'Downton Abbey' to End Next Season, Producers Say 'It's Good to Quit While You're Ahead'

Throughout its lifespan, Downton Abbey has chronicled the end of an era — the last gasp of the British manor system in the face of encroaching modernity. That storyline will finally arrive at its natural conclusion now that Downton executive producer Gareth Neame has made official what has been long suspected: The show’s sixth season will be its last.

Ratings aren’t the issue, of course. Downton Abbey’s recently concluded fifth season continued to attract big numbers in its native land, as well as in the U.S., where it airs on Masterpiece. Instead, Neame made it clear that the decision to end the show is a creative one. “Our feeling is that it’s good to quit while you’re ahead,” he told reporters in a conference call. “We feel the show is in incredibly strong shape. The scripts that we’re working on for the upcoming season are fantastic. The show is so popular globally. But the danger with this sort of thing is to let them go on forever. I think it’s more important to us to make a perfectly formed show that we bring to an end when we think the timing is right and we think that people will love and remember that show for many, many years to come and not feel that we outstayed our welcome.”  

Here are a few other details Naeme shared about the impending end of Downton.

The Show Wouldn’t Go On Without Creator Julian Fellowes

Fellowes has had a period drama series in development with NBC for some time, but Neame said that wasn’t the reason he decided to bring the curtain down on Downton. “If Julian wanted out of the show, I would not be inclined to try and keep the show alive without Julian. He’s been the creator of the show and has written every episode. It’s been a fantastic partnership. I couldn’t entertain continuing to make the show with other writers. I think that would be a big mistake. But it really isn’t the case where Julian said, ‘I want out,’ and everyone else is being forced [into ending it].”

Watch Calm Downton!, a supercut of all the yelling on Downton Abbey: 

Don’t Expect a Spinoff

While rumors have flown for awhile that Downton might get a spinoff, Neame sought to put that speculation to rest. “There are no definite plans for a spinoff. There are so many routes you could go down, but we don’t have any plans at all at the moment, I’m afraid.”

That Said, a Movie Isn’t an Impossibility

A small-screen continuation may not be in the cards, but don’t necessarily rule out a Downton Abbey movie. “Our position on that is that we’d be very interested in that, and it’s definitely something we’re contemplating. It would be great fun to do and I think it would be a wonderful extension of everything people love about the TV show. But I can’t confirm that it’s definitely going to happen. It would take a lot of planning and thinking about. We shall see.”

Watch our trailer for Downton Abbey: The Horror Movie:

A No-Spoilers Policy Is in Effect

The only details that Neame would share about Season 6 is its structure. “The structure of the upcoming season will be exactly the same: 11 hours of drama in total over nine episodes. In Britain, the finale, as usual, will be on Christmas night.” Otherwise, he remained tight-lipped about the events of the final season, saying only, “Right from the beginning of the show, we’ve been about the end of a way of life, the end of a particular era of history. I think it will come to great relief in the last season. We will now in this final season be starting to see how that way of life comes to an end.”

Neame Has No Regrets About Matthew’s Fatal Joyride

Downton fans expressed outpourings of grief about Matthew’s death at the end of Season 3, but Neame looks back on that death — and others — with dry eyes. “The deaths were largely forced upon us by actors who wanted to move on and do other things. In hindsight, I don’t regret any of them. The deaths of very high-profile characters allow the show to veer off in directions that people wouldn’t normally expect from this kind of content, and made the show at times edgier than it might have been. I think it gave us dramatic rocket fuel. In a way, I think the best thing that could have happened to the story is for Mary to end up as a widow so that she had to start all over again. I think that’s made Seasons 4 and 5 stronger for it.”