Don’t look for me anymore. Now I only walk around 61e Rue de New York and the Newport tennis club with a shadow on the shoulder and a high -shaped hat like the man of Monopoly game.
Valet, prepare my carriage, there is a small jumping at the Rockefeller!
After a short hiatus, here I am plunged into the sumptuous universe of The Gilded Age On the Crave platform, completely obsessed with its cruel power games between the old family money and the new wealthy of Manhattan high society.
I liked the first season of The Gilded Age (The golden agein French version), which started in 1882 in the Upper East Side district, but not enough to continue with the second chapter, which I abandoned like an old telegram on a servant plateau. Beginner’s error (ball).
I caught up on this summer, and I only have a few episodes of the third season, the best so far, which I stretch to extend this television pleasure concocted by the great manitou of Downton AbbeyJulian Fellowes.
Which amazes in The Gilded Agein addition to lush costumes and opulent sets, it is the superposition of the fictitious intrigue and truthful historical facts.
The second season is articulated in particular around the War of Operas in New York, where the noble aristocrats fiercely oppose the erection of the Metropolitan Opera, the cultural reception land of the vulgar new rich, who won their own fortune, what a horror, instead of inheriting.
There is also talk of the opening of the Brooklyn bridge, whose construction was supervised by a woman engineer, Emily Warren Roebling. We are also witnessing the presentation of the first play by the writer Oscar Wilde, Vera or nihilistswhich was disastrous.
The majority of the characters who populate the ostentatious manors of the 5e Avenue have also already existed. Starting with the formidable couple at the heart of the story, that is, the formidable magnate of railways George Russell and his ambitious wife Bertha, obsessed with his social ascent and that of his two children.
In fact, George and Bertha Russell were largely inspired by the wealthy William and Alva Vanderbilt, of “upstarts” who snatched it before being “accepted” by the worldly elite. Like Alva Vanderbilt, Bertha Russell is a brilliant, progressive, determined, energetic and extremely cunning woman. It is the most beautiful character in this Victorian series and her interpreter, actress Carrie Coon, is masterful.
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Gladys Russell, daughter of George and Bertha, played by Taissa Farmiga
Bertha Russell’s largest rival is called Caroline Astor (Googlez-la!) And she imposed social order in New York for decades with her two allies, the fun Mme Fish and the Ratoty M. McAlister. These three, world caliber vegetables are real historical figures. Just like the publisher of Globe Thomas Fortune, the banker JP Morgan as well as the Duke of Buckingham, a copy of the real Charles Spencer-Churchill, Duke of Marlborough.
The incredible quantity of “memes” that the third season of The Gilded Age has cemented its privileged status in popular culture. It’s really very, very good. The best aftershocks all come from the elegant widow Agnes Van Rhijn, camped by Christine Baranski, a harsh, rigid, sarcastic woman attached to traditions, but whose character is softening over the episodes. He is a mirror character to that of the Dowaire Purple Crawley of Downton Abbeyinterpreted by the incredible Maggie Smith.
Controversial opinion now. Orphan Marian Brook, hosted by Aunt Agnes and Aunt Ada, is probably the most beige and uninteresting character in this time series. How much Marian is lacking in spark and expression, Lord?
It is as smooth as its cousin Aurora Fane, which has long been confused with the patterns of the tapestry before obtaining a more bewilder, which implies a possible divorce, the equivalent of an immediate banishment of the circles of influence at the end of the XIXe century.
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Marian Brook and Peggy Scott, respectively embodied by Louisa Jacobson and Dené Benton
As Downton Abbey, The Gilded Age is interested in the tightness between servants and their employers by putting romance-and dramatic violins-in preview. Who secretly cracks for whom? Who will marry who? It is practically Gossip Girlbut 125 years earlier and with more frills and eccentric hats.
And beyond its soapy appearance, The Gilded Age Watch with a good acuity how the United States is transformed during this pivotal period. The emancipation of women, the class struggle, the progress brought by the industrial revolution and, above all, the racial segregation, still very present, notes that the African-American journalist Peggy Scott during a report in Alabama, in the south of the country.
Yes, there are a lot of curbs, reverences and decency codes to be respected in The Gilded Age. The fact remains that there is something happy to attend so many epic baffles between ladies of the upper who hate each other, but who smile in a hypocritical manner in front of a cup of tea while planning their next leg for the season. How not to love these refined, polished and devilishly effective shenanigans?
