Tredegar House and Upstairs Downstairs

Annie — Mon, 20 Feb 2012 08:10:58 +0000

Filming at The Edney Gates

Were you watching Upstairs Downstairs episode 1- Series 2

19th February 2012 ?

The Gilt Room appeared in an entire scene.

The scene comes on about 39.26 into the show

you also get to see the lake

and a tiny corner of the house in other scenes.

See Links at the Bottom of the page

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We’ve had some great productions filmed at Tredegar House. From ‘Dr Who’, to ‘Torchwood’, ‘Being Human’, ‘Sherlock Holmes’,The Hairy Bikers, to most recently ‘Upstairs Downstairs’.

The money is an obvious benefit, but it does attract visitors to Tredegar House too. We get many Dr Who fans coming to see the fireplace in front of which Queen Victoria (Pauline Collins) knighted Dr Who (David Tennant), when we doubled as Torchwood House. It is fantastic for us to see rooms in the House transformed too – the Gilt Room looks fantastic in ‘Upstairs Downstairs’ decked out with art deco furniture and a cocktail bar!

The film companies sign guidelines before they come into the House. These state out what they can and can’t do, and why. Hopefully the crew can appreciate that we’re not just being awkward, or over protective. We want to make sure, for example, that beautiful wooden panelling, over 300 years old, lasts another 300 years and doesn’t get scratched or dented by equipment being lent against it.

The process can be rather chaotic though. We love having the smaller companies, perhaps 10 people, filming in one area, who are easy to keep an eye on. With the bigger BBC production there are easily 40 – 50 people in the House, from the actors to the carpenters, set designers to the lighting crew. They might be filming in one area, and setting up in another. For this we have trained staff to keep an eye on what is going on - but they need eyes in the back of their heads! Unsurprisingly people aren’t used to filming in a historic house museum, so we may have to explain for example that they can’t carry drinks through the House.

Touchwood, we have only had one mishap. This happened when John Barrowman, as Captain Jack in Torchwood, was thrown into a historically important door in the Cellar. Indeed the only thing we were protective over! The BBC insurance covered the repairs. Looking on the bright side, the door is in much better condition after conservation than it was before the accident!

Who knows who might ask to film at TH next…. but we hope one day it might be Johnny Depp. As many of you know, we have a cardboard cut out of him that we use for pirates day, wouldn’t it be nice to have the real thing!

Emily Price, Curator Tredeagar House

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/p00njdz8/Upstairs_Downstairs_Series_2_A_Faraway_Country_About_Which_We_Know_Nothing/