If Downton Abbey wasn’t powerful enough ITV and Carnival films has just confirmed the addition of Paul Giamatti (Twelve Years A Slave) to the cast of the fourth series. The Hollywood actor will be joining the British period drama for the climactic Christmas episode series finale, which will more than likely air on Christmas Day in the same way that the 2012 episode did.
Giamatti is set to star as Lady Grantham’s Mr Toad-like excitable playboy brother Harold as he visits with their mother Martha Levinson (Shirley MacLain). With Emmy and Golden Globe wins already for both the actor and the drama it will inevitably be one of the must-see Christmas TV slots this year.
The star of Sideways, The Ides of March and Turbo isn’t the only new addition to the cast for Series 4 as Dame Kiri Te Kanawa, Julian Ovenden, Nigel Harman (Eastenders), Tom Cullen (Black Mirror), Gary Carr (Bluestone 42, Nation at the National Theatre), who will play jazz singer Jack Ross, and Joanna David have also been confirmed.
The new faces join series regulars, Hugh Bonneville (Lord Grantham), Elizabeth McGovern (Lady Grantham), Maggie Smith (Lady Violet Crawley, Lord Grantham’s mother), Michelle Dockery (Lady Mary), Starlings‘ Brendan Coyle (Lord Grantham’s valet, John Bates) and Jim Carter (the house butler, Carson) in the continuation of the dramatic lives of the Crawley family home of Downton Abbey.
It will pick up following the tear jerkingly climactic events of Series 3, which (spoiler for anyone that hasn’t seen Series 3 yet) closed on the death of Lady Mary’s husband, Matthew, who died while driving a little too exuberantly after visiting his wife and newborn baby son George in hospital.
Downton Abbey Series 4 is set to air in the UK on ITV in Autumn 2013 running up to its regular close in November before the two hour series finale at Christmas. It will also go out in the US on PBS in February 2014. 8 new episodes have been confirmed as a part of the upcoming series, as well as the feature length festive, and more than likely heart breaking, special episode.
