First Look at the Mitford Sisters: ‘Outrageous’ Tells the Story of the Talented, Disreputable 1930s Siblings

Carter says that during the first reading, the cast got to meet Lovell, which the actor found helpful, since the author had spent time with some of the sisters. “One of the things that came out was that they were raised by a very intelligent mother. She was described as ‘ambiguous.’ In modern terms, she probably didn’t know how to love her children the way that we do, in our time—we’re all friends with our parents, more often than not.” But Muv’s mother died when she was young, and in any case, that was in the early to mid-1930s, the period covered in the first season of It’s absurd, This woman faces more family troubles than she shares.

The casting of heavyweights like Purefoy and Chancellor proves that That’s ridiculous. serious about showing the Mitford parents as complex people who were more than just upper-class caricatures. The same goes for the daughters, who later carefully managed the family image—a veil that Williams hopes to lift with this show.

“We’re looking at characters offstage,” Williams says. “Of course when they’re ‘onstage,’ which is when they write letters to each other or when they actually appear on television at the end of their lives, they seem complete. They have a mask. This series seems to be hiding under the mask. But even then, there’s very, very little self-pity, and I like that about them.”

Williams has outlined three seasons That’s ridiculous. (although only the first part was used.) I found this plan to be reasonable, as bringing such a large series of complex people and their relationships to life would require “subtlety”.

“That’s the keyword,” Williams replied.

She chose not to depict the women’s childhoods, but began when Nancy was in her late 20s and her youngest daughter, Debo, was in her early teens. Williams has “a bit of an aversion to flashbacks”, and in any case, “coming from a big family myself, what I know is that when everyone comes back together, everyone is eight years old again anyway”.

Jessica, Unity & Debo in the Honor CupPowered by BritBox and UKTV.

As the 1930s dawned, Nancy was a bit of a misfit, shackled to a hopeless romantic relationship, and although she was popular with artists, socialites, and writers (many of whom remained lifelong friends), she was not the literary success she would become. But all of those elements really gave the audience a way into this family full of big personalities. Nancy was “a natural narrator for me,” Williams notes. “She was probably the most politically neutral. I think she’s the most relatable to a modern audience. She’s the oldest, so she has a good perspective on the family.”

While Nancy’s narration frames the episodes—and also, according to Carter, breaks the fourth wall—one thing you won’t hear is an exact replica of the distinctive Mitford accent, which was featured in a 1980 documentary about Nancy. While Carter found it helpful to watch that film, the way the women speak is so stylized and classical that the audience “can feel detached” from the story. “They have a very, very posh Mitford accent,” Carter says. “They have a very specific kind of rhythm and tone to their voices.” In that 1980 documentary, Diana says that during the war, other volunteers found Nancy’s accent “annoying.”

The problem is, Carter added, “none of us hear that voice anymore. And if we do, it’s probably through the royal family, who, you know, half the country doesn’t care about anymore.… The scripts are very honest and real and realistic, and we wanted… people to really feel that, and understand that these are real people, not ‘characters’ from the ’30s.”