From the '20s smart set...

As Belgravia begins on TV, Simon Williams recalls the London of Upstairs, Downstairs

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These memories of filming Upstairs, Downstairs at 165 Eaton Place in the heart of Belgravia are dedicated to the residents of that address.

These people were plagued for years by tourists eager to glimpse the Bellamys’ fictional home. Their hall was piled with fan mail from around the world. None of the poor suckers had any idea that the house we used was down the street at number 65. The set designers simply added a ‘1’ in front of it.

‘Resting’ is the euphemism for unemployment we actors have to live with; there’s even a gravestone in Highgate that reads ‘Actor Resting’. In one of my resting periods, I enrolled as a freelance cleaner with Pimlico Domestics. They would dispatch me to muck out the homes of Belgravia’s gentlefolk; hawk-eyed women in housecoats would put me to work.

As an Old Harrovian who had survived the fagging system, I was used to degradation. One measly slave-driver even made me bring my own Marigolds. Still, bless her, in Eaton Place an old sweetie volunteered to hear my lines for an audition. As I scoured her grease encrusted oven, she’d prompt my lines from Richard II: ‘Come let us sit upon the ground and tell sad stories of the…’ she’d recite. ‘You’ve missed a bit in the corner, dear.’

Four years later, in 1971, I was in