one. In a slightly more grown up way and for very different reasons, she was quite a superficial, spoilt brat in the first series but now she’s changed. It’s through the grief really.”
Mary may be reluctant to move on, but that doesn’t stop certain parties from trying to persuade her.
“Let’s face it,” says Dockery, “Mary obviously doesn’t find relationships easy. She can be quite tough, she’s not a walkover so it will take quite a strong man to handle her and we saw that storyline play out with Matthew and Mary – in the end he sort of tamed her a bit.”
Where Matthew had challenged Robert about the management of the estate, that task now falls to Mary.
“It’s a lot to take on and Lord Grantham is quite tough with Mary at first. Because she’s a woman as well he’s not quite sure she’s capable of taking on that responsibility. She puts up a fight when she thinks that he’s making the wrong decision or he needs to be a bit more open minded about something. So that’s another lovely aspect of the story for me – the relationship, again, with Lord Grantham and that struggle she has with her father.”
Finally, of course, Mary now has a baby, George, to contend with.
“Actually in the beginning Mary finds it very difficult to bond with George because she sees Matthew in him. But gradually that starts to change.”
It’s meant that Dockery has had to learn how to play mum.
“George is actually twins and they are just gorgeous. Luckily they are very good. They are very quiet and they seem to enjoy it even at that age.”
But if the babies on set have been merely a minor distraction, a much greater diversion has been the presence of a new game that has taken the green room by storm.
“Bananagrams is a bit like Scrabble. Tom Cullen (who plays Lord Gillingham) brought it with him and we all love it. It sort of keeps your brain alive between set ups. Pretty much everyone’s playing.”
And dare we ask who is the Bananagram champion?
“Maggie’s very good. And Laura’s very good. Me? I get good days and bad days.”
Source:
http://michelle-dockery.com/downton-abbey-season-4-press-pack-interview-with-michelle/