No Responses to “What Is O’brian’s Problem On “downton Abbey”?”

1. lorie v says:

   January 27, 2013 at 6:26 pm

   Sarah O’BrienSarah O’Brien (played by Siobhan Finneran), who is mainly known as Miss O’Brien, is Lady Grantham’s personal maid. She is especially bitter and resentful towards most of the other servants, perhaps due to her family circumstances; she had one favourite brother who had shell shock and later died during the Great War. Although scheming in nature and always looking to manipulate circumstances to hers and Thomas’s own benefit, she has a conscience and softens up over the second series. She is one of the few servants who smoke on a regular basis. This is at a time when most women did not smoke and it was very rare for a woman to be seen smoking in public.
   O’Brien and Thomas were the only servants who never did like Bates and the duo constantly try to find faults and uncover his past in an attempt to force Mr Carson to fire him. She tells Bates’ vengeful estranged wife Vera about the family’s dirty secrets in an attempt to force Bates out and Vera uses it to blackmail Bates. After she causes her mistress’s unborn child to miscarry by leaving a bar of soap on the floor of Cora’s bathroom for her to slip on, she feels guilty. When Thomas decided to buy extra food and supplies on the black market to sell to Downton’s kitchen staff, she refuses to get involved in his business but sympathises with Thomas after he realises he has been swindled. After Lady Grantham is struck by a severe case of Spanish flu, O’Brien maintains a bedside vigil, attempting to atone for the miscarriage. Towards the end of the second series she becomes guilt-ridden when she finds out her meddling in Bates’ private life has started a chain reaction which led to Vera threatening to expose the family secrets and bring the Crawley family down. O’Brien is one of several servants asked to testify at Bates’ trial and is genuinely relieved when they learn that Bates had been reprieved

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