In America, Via ‘House of Eliott’

Since July, fans of such great British series like “Upstairs, Downstairs” and “Brideshead Revisited” have been relishing A&E;’s “The House of Eliott.” The series follows the lives and loves of two sisters who operate a fashion house in 1920’s England.

Stella Gonet and Louise Lombard play siblings Beatrice and Evangeline in “Eliott,” which is a huge hit in England.

But Gonet was shocked when fan letters started arriving from the United States asking for her photograph. “I have never been to America,” she says. “I long to. I know I will (go) one day.”

Scottish-born Gonet, who is featured in HBO’s upcoming “Stalin,” believes Americans are responding to the series “because people like a sort of program that has got every period detail right. People are going through hard times (now) and people like to look back.”

Gonet and Lombard’s backgrounds are as different as night and day. For 12 years, Gonet acted with the Royal Shakespeare Company and the National Theatre.

Lombard’s experience is strictly television. “From a very young age, I took evening drama classes, and an agent had seen me do an improvisation one evening and put me up for something,” Lombard says. “I literally just finished a series when I got the part of Evangeline and started filming about three days later.”