Could ‘The Gilded Age’ Cross Over With ‘Downton Abbey’ in Season 3? Julian Fellowes Weighs In

Kelli Boyle June 17, 2025, 1:39 pm

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Jaap Buitendijk / Focus Features / Everett Collection; Barbara Nitke / HBO

Viewers love a Julian Fellowes period drama. With his and Sonja Warfield‘s HBO series, The Gilded Age, being set in the 1880s (1883 specifically in Season 3, premiering Sunday, June 22), there are fans who wonder if a Gilded Age and Downton Abbey crossover is possible. One Downton Abbey character, in particular, makes this somewhat doable: Elizabeth McGovern‘s Cora Crawley.

The American-born heiress who married into English nobility. Cora was born in 1868 in Ohio and didn’t marry Robert Crawley (Hugh Bonneville) until 1890, which means she’s presumably still living in the United States during the plot of The Gilded Age and could, in theory, pop in this world (she would’ve been 15 years old in 1883). But there’s one major problem in this crossover talk: networks.

TV Insider connected with Fellowes ahead of The Gilded Age Season 3 premiere and asked if Downton Abbey and Gilded Age crossing over would be prevented by the shows hailing from two different channels (the former aired on PBS, the latter airs on HBO).

“The being on different networks puts a problem in the path of that, so we’ll just have to wait and see,” Fellowes says.

There are events in The Gilded Age Season 3 that open the door to a Downton crossover even more, but it still feels like a stretch that these narrative worlds could collide.

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Downton Abbey was a production of Carnival Films & Television in co-production with Masterpiece Theatre. The Gilded Age is a co-production between HBO and Universal Television, a division of Universal Studio Group. While the shows have Fellowes in common, it’s not as simple as Fellowes deciding that he wants to have his TV worlds collide and writing it into The Gilded Age‘s story. The networks would have to agree to let these shows come together.

Premiering Sunday, June 22, at 9/8c on HBO (streaming on HBO Max), The Gilded Age Season 3 is the most action-packed season yet (well, as action-packed as a show like this can be). The American Gilded Age was a period of immense economic and social change, when empires were built, but no victory came without sacrifice. Following the Opera War, the old guard is weakened and the Russells stand poised to take their place at the head of society in the third season. Bertha Russell (Carrie Coon) sets her sights on a prize that would elevate the family to unimaginable heights while George Russell (Morgan Spector) risks everything on a gambit that could revolutionize the railroad industry — if it doesn’t ruin him first.

Across the street, the Brook household is thrown into chaos as Agnes Van Rhijn (Christine Baranski) refuses to accept newly widowed sister Ada Forte’s (Cynthia Nixon) new position as lady of the house. Peggy Scott (Denée Benton) meets a handsome doctor from Newport whose family is less than enthusiastic about her career. As all of New York hastens toward the future, their ambition may come at the cost of what they truly hold dear.

The third and final Downton Abbey movie, Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale, comes out in theaters on September 12.

The Gilded Age, Season 3 Premiere, Sunday, 9/8c, HBO, Streaming on HBO Max