Forsyte unseen
Poldark writer Debbie Horsfield tells DQ about her “alternative” approach to crafting The Forsytes, a new period drama based on John Galsworthy’s Forsyte novels, writing for its starry ensemble cast and the unique circumstances behind making the series.
While audiences have been eagerly awaiting The Forsytes, a new series based on John Galsworthy’s Forsyte novels, writer Debbie Horsfield is reflecting on an unusual television circumstance: season two has completed filming before the period drama’s first season has aired.
First announced by Masterpiece PBS in the US in April 2024, 5 in the UK then came on board in March this year before a second season was confirmed in June. 5 is set to launch the series today before the Masterpiece premiere in 2026.
When Horsfield speaks to DQ, “we just finished season two, and we’re in the edit,” she reveals. “It’s quite amazing, really, that we got a season two greenlit before season one has gone out. It’s quite unusual. Obviously we feel very grateful for that.”
In what was a rapid development process, Horsfield and the Mammoth Screen production team knew “pretty much within a few months of season one ending” that Masterpiece would order a second after commissioners first caught sight of early episodes.
“They were very enthusiastic about what they’d seen of season one,” she continues. “I had an idea of what would go into a season two before we got the green light and then as soon as we did, which was around the beginning of this year, I got straight into writing it.”
A third TV adaptation of Galsworthy’s novels, which were first published in 1922, The Forsytes follows a BBC version in 1967 and an ITV series in 2002. But Horsfield says her take isn’t strictly an adaptation at all.
Boasting a starry cast headed by Francesca Annis, Jack Davenport, Tom Durant Pritchard, Millie Gibson, Tuppence Middleton and Eleanor Tomlinson, it is described as a lavish reimagining of Galsworthy’s classic tale of love, ambition and betrayal among the wealthy Forsyte family in 1880s London.
Annis plays formidable Forsyte matriarch Anne, with Stephen Moyer as her eldest son Jolyon Senior, the head of the family stockbroking firm, Forsyte & Co. Danny Griffin is his bohemian son Jo, Middleton is Jo’s status-driven wife Frances and Tomlinson is Louisa Byrne, a Soho dressmaker and Jo’s first love.
Davenport plays Ann’s competitive younger son James, with Joshua Orpin as his shrewd and sometimes ruthless son Soames. Gibson plays Irene, the dancer with whom Soames falls in love. Pritchard is Monty Dartie, James’s son-in-law.
Meanwhile, Josette Simon is Mrs Ellen Parker Barrington, a wealthy heiress and friend of the Forsyte family, with Jamie Flatters as architect Philip Bosinney and Owen Igiehon as lawyer Isaac Cole.
Horsfield was talking with Mammoth Screen for around nine months before she started writing the season one scripts, after reuniting with the production company she partnered for five seasons of BBC period drama Poldark, which was itself an adaptation of Winston Graham’s novels.
She was immediately drawn to the family sagas and intergenerational conflicts in Galworthy’s novels. But from the outset, both parties were clear The Forsytes would not be a strict adaptation of the books. “There’s been two already, both of them amazing. So why do another straight adaptation?” she says. “But we were fascinated by the period in which the book was written, that historical era. We had lots of long walks and talks where we just talked about what we found really engaging and fascinating about the subject matter and some of the characters.
“I guess it boiled down to the fact that the books are written by a male writer. Therefore, it’s a male perspective and the male characters are really drawn in great detail, but some of the female characters less so.”
This is particularly apparent in the case of Irene, “who carries a lot of the story and yet in the book, she’s very much seen from a male perspective,” Horsfield notes. “She’s described as being breathtakingly beautiful. Everyone’s kind of in love with her. Yet I was always quite interested in the fact that she meets Soames. She doesn’t warm to him. He’s obsessed with her, fascinated by her. He spends a couple of years wooing her. She keeps saying no, and then, for no obvious reason, she says yes, and then they have a terrible marriage.”
Horsfield felt it would be more interesting, and dramatic, to explore how Soames is someone who sees women as property, “almost like a trophy,” yet is a product of the era and of his family and his upbringing. “So wouldn’t it be interesting to dig a little more into the vulnerabilities and frustrations of that character? Wouldn’t it be more interesting to actually show a relationship in which, when they first meet, they actually like each other. Maybe they fall madly in love, maybe they marry quite quickly, and then she discovers that maybe he’s not the person [she thinks he is]?
“I just couldn’t get my head around the idea that she knew it was going to be a disaster, and then, guess what? It was a disaster. There’s not much obvious journey there for her.”
Horsfield also took the decision to bring all the characters together within the same industry, to heighten the rivalry and conflict between the characters.
“We even have them living next door to each other, the two main families, in order to illustrate that they are close, but also there is massive rivalry between them,” she says. “Family dynamics are something that I just find really fascinating, so there was just so much material to dig into there.”
Horsfield describes The Forsytes as very much an “alternative” look at the world and the characters – some of whom are only mentioned in the books within a family tree, but are fleshed out here, signalling the writer’s use of the source material as a jumping off point for the series.
Some key elements are retained, such as the relationship between Soames and Irene. Then there’s the character of June Forsyte (Justine Emma Moore), who goes against the expectations of her family and falls in love with someone considered unsuitable. “So we keep those, because that seemed to me to be very fertile ground,” the writer says.
Considering the story she has written in season two, she says characters are then left to deal with the consequences of the decisions they made in season one. “The story is always going to be, ‘Does one do one’s duty, or does one follow one’s heart?’ In either case, does that necessarily guarantee happiness?” Horsfield asks. “Because even if you follow your heart, does that actually mean it’s all going to work out? Likewise if you do your duty. We all have this idea that following the heart is the be all and end all, and it’s going to solve everything. But does it? We see in season two whether that’s the case.”
But one particular advantage of a second season is knowing the actors you’re writing for.
“I’ve always appreciated that with anything I’ve done that’s gone to more than one season, right way back to things like [BBC hairdressing drama] Cutting It,” she adds. “You have the actor’s voices in your head as you’re writing the lines, and you can imagine what their facial expressions are going to be. So you do lean into the things that you enjoyed about their performance first time round. It’s always a great treat to know who you’re writing for.”
In the same way that she did on Poldark, Hosfield read the Forsyte novels extensively before plotting out the parameters of the series. Then having “absorbed” the books, she puts them to one side before she starts writing.
“There comes a point where I have to take on these characters as if they’re my own,” she says. “That was the difficult thing with Poldark, because I’d never done an adaptation before, and there was this nervousness about, ‘Do I even have a right to put dialogue in the mouth of a character that I haven’t invented?’ But ultimately you have to, because you can’t just cut and paste from the book.
“For The Forsytes, that process was easier because I was aware that’s what needed to happen in order for me to really embody these characters, and take them on journeys, some of which may not be in the books. I always ask myself the question, ‘How well do I know these characters now? Could I put them in any situation and know how they would respond?’ That’s the ultimate aim, really.”
One departure from Poldark is the social class of the characters Hosfield gets to play with. Here, the Forsytes represent the upper middle class and high society, and for the women at the time the show is set, they would often change outfits multiple times a day – with huge implications for the cast of a TV production.
“If you want to be completely historically accurate, they’d never be out of the makeup or the wardrobe department, and obviously that has to be factored into a working day,” Horsfield says. “On Poldark, they basically wore the same clothes for days on end. There just wasn’t the women’s morning gown, day gown, afternoon tea gown, evening gown, night wear… So that was a big learning curve between Poldark and The Forsytes.”
As Hosfield combines her writing role with an executive producer credit, she was part of the casting process and the decision to hire season one directors Meenu Gaur and Annetta Laufer. Then if she’s not on set, she still watches rushes from the day’s filming and watches each episode cut as it emerges from the edit. Then there’s the numerous rewrites she might need to deliver at a moment’s notice or offer her notes on decisions to trim down certain scenes – or cut them altogether.
“It doesn’t stop until we lock every episode, by which stage potentially I’m on to the next thing,” she says.
Horsfield believes The Forsytes, distributed internationally by ITV Studios, stands out as a period drama thanks to its on-screen ensemble. “We do have the most amazing cast and I feel very privileged,” she says. “There’s some big names there and it works because it’s a family. Those family relationships work so beautifully and they feel so real to me.”
Like that? Watch this! Suggested by AI, selected by DQ
Downton Abbey: Opening in 1912, Downton Abbey charts the lives of the artistocratic Crawley family and their staff, facing seismic historical events and personal upheavals.
The House of Eliott: In 1920s London, two sisters defy expectations to establish a fashion business, confronting the rigid boundaries of class and gender.
Poldark: Returning from war, Ross Poldark finds Cornwall transformed and his family’s future uncertain.
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tagged in: Debbie Horsfield, Eleanor Tomlinson, Francesca Annis, Jack Davenport, John Galsworthy, Mammoth Screen, Masterpiece PBS, Millie Gibson, Poldark, The Forsytes, Tom Durant Pritchard, Tuppence Middleton