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PBS Masterpiece: “What was it like filming those indelible, iconic scenes of Sanditon‘s finale? Rose Williams, Ben Lloyd-Hughes, Crystal Clarke and other members of the Sanditon cast discuss making the series finale, the Happy Ever Afters, and what they imagine would be ahead in their characters’ lives.

Contains significant Series Finale spoilers.”

Rose Williams on All the Happy Ever Afters

I think the ending was brilliant, and I think that’s what we all wanted. Being a show that inspired by Jane Austen’s work and inspired by characters that she formed in her mind, it was absolutely only right to give everybody their Austen endings. Because that’s the point, to be able to observe relationship dynamics. And I think part of Jane Austen’s legacy is how she put emphasis on really learning to love the other and searching for the best, rather than walking away. Her emphasis at the end of all of her stories was always on true love. And to be able to close out our version of Sanditon in that spirit is essential.

Ben Lloyd-Hughes on the Ending

In those two scenes on the cliff and the promenade, I think it was a huge sense of relief for [Colbourne]. He’s a man who, when we first met him, was clouded with grief and torturous memories. So I do believe that cliff scene is closure for him, but it’s also that feeling of lightness, of a weight being lifted off your shoulders and being able to breathe. It’s like he hasn’t been properly breathing for the two series, and it’s only at that very end that he could breathe. That was the characterization for him in a way—he could be so contained and so insular and such an introvert, that I tried at least to convey this sense of almost a different physicality of someone who could finally look up, and not look down, and breathe again, and hold his head high…

…I remember, we had an intimacy director on set about the kiss and how we were going to do the kiss, and [convey] that sense of relief and exhaustion, that it’s taken so many months and ups and downs to get to this point and that feeling of, “Well, this is a kiss, but this doesn’t have to be the defining kiss of our lives, because we’re about to spend the rest of our lives together.” So in a way, it’s more of a hug—it’s an exhausted falling into each other’s arms because we now don’t have to…All the previous kisses you see from us before were stolen, illicit kisses, either illicit for obvious relationship reasons, or illicit because of society. And now it’s not a stolen kiss—it’s a kiss of relief and happiness and almost the sense that we’re about to spend the rest of our lives kissing, so we don’t need to put too much pressure on this one.

Rose Williams on the Ending

They were really important scenes. I think Ben and our director Steve [Brett] and I, for the final scene and for that cliff top final moment, we all knew that those scenes were really important and I really, really cared about preserving them in this style of Austen as much as possible, and honoring this character Charlotte as much as possible, and having it be as precisely aligned to our shared vision as possible. With filming, you always shoot out of order, so while it would’ve been heaven to be able to shoot the final moment on the final day, it was the last week, I think, when we shot the final scene moment, which was really sweet.

I’ll always remember that day because it was the last day for Flora [Mitchell], who plays Leo. Her mom was there and we were taking pictures and I got really emotional. It was incredibly meaningful, everything you would imagine that it would possibly feel like, to be closing out this final chapter of a character and having the satisfaction and peace of mind. The time that I’ve most felt like this in my life—I will never forget the day—was when I read the final page of the last Harry Potter book, you know, that, “I’m having a happy life and it’s okay.” I got to experience that in the shoes of Charlotte, and I’m very grateful for it. It felt like closing out the final chapter of this person, and this experience of working with these amazing people.

Crystal Clarke on Georgiana's Happy Ever After

Love is always a part of it. It’s always a part of it, to have someone to share our lives with. I don’t deny that, but I think part of Georgiana’s happy ever after is also her having autonomy and her being able to fully discover who she is, the things that she loves, what she values, and where she comes from, as well. To be able to have familial relationships. Relationships, not just necessarily just with her mom, but the Parkers too—a sense of community around her, because when we met her at first, she felt isolated, and not by choice. So her happy ever after is the opposite of that, and that’s community and that’s love. And yeah, I think she got that. She got there.

Liam Garrigan & Sophie Winkleman on Samuel and Lady Susan's Happy Ever After

Liam Garrigan: I guess they would move back to London, that’s where their lives are. So it would be going back to London and then trying to figure out what that then meant. I always felt like that unexpected true love for Samuel and Lady Susan blindsides them both, but I definitely think that it would be strong enough to handle whatever life beyond Season 3 threw at them.

Sophie Winkleman: I don’t know really what Samuel’s romantic past is, but it seems like she’s been attracted to rather dazzling figures who’ve not really come up with the goods, so she’s probably quite wise and a bit calcified to men’s charms. But she knows this one’s a very good egg, and I think she’d let her guard down. I think they just feel like really good friends as well as lovers, and I feel like they just have a lot of fun together, which makes me think that it really would last forever. Because I think it probably is all about that. And I think they’d be very happy without children.

Liam Garrigan: Foot loose and fancy free—it’s all good!

Sophie Winkleman: Yeah, they’re sort of posters for not having children, either of them. I think they could have a very brilliant life together without all that conventional stuff. I think the future looks very rosy for those two. Probably the most, actually!

Liam Garrigan & Sophie Winkleman on Charlotte & Colbourne's Happy Ever After

Liam Garrigan: I think they’d have more kids, and Sanditon and Heyrick Park would become everything for them, I think.

Sophie Winkleman: I completely agree. I think they’d have millions of children. We’re the complete opposite—we’re just going to go to Paris and Rome a lot. But they’ve had their big old dark phantoms in their past, haven’t they? And I think they’ve learned to trust each other over their very arduous journey. So I think they have something really solid, as well. I think it would be a very fertile, lovely future for them.

Ben Lloyd-Hughes on Augusta's Happy Ever After

Augusta, obviously, is going to get her own spinoff series, so I’m excited to watch that—that’s what we used to joke. I imagine Augusta doesn’t settle down for a while. She really butt heads with Miss Charlotte Heywood at the beginning [of Season 2], and they seemed like chalk and cheese, like complete opposites. But as the series went on, it seemed actually how similar they are. They both wear their heart on their sleeve, and they’re both passionate, and intelligent, and romantic, and loyal. So I could imagine Augusta, without realizing it, taking Charlotte’s path and going on an adventure before she settles down, so to speak. And even going on to work, being a governess somewhere, or working at Charlotte’s school, and having her own adventures before finding the right person to love and marry.

Rose Williams on "A girl can be anything she chooses to be."

That scene was really important to me and had a lot of versions, and I was quite staunch on maintaining the final line. You can be whatever you want to be—you really can— I really wanted to say it, and I said it believing it, as Rose. It meant a lot to me that it ended on that line because I think the message from Charlotte, even beyond the romance, is to be and do and explore what you want to do as a girl—that’s what I care about the most, most, most. And the fact that she could follow her heart and be a mother, which she always wanted to, but at the same time, be working and inspiring this next generation.

Had Charlotte been in different circumstances, would she have ended up being a teacher? Maybe not. Maybe it’s her daughter who gets to go to London and become an architect, who has even more freedom to go and be what she wants to be. Maybe it’s one of her students who gets inspired by Miss Hayward’s descriptions of the world and it gives them confidence to leave the town of Sanditon and explore other places in England, or allow themselves to think that they can do what they want. And then hopefully the legacy would continue in that line. So that was something I held in my mind as well.

But Charlotte was the cycle-breaker and did a lot of groundwork for her daughter. That’s how I sat with it. The pieces that I really like are the bookends of the character: Seeing her for the first time with a gun—that was Ollie [Blackburn, the first director]’s idea, which I thought was fantastic, and we fought for. And then to end on a line saying, “You can be what you choose to be.” Those are the marker points, the bookends for me for the character.

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