DOWNTON ABBEY S3/E3 (review)

By Christopher Cerasi

In the two blogs I’ve written for Downton Abbey Series 3 so far I have primarily focused on the upstairs cast of characters, so for this entry I think it is only fair we check in with the below-stairs staff. In this case, it’s actually someone who used to be staff, Ethel Parks (Amy Nuttall), who figures prominently in this episode.

Ethel was the housemaid with grander visions of wealth and comfort in Series 2, alienating most of her fellow downstairs staff.



She was brazen and naively foolish, especially when she began fooling around with a handsome army major who was recuperating at Downton Abbey, which had been (somewhat reluctantly) turned into a convalescent home for soldiers during the Great War. But things quickly turned sour for Ethel when her dalliances with Major Bryant (Daniel Pirrie) were discovered by Mrs. Hughes (Phyllis Logan), leading her to be turned out of Downton.


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