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North and South (2004 TV serial)
Encyclopedia
North & South is a British
television
drama serial
, produced by the BBC
and originally broadcast in four episodes on BBC One
between November and December 2004. It follows the story of Margaret Hale
(Daniela Denby-Ashe
), a young woman from southern England
who has to move to the North
after her father decides to leave the clergy. The family struggles to adjust itself to the industrial town's customs, especially after meeting the Thorntons, a proud family of cotton mill
owners who seem to despise their social inferiors. The story explores the issues of class and gender, as Margaret's sympathy for the town mill workers conflicts with her growing attraction to John Thornton (Richard Armitage
).
The serial is based on the 1855 Victorian
novel of the same title
by Elizabeth Gaskell
. It was adapted for television by Sandy Welch
and directed by Brian Percival
. Despite their initially low expectations, the BBC responded to positive audience reception by releasing the series on DVD on 11 April 2005.
(Daniela Denby-Ashe
) and her parents Maria (Lesley Manville
) and Richard (Tim Pigott-Smith
) move to the fictional industrial town of Milton, Darkshire, in the north of England
because her father, a clergyman, decides to leave the Church of England
and become a Nonconformist
. Thanks to his friend, Mr. Bell (Brian Protheroe
), he is able to find a house and gains employment as a private tutor
. One of his pupils is local mill-owner John Thornton (Richard Armitage
), who gets off to a bad start with Margaret when she witnesses him beating up a worker whom he has caught smoking in the mill. Gradually, Margaret gets used to Thornton, but his mother Hannah (Sinéad Cusack
) and sister Fanny (Jo Joyner
) disapprove of her, believing her southern ways haughty and alien to the customs of the North. In the meantime, Margaret attempts to do charitable work among the working classes, and thus comes into contact with Nicholas Higgins (Brendan Coyle
) and his daughter, Bessy (Anna Maxwell Martin
), whose health has suffered from the effects of working in the mills. Margaret learns that, when Bessy became ill at Hamper's Mill, her father moved her to Marlborough Mills, Thornton's mill, because the working environment is better. In a separate meeting with fellow mill owners, Thornton says he has a wheel for ventilation in all of the rooms of his factory, despite the fact that it costs a great deal of money. The other industrialists have refused to install a wheel because of the expense.
Margaret notices that her mother is becoming ill, and that she has been seen by a doctor several times. Mrs Hale insists that she wants to see her son before she dies. Margaret is aware that her brother was involved in a mutiny and that he cannot return to England without risking his life. However, without telling her father, Margaret writes to her brother Frederick (Rupert Evans
) in Cádiz
, Spain, to tell him that their mother is dying. Margaret calls on the Thorntons to ask to borrow a water-bed for her mother and is trapped while mill workers riot during a strike. When the angry mob threatens John's safety as he attempts to calm them down, Margaret defends him from the rioters and is injured in doing so.
Margaret recovers and returns home, never telling anyone about what had happened at the Mill, mainly to protect the health of her mother. When Thornton proposes to her the next day, she scorns him, thinking he believes himself superior because of the difference in their financial circumstances. He denies this and tells her that he is in love with her, but she insist that her actions were not personal.
To provide a distraction for Mrs Hale, and for herself, Margaret visits the Great Exhibition
with her Aunt Shaw, her cousin Edith and Edith's husband. Margaret meets Thornton at the exhibition, where he is discussing the machinery with a group of gentlemen, all of whom are listening with great respect and admiration for his simple good sense. Margaret is embarrassed to meet Thornton so soon after her rejection but defends him when Henry Lennox (John Light
), Edith's brother-in-law and an admirer of Margaret, tries to belittle him for being in trade. Henry's sophistication and reliance on fashionable wit and sarcasm compares unfavourably with Thornton's honesty when Margaret sees them together.
When Margaret returns home, her mother has taken a turn for the worse and might not live long. Margaret's brother arrives just in time to see his mother on her death-bed. While Frederick is still in the house, Thornton comes to visit his friend Mr Hale, but he cannot be allowed in, in case he sees Fred. Thornton interprets this as Margaret refusing to see him. The family's servant, Dixon (Pauline Quirke
), sees a former member of Frederick's crew in Milton town, and it is decided that Frederick must leave at once, before he is discovered and arrested. He and Margaret are seen together at the railway station by Thornton, who draws the wrong conclusion.
Thornton gives employment to Higgins after Bessy's death and master and hand get along surprisingly well, despite their differences. They come up with a philanthropic plan to feed the workers cheaply, and Thornton comes to a greater understanding with his workers as they share ideas. However, because of the problems caused by the strike, Thornton's business is in trouble, and he is forced to close the mill.
Margaret's father dies and she leaves the north to stay with relatives in London, but her godfather, Mr Bell, makes over his fortune to her when he find out that he has a terminal illness and chooses to move to Argentina
, for the better climate. Margaret therefore becomes the owner of Marlborough Mills and John Thornton's landlord. Thornton, having discovered the truth about Fred from Mr Higgins, goes south to see Margaret's home town, and on the way back meets her returning from a visit to the north. She proposes a business deal by which the factory can be reopened, and their final love scene takes place on the railway station platform with both going "home" to Milton.
started adapting Elizabeth Gaskell
's 1855 North and South
in 2001, making a few changes to emphasise the industrial landscape of the story. Welch's story, for example, begins and ends with the main character Margaret Hale travelling by train, which are not the starting and ending point of the novel (although Gaskell describes the Hales travelling from the South to the North by train). Welch also made the main characters visit the Great Exhibition of 1851. These are changes Welch believed Gaskell would have done "if she'd had the time", since Gaskell had complained of being under pressure to complete the novel by her editor Charles Dickens
. In the summer of 2003 Kate Bartlett was brought to the project as a producer and a 10 week period of pre-production started at the beginning of February.
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Filming took place from the end of April 2004 until July 2004.
Gaskell's fictional town of Milton, Darkshire, was loosely based on Manchester
, but the producers decided to shoot many of the town scenes in Edinburgh
, which maintains more of its visual and architectural heritage from the industrial Victorian era
. Keighley
in West Yorkshire
became one of the main locations, with the cotton mill's exteriors being filmed at Dalton Mill. The scenes that took place inside the mill were shot at Rossendale
's Helmshore Textile Museum in Lancashire
. London
was another main location, with all of the interior scenes being shot at the Ealing Studios
in west London
and the Great Exhibition scene being shot at the Alexandra Palace
in North London
. Other locations were Selkirk, a town in the Scottish Borders
, Burnley
in Lancashire, and the Bluebell Railway
in Sussex
, were the final and the beginning scenes were shot. Additional railway sequences were filmed in Yorkshire, using carriages provided by the Vintage Carriages Trust
Being a costume drama
, North & South required substantial work from the art department. In 2005 the serial's production designer
Simon Elliot received a British Academy Television Award
nomination for Best Production Design.
s. The music is especially loud and clear whenever there is a turning point in the relationship between Margaret and Thornton.
As the BBC had low expectations for the series, it was not well publicised and went almost unnoticed by critics. Audiences, however, were more receptive; hours after the first episode aired in November 2004, the message board
of the programme’s website crashed
because of the number of visitors the site was receiving, forcing host bbc.co.uk
to shut it down. This sudden interest on the serial was attributed to Richard Armitage, a relatively unknown actor, whose portrayal of the emotionally restrained John Thornton drew parallels with Colin Firth
's portrayal of Fitzwilliam Darcy
on the BBC's 1995 mini-series Pride and Prejudice, and the reception he later received. Armitage himself claims that the series was a success because of the "industrial landscape and the attention [that the series gives] to the working class
es and the way they develop". The reaction to the series was a surprise to the BBC, who then decided to release the DVD on 11 April 2005.
North & South was voted "Best Drama" in the BBC drama website's annual poll in 2004. Richard Armitage was voted "Most Desirable Drama Star" and "Best Actor", Daniela Denby-Ashe was voted "Best Actress" (Sinead Cusack came in third) and three different scenes were voted as the year's "Favourite Moments", with the final scene winning the number one spot.
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
television
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
drama serial
Serial (radio and television)
Serials are series of television programs and radio programs that rely on a continuing plot that unfolds in a sequential episode by episode fashion. Serials typically follow main story arcs that span entire television seasons or even the full run of the series, which distinguishes them from...
, produced by the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
and originally broadcast in four episodes on BBC One
BBC One
BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution...
between November and December 2004. It follows the story of Margaret Hale
Margaret Hale
Margaret Hale is the heroine of Elizabeth Gaskell's 1855 novel North and South. Indeed, Gaskell wanted the title of North and South to be Margaret Hale.- Descriptions :From Chapter Seven......
(Daniela Denby-Ashe
Daniela Denby-Ashe
Daniela Denby-Ashe is an English actress, best known for playing the character Janey Harper in the sitcom My Family.-Early life:...
), a young woman from southern England
Southern England
Southern England, the South and the South of England are imprecise terms used to refer to the southern counties of England bordering the English Midlands. It has a number of different interpretations of its geographic extents. The South is considered by many to be a cultural region with a distinct...
who has to move to the North
Northern England
Northern England, also known as the North of England, the North or the North Country, is a cultural region of England. It is not an official government region, but rather an informal amalgamation of counties. The southern extent of the region is roughly the River Trent, while the North is bordered...
after her father decides to leave the clergy. The family struggles to adjust itself to the industrial town's customs, especially after meeting the Thorntons, a proud family of cotton mill
Cotton mill
A cotton mill is a factory that houses spinning and weaving machinery. Typically built between 1775 and 1930, mills spun cotton which was an important product during the Industrial Revolution....
owners who seem to despise their social inferiors. The story explores the issues of class and gender, as Margaret's sympathy for the town mill workers conflicts with her growing attraction to John Thornton (Richard Armitage
Richard Armitage (actor)
Richard Crispin Armitage is an English actor famous for his roles as John Thornton in North and South, Guy of Gisborne in Robin Hood, and Lucas North in Spooks...
).
The serial is based on the 1855 Victorian
Victorian literature
Victorian literature is the literature produced during the reign of Queen Victoria . It forms a link and transition between the writers of the romantic period and the very different literature of the 20th century....
novel of the same title
North and South (1854 novel)
North and South is an Industrial novel by Elizabeth Gaskell. It first appeared as a twenty-two-part weekly serial from September 1854 to January 1855 in the magazine Household Words. It was published as a book, in two volumes, in 1855....
by Elizabeth Gaskell
Elizabeth Gaskell
Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell, née Stevenson , often referred to simply as Mrs Gaskell, was a British novelist and short story writer during the Victorian era...
. It was adapted for television by Sandy Welch
Sandy Welch
Sandy Welch is a British television writer and screenwriter.Sandy Welch's works for the BBC have included The Magnificent 7, adaptations of Charles Dickens' novel Our Mutual Friend and Elizabeth Gaskell's North and South, and most recently the BBC's well-received 2006 interpretation of Charlotte...
and directed by Brian Percival
Brian Percival
Brian Percival is a British film director, working mainly in television.He has directed Pleasureland, North & South, ShakespeaRe-Told , The Ruby in the Smoke and The Old Curiosity Shop....
. Despite their initially low expectations, the BBC responded to positive audience reception by releasing the series on DVD on 11 April 2005.
Plot
Margaret HaleMargaret Hale
Margaret Hale is the heroine of Elizabeth Gaskell's 1855 novel North and South. Indeed, Gaskell wanted the title of North and South to be Margaret Hale.- Descriptions :From Chapter Seven......
(Daniela Denby-Ashe
Daniela Denby-Ashe
Daniela Denby-Ashe is an English actress, best known for playing the character Janey Harper in the sitcom My Family.-Early life:...
) and her parents Maria (Lesley Manville
Lesley Manville
Lesley Manville is an award-winning English actress.-Early life:Born in Brighton, Manville was raised in Hove, East Sussex, one of three daughters of a taxicab driver. Training as a soprano singer from age 8, she twice became under-18 champion of Sussex...
) and Richard (Tim Pigott-Smith
Tim Pigott-Smith
Tim Pigott-Smith is an English film and television actor.-Early life:Pigott-Smith was born in Rugby, Warwickshire, the son of Margaret Muriel and Harry Thomas Pigott-Smith, who was a journalist. He was educated at Wyggeston Boys' School, Leicester, King Edward VI School Stratford-upon-Avon, and...
) move to the fictional industrial town of Milton, Darkshire, in the north of England
Northern England
Northern England, also known as the North of England, the North or the North Country, is a cultural region of England. It is not an official government region, but rather an informal amalgamation of counties. The southern extent of the region is roughly the River Trent, while the North is bordered...
because her father, a clergyman, decides to leave the Church of England
Church of England
The Church of England is the officially established Christian church in England and the Mother Church of the worldwide Anglican Communion. The church considers itself within the tradition of Western Christianity and dates its formal establishment principally to the mission to England by St...
and become a Nonconformist
Nonconformism
Nonconformity is the refusal to "conform" to, or follow, the governance and usages of the Church of England by the Protestant Christians of England and Wales.- Origins and use:...
. Thanks to his friend, Mr. Bell (Brian Protheroe
Brian Protheroe
Brian Protheroe , of a Welsh father and English mother, is a musician and actor.-Career:Protheroe joined a local church choir when he was twelve years old, and started piano lessons at about the same time. The music of Cliff Richard and The Shadows inspired him to start learning the guitar...
), he is able to find a house and gains employment as a private tutor
Tutor
A tutor is a person employed in the education of others, either individually or in groups. To tutor is to perform the functions of a tutor.-Teaching assistance:...
. One of his pupils is local mill-owner John Thornton (Richard Armitage
Richard Armitage (actor)
Richard Crispin Armitage is an English actor famous for his roles as John Thornton in North and South, Guy of Gisborne in Robin Hood, and Lucas North in Spooks...
), who gets off to a bad start with Margaret when she witnesses him beating up a worker whom he has caught smoking in the mill. Gradually, Margaret gets used to Thornton, but his mother Hannah (Sinéad Cusack
Sinéad Cusack
Sinéad Moira Cusack is an Irish stage, television and film actress. She has received two Tony Award nominations: once for Best Leading Actress in Much Ado About Nothing , and again for Best Featured Actress in Rock 'n' Roll .-Background:...
) and sister Fanny (Jo Joyner
Jo Joyner
Joanne Mary Joyner is an English actress who is best known for her role as Tanya Branning in the BBC soap opera EastEnders, in which she has appeared since June 2006.-Career:...
) disapprove of her, believing her southern ways haughty and alien to the customs of the North. In the meantime, Margaret attempts to do charitable work among the working classes, and thus comes into contact with Nicholas Higgins (Brendan Coyle
Brendan Coyle
-Early life and family:Coyle was born in Corby, Northamptonshire, to an Irish father and Scottish mother; his parents moved to Corby from Strabane, County Tyrone, Northern Ireland. Coyle holds Irish and British citizenship. He is the great nephew of football manager Sir Matt Busby...
) and his daughter, Bessy (Anna Maxwell Martin
Anna Maxwell Martin
Anna Maxwell Martin , sometimes credited as Anna Maxwell-Martin, is a two-time BAFTA award-winning English actress who has won acclaim for her performances as Lyra in His Dark Materials at the Royal National Theatre, as Esther Summerson in the BBC's 2005 adaptation of Bleak House, and as N in...
), whose health has suffered from the effects of working in the mills. Margaret learns that, when Bessy became ill at Hamper's Mill, her father moved her to Marlborough Mills, Thornton's mill, because the working environment is better. In a separate meeting with fellow mill owners, Thornton says he has a wheel for ventilation in all of the rooms of his factory, despite the fact that it costs a great deal of money. The other industrialists have refused to install a wheel because of the expense.
Margaret notices that her mother is becoming ill, and that she has been seen by a doctor several times. Mrs Hale insists that she wants to see her son before she dies. Margaret is aware that her brother was involved in a mutiny and that he cannot return to England without risking his life. However, without telling her father, Margaret writes to her brother Frederick (Rupert Evans
Rupert Evans
Rupert Evans is an English actor, who is well known in the United Kingdom for his television career.Evans was born in Staffordshire, England. He attended Milton Abbey School, in Dorset, and went on to train at the Webber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art...
) in Cádiz
Cádiz
Cadiz is a city and port in southwestern Spain. It is the capital of the homonymous province, one of eight which make up the autonomous community of Andalusia....
, Spain, to tell him that their mother is dying. Margaret calls on the Thorntons to ask to borrow a water-bed for her mother and is trapped while mill workers riot during a strike. When the angry mob threatens John's safety as he attempts to calm them down, Margaret defends him from the rioters and is injured in doing so.
Margaret recovers and returns home, never telling anyone about what had happened at the Mill, mainly to protect the health of her mother. When Thornton proposes to her the next day, she scorns him, thinking he believes himself superior because of the difference in their financial circumstances. He denies this and tells her that he is in love with her, but she insist that her actions were not personal.
To provide a distraction for Mrs Hale, and for herself, Margaret visits the Great Exhibition
The Great Exhibition
The Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of all Nations or The Great Exhibition, sometimes referred to as the Crystal Palace Exhibition in reference to the temporary structure in which it was held, was an international exhibition that took place in Hyde Park, London, from 1 May to 15 October...
with her Aunt Shaw, her cousin Edith and Edith's husband. Margaret meets Thornton at the exhibition, where he is discussing the machinery with a group of gentlemen, all of whom are listening with great respect and admiration for his simple good sense. Margaret is embarrassed to meet Thornton so soon after her rejection but defends him when Henry Lennox (John Light
John Light (actor)
John Light is an English cinema, television and theatre actor.-Career:His theatre performances include the Complete Works Festival in Stratford-upon-Avon, where he starred in Sean Holmes' Julius Caesar as Brutus and in Rupert Goold's The Tempest as Caliban...
), Edith's brother-in-law and an admirer of Margaret, tries to belittle him for being in trade. Henry's sophistication and reliance on fashionable wit and sarcasm compares unfavourably with Thornton's honesty when Margaret sees them together.
When Margaret returns home, her mother has taken a turn for the worse and might not live long. Margaret's brother arrives just in time to see his mother on her death-bed. While Frederick is still in the house, Thornton comes to visit his friend Mr Hale, but he cannot be allowed in, in case he sees Fred. Thornton interprets this as Margaret refusing to see him. The family's servant, Dixon (Pauline Quirke
Pauline Quirke
Pauline Perpetua Quirke is a British actress. She is best known for her role as Sharon in the comedy series Birds of a Feather, alongside her lifelong friend and frequent acting partner Linda Robson...
), sees a former member of Frederick's crew in Milton town, and it is decided that Frederick must leave at once, before he is discovered and arrested. He and Margaret are seen together at the railway station by Thornton, who draws the wrong conclusion.
Thornton gives employment to Higgins after Bessy's death and master and hand get along surprisingly well, despite their differences. They come up with a philanthropic plan to feed the workers cheaply, and Thornton comes to a greater understanding with his workers as they share ideas. However, because of the problems caused by the strike, Thornton's business is in trouble, and he is forced to close the mill.
Margaret's father dies and she leaves the north to stay with relatives in London, but her godfather, Mr Bell, makes over his fortune to her when he find out that he has a terminal illness and chooses to move to Argentina
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
, for the better climate. Margaret therefore becomes the owner of Marlborough Mills and John Thornton's landlord. Thornton, having discovered the truth about Fred from Mr Higgins, goes south to see Margaret's home town, and on the way back meets her returning from a visit to the north. She proposes a business deal by which the factory can be reopened, and their final love scene takes place on the railway station platform with both going "home" to Milton.
Production
Origins
Sandy WelchSandy Welch
Sandy Welch is a British television writer and screenwriter.Sandy Welch's works for the BBC have included The Magnificent 7, adaptations of Charles Dickens' novel Our Mutual Friend and Elizabeth Gaskell's North and South, and most recently the BBC's well-received 2006 interpretation of Charlotte...
started adapting Elizabeth Gaskell
Elizabeth Gaskell
Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell, née Stevenson , often referred to simply as Mrs Gaskell, was a British novelist and short story writer during the Victorian era...
's 1855 North and South
North and South (1854 novel)
North and South is an Industrial novel by Elizabeth Gaskell. It first appeared as a twenty-two-part weekly serial from September 1854 to January 1855 in the magazine Household Words. It was published as a book, in two volumes, in 1855....
in 2001, making a few changes to emphasise the industrial landscape of the story. Welch's story, for example, begins and ends with the main character Margaret Hale travelling by train, which are not the starting and ending point of the novel (although Gaskell describes the Hales travelling from the South to the North by train). Welch also made the main characters visit the Great Exhibition of 1851. These are changes Welch believed Gaskell would have done "if she'd had the time", since Gaskell had complained of being under pressure to complete the novel by her editor Charles Dickens
Charles Dickens
Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...
. In the summer of 2003 Kate Bartlett was brought to the project as a producer and a 10 week period of pre-production started at the beginning of February.
Casting
Daniela Denby-Ashe had not originally auditioned for the role of Margaret Hale but for that of Fanny Thornton, and was not sure she would be participating on the project, but the producers had been looking for the right Margaret for a long time and Denby-Ashe's "directness, energy and charm" as well as the chemistry she had with would-be co-star Richard Armitage proved decisive. Armitage himself had been the first actor to read for the role of John Thornton and even though his performance had impressed producer Kate Bartlett and casting director Jill Trevellick, they still had to see many other possible Thorntons. Three weeks after casting had begun, Trevellick decided to recapitulate the first auditions, realising that Armitage was "perfect".Filming
Gaskell's fictional town of Milton, Darkshire, was loosely based on Manchester
Manchester
Manchester is a city and metropolitan borough in Greater Manchester, England. According to the Office for National Statistics, the 2010 mid-year population estimate for Manchester was 498,800. Manchester lies within one of the UK's largest metropolitan areas, the metropolitan county of Greater...
, but the producers decided to shoot many of the town scenes in Edinburgh
Edinburgh
Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland, the second largest city in Scotland, and the eighth most populous in the United Kingdom. The City of Edinburgh Council governs one of Scotland's 32 local government council areas. The council area includes urban Edinburgh and a rural area...
, which maintains more of its visual and architectural heritage from the industrial Victorian era
Victorian era
The Victorian era of British history was the period of Queen Victoria's reign from 20 June 1837 until her death on 22 January 1901. It was a long period of peace, prosperity, refined sensibilities and national self-confidence...
. Keighley
Keighley
Keighley is a town and civil parish within the metropolitan borough of the City of Bradford in West Yorkshire, England. It is situated northwest of Bradford and is at the confluence of the River Aire and the River Worth...
in West Yorkshire
West Yorkshire
West Yorkshire is a metropolitan county within the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England with a population of 2.2 million. West Yorkshire came into existence as a metropolitan county in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972....
became one of the main locations, with the cotton mill's exteriors being filmed at Dalton Mill. The scenes that took place inside the mill were shot at Rossendale
Rossendale
Rossendale is a local government district with borough status. It is made up of a number of small former mill towns in Lancashire, England centered around the valley of the River Irwell in the industrial North West...
's Helmshore Textile Museum in Lancashire
Lancashire
Lancashire is a non-metropolitan county of historic origin in the North West of England. It takes its name from the city of Lancaster, and is sometimes known as the County of Lancaster. Although Lancaster is still considered to be the county town, Lancashire County Council is based in Preston...
. London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
was another main location, with all of the interior scenes being shot at the Ealing Studios
Ealing Studios
Ealing Studios is a television and film production company and facilities provider at Ealing Green in West London. Will Barker bought the White Lodge on Ealing Green in 1902 as a base for film making, and films have been made on the site ever since...
in west London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
and the Great Exhibition scene being shot at the Alexandra Palace
Alexandra Palace
Alexandra Palace is a building in North London, England. It stands in Alexandra Park, in an area between Hornsey, Muswell Hill and Wood Green...
in North London
North London
North London is the northern part of London, England. It is an imprecise description and the area it covers is defined differently for a range of purposes. Common to these definitions is that it includes districts located north of the River Thames and is used in comparison with South...
. Other locations were Selkirk, a town in the Scottish Borders
Scottish Borders
The Scottish Borders is one of 32 local government council areas of Scotland. It is bordered by Dumfries and Galloway in the west, South Lanarkshire and West Lothian in the north west, City of Edinburgh, East Lothian, Midlothian to the north; and the non-metropolitan counties of Northumberland...
, Burnley
Burnley
Burnley is a market town in the Burnley borough of Lancashire, England, with a population of around 73,500. It lies north of Manchester and east of Preston, at the confluence of the River Calder and River Brun....
in Lancashire, and the Bluebell Railway
Bluebell Railway
The Bluebell Railway is a heritage line running for nine miles along the border between East and West Sussex, England. Steam trains are operated between and , with an intermediate station at .The railway is managed and run largely by volunteers...
in Sussex
Sussex
Sussex , from the Old English Sūþsēaxe , is an historic county in South East England corresponding roughly in area to the ancient Kingdom of Sussex. It is bounded on the north by Surrey, east by Kent, south by the English Channel, and west by Hampshire, and is divided for local government into West...
, were the final and the beginning scenes were shot. Additional railway sequences were filmed in Yorkshire, using carriages provided by the Vintage Carriages Trust
Being a costume drama
Costume drama
A costume drama or period drama is a period piece in which elaborate costumes, sets and properties are featured in order to capture the ambiance of a particular era.The term is usually used in the context of film and television...
, North & South required substantial work from the art department. In 2005 the serial's production designer
Production designer
In film and television, a production designer is the person responsible for the overall look of a filmed event such as films, TV programs, music videos or adverts. Production designers have one of the key creative roles in the creation of motion pictures and television. Working directly with the...
Simon Elliot received a British Academy Television Award
British Academy Television Awards
The British Academy Television Awards are presented in an annual award show hosted by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts . They have been awarded annually since 1954, and are analogous to the Emmy Awards in the United States.-Background:...
nomination for Best Production Design.
Music
Martin Phipps composed the score for North & South. The tune is a short piano composition which plays throughout the whole series in different rhythmRhythm
Rhythm may be generally defined as a "movement marked by the regulated succession of strong and weak elements, or of opposite or different conditions." This general meaning of regular recurrence or pattern in time may be applied to a wide variety of cyclical natural phenomena having a periodicity or...
s. The music is especially loud and clear whenever there is a turning point in the relationship between Margaret and Thornton.
Reception
Internet forum
An Internet forum, or message board, is an online discussion site where people can hold conversations in the form of posted messages. They differ from chat rooms in that messages are at least temporarily archived...
of the programme’s website crashed
Crash (computing)
A crash in computing is a condition where a computer or a program, either an application or part of the operating system, ceases to function properly, often exiting after encountering errors. Often the offending program may appear to freeze or hang until a crash reporting service documents...
because of the number of visitors the site was receiving, forcing host bbc.co.uk
Bbc.co.uk
BBC Online is the brand name and home for the BBC's UK online service. It is a large network of websites including such high profile sites as BBC News and Sport, the on-demand video and radio services co-branded BBC iPlayer, the pre-school site Cbeebies, and learning services such as Bitesize...
to shut it down. This sudden interest on the serial was attributed to Richard Armitage, a relatively unknown actor, whose portrayal of the emotionally restrained John Thornton drew parallels with Colin Firth
Colin Firth
SirColin Andrew Firth, CBE is a British film, television, and theatre actor. Firth gained wide public attention in the 1990s for his portrayal of Mr. Darcy in the 1995 television adaptation of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice...
's portrayal of Fitzwilliam Darcy
Fitzwilliam Darcy
Fitzwilliam Darcy, generally referred to as Mr Darcy, is one of the two central characters in Jane Austen's novel Pride and Prejudice. He is an archetype of the aloof romantic hero, and a romantic interest of Elizabeth Bennet, the novel's protagonist...
on the BBC's 1995 mini-series Pride and Prejudice, and the reception he later received. Armitage himself claims that the series was a success because of the "industrial landscape and the attention [that the series gives] to the working class
Working class
Working class is a term used in the social sciences and in ordinary conversation to describe those employed in lower tier jobs , often extending to those in unemployment or otherwise possessing below-average incomes...
es and the way they develop". The reaction to the series was a surprise to the BBC, who then decided to release the DVD on 11 April 2005.
North & South was voted "Best Drama" in the BBC drama website's annual poll in 2004. Richard Armitage was voted "Most Desirable Drama Star" and "Best Actor", Daniela Denby-Ashe was voted "Best Actress" (Sinead Cusack came in third) and three different scenes were voted as the year's "Favourite Moments", with the final scene winning the number one spot.