Finale time for The Forsytes this Autumn in August

It’s almost hard to believe for this session of Autumn in August that this riveting first season of The Forsytes is only six episodes long yet quite a bit of drama has been packed in there, as snugly as a steamer trunk all set for a Grand Tour!

Speaking of grand tours, let’s look at Jo Forsyte’s situation; while he still wants to maintain his marriage with Frances(and not pursue an intimate relationship with Louisa), he does want contact with his kids and even tells June of his plans to financially provide for them.

While trusting his stepdaughter is one thing, dealing with her mother is quite another and Frances goes so far as to having Jo followed by a servant(who I hope is getting paid extra for this!) and arranging for Louisa to be evicted from her shop.

Upon learning all of this, Jo confronts Frances , who demands that he send Louisa and the kids far away, never to see them again.

This leads to a separation and eventually to a more permanent break from the family altogether; Jo has no desire to take over the family firm and Frances ‘unending distrust is difficult to live with.

Don’t get me wrong, I get why Frances is so upset but to be fair, Jo was with Louisa long before he got married (Louisa broke it off,btw, without telling him she was pregnant) and while he should’ve been more upfront with Frances, her tactics are rather off putting to say the least.

Frankly, I don’t know why Frances doesn’t hook up with Jolyon Sr. , as the two of them see more eye to eye on things and have way better chemistry together! Nevertheless, she’s going to be persistent about keeping her foot on the Forsyte social ladder there for now, despite the lack of a husband by her side:

Speaking of husbands by the side, Irene is truly feeling suffocated as it becomes very clear to her that Soames has no intention of letting her go back to Paris to become a dancer.

His insistence upon controlling her every move leads to him going to June’s fiancé Phillip to hire his services as an architect. Soames wants a country home built as a “surprise “ for his new wife, keeping her further isolated from the rest of society.

While Phillip is eager to get that first commission in order to marry June, he soon learns of the real nature of Irene and Soames’ marriage and would rather contrive an inflated budget as a reason for being fired than go through with contributing to the domestic disharmony here.

That doesn’t work for long as Soames is determined to have his way and little does he realize that bringing Irene and Phillip together like this won’t end well for all involved:

With these tantalizing storylines left open, we have much to look forward to in Season Two indeed.

As I said earlier, making this epic novel into a possibly long running series (season three has also been confirmed) is an excellent idea and one that should pay off nicely for readers and viewers alike.

Out of all of the players in this cast, the MVP of The Forsytes is grand matriarch Ann(Francesca Annis), who plays her cards as smoothly as any seasoned gambler. 

From her sly observations to the subtle advice given when deemed necessary to her family and friends alike, Ann is no one to be trifled with, something that those who attempt to do so instantly regret. 

Plus, her narrator role during each episode is a delightful emotional soundtrack for the show and she even drops a bit of a bombshell to one of her sons during the finale! Yes, Ann is quite the formidable ally as well as opponent who ought to make the next few seasons all the more engaging to watch:

So, this concludes our Autumn in August season and I will see you all in September (when I shall be wrapping up my High Summer readathon results, amongst other topics!).

Perhaps this time next year, we can catch up on season two and see what follies the Forsytes get themselves up to. Until then, have a great rest of the summer and enjoy yourselves as much as possible with good books and good book based TV:

 

Star crossed lovers abound for The Forsytes this Autumn in August

Welcome back, folks, for more Autumn in August fun with the latest adaptation of John Galsworthy’s The Forsytes on PBS Masterpiece.

For episodes three and four, love is definitely in the air as we observe Soames Forsyte(Joshua Orpin), the competitive cousin of Jo at their family’s financial firm.

While his father is hellbent on getting Soames put in charge (much more interested in that than his son is, if you ask me), he has fallen in love with a young woman named Irene(Millie Gibson).

Irene has always dreamed of being a ballet dancer in Paris as her mother once was but upon the sudden death of her academic father, she and her scheming stepmother Clarissa(Fiona Button) soon realize that their finances are not as flush as they thought they were.

A quick solution to their money problems would be for Irene to marry well but she’d rather earn the funds for Paris herself. She initially sees Soames as a friend but over time, his true feelings are made known to her and eventually a proposal of marriage that she decides to accept:

While Soames’ father is less than thrilled about this marriage, Irene’s connections are good enough for him to not have any major objections(or at least not any that would add societal pressure upon Soames to reconsider). What does anger him is the young couple planning to extend their honeymoon in Paris into a permanent living arrangement.

However, that plan is doomed to fail as Soames starts to exert his anxieties over his marriage. As his grandmother points out early on to Irene, this is his first time being in love and his immediate discomfort around Irene and her friends in Paris sets off emotional alarm bells for him.

He’s as subtle as he can be towards Irene(who was hoping for the two of them to build a life together in Paris to pursue her artistic talent) but those red flags are waving, especially when they attend a ballet performance and all his thoughts are smothered in jealousy:

Meanwhile, June has found herself a romantic partner that her parents are sure to disapprove of; Phillip Bonsinney(Jamie Flatters), a young architect whose home and office are one and the same.

He also has “radical “ politics-helping the poor and the erasing of class lines-all of which makes June’s mother instantly upset. Jo, however, agrees to meet Bonsinney and tells him that as soon as he completes his first commission as an architect, he and June can get married.

As Jo explains later to his wife, it’ll probably be a long time before Bonsinney even gets a credible job offer and permitting a long engagement  here may allow for the relationship to cool off and end on its own terms. Her mother reluctantly sees the logic of this but June is a persistent person and it won’t be that easy to dissuade her in the long run:

Well, with two episodes left, plenty of fireworks are about to go off, I’m sure!

I am glad that this is going to be a several season show (seasons two and three have already been greenlit and in production)rather than a one and done miniseries. You get more time with the characters and there’s more than enough source material to take this family drama into the next decade.

Plus, thanks to PBS Passport, I was able to wait until summer to enjoy this series and my patience will no doubt be well rewarded for the next two seasons indeed. See you all next week for the finale!:

 

Time to meet The Forsytes this Autumn in August

Welcome one and all to LRG’s annual late summer soirée, Autumn in August , where we highlight movies and TV shows that give us that special fall feeling even during these overheated days.

Speaking of overheated, PBS Masterpiece gave us earlier this year a new period drama, The Forsytes , based on the  Nobel Prize winning set of novels and short stories known as The Forsyte Saga by John Galsworthy. Since being fashionably late seemed appropriate. I chose to watch it for the first time this season.

Instead of a recap of each episode, I’m watching them two at a time and just highlighting certain plot points, characters, etc.

In the first two episodes, we are introduced to the rather formidable Forsyte family via a new member, June(Justine Moore), the stepdaughter of family favorite son Young Joltob aka Jo(Jack Davenport), set to inherit the commerce empire run by his father Jolyon Sr.(Stephen Moyer, nice to see him in a non vampire role!).

By the time the story gets underway, June has been a Forsyte for several years and now old enough for her ambitious mother Frances(Tuppence Middleton) to start the matchmaking process, something her daughter is not in a rush to get into:

Jo is a touch sympathetic to June’s wish to see more of the world before getting married off; in his past days, he had artistic ambitions, which he had to give up upon returning home from what was called The Grand Tour(a trip through Europe for young men of means). Nowadays, he’s the reluctant  yet moral heir to the family throne, competing with his less scrupulous cousin Soames(more than him later on in this series).

However, as we quickly find out, Jo wasn’t always a good boy as an unexpected person from his time in Italy appears in their midst.

Turns out that the popular dressmaker who has been putting together June’s society wardrobe is a “widow” named Louisa (Elinor Tomlinson, who Poldark fans fondly remember as Demelza) with two young children to support.

I have to say spoiler alert at this point but by the end of episode two, just about everyone important to the plot knows the big secret to be revealed; Louisa was once a ladies maid in Italy and fell in love with Jo around his time there and yes, he’s the father of her fraternal twins.

To be fair, she didn’t tell him about the kids, knowing that his family would never allow them to be a couple and passing herself off as a widow was a pragmatic decision, especially given the time period.

Through a series of unintentional events, Jo and Louisa run into each other and he goes looking for her shop which leads to him meeting his kids for the first time. Naturally, he wants to openly acknowledge them but Frances(who figured it way before he did) wants this whole thing under wraps.

Of course, June finds out and is very disappointed as she looks up to Jo and his father agrees with Frances in not letting this secret surface as he’s ready to hand over the company reins to Jo. It’s all a glorious mess but more is yet to come indeed:

My initial thoughts here are first; it’s great to see distinguished actors like Francesca Annis as the Forsyte matriarch who does a bit of narration every now and then.

Second, most of the cast seems rather younger than expected; I have seen an earlier adaptation of The Forsyte Saga and those performers were definitely more mature in appearance. I suppose it’s to interest a younger demographic (fans of The Gilded Age and/or Bridgerton) and while I’m happy to see Elinor Tomlinson again, it’s not so bad but it does take a little getting use to.

Nevertheless, this is a good time to be had here and next week, we’ll look at episodes three and four with more of a focus on Soames, who is not what he seems to everyone indeed!: