. >> and hugh bonneville for robert grantham, because -- >> rose: you had him in mind. >> i absolutely had him in mind because one of the hardest things to find now is an actor who has that kind of inner niceness, sort of a likability, because we have had unpleasant heroes for so long in films and television and everyone's violet and ralph shout at each other and that is great too, you know, you don't have to have just one kind of television but there is something in that tradition of the sort of, the more people, jack hawkins, the sort of nice people. >> rose: yes. >> that i missed from the screen and i really wanted to have that in robert grantham and i think he has got that, and the other one was brendan coyle for bates, because what brendan has got is that sense of danger that you never quite feel you know bates, there is all of this sort of stuff going on inside him, but at the same time, he is a symthetic character and i think that is quite a difficult double to bring off for an actor, and i think he does bring it off absolutely marvelously but all the others, you know, when they

robert, don't catch me out. >> reporter: notice the accent? lady granthamave his estate. >> she's an american looking at all her english family with bemusement, frustration, at times utter astonishment at what they take for granted about the way they behave and the things that drive them in their life. >> reporter: her story? it's an echo of lady almina, the current earl's real great granny >> lasy almina, there, jordy's great grandmother, the fifth countess of carnarvon really was an heiress. and obviously cora was also an heiress. >> reporter: lady almina was rich but hardly an aristocrat. but as the illegitimate daughter of a rothschild banker, the american heiress had a delightfully bountiful dowery. lady carnarvon wrote about her story. >> and there were marriages which were marriages of contract, as well of one hoped of love. between and almina and her husband, actually it was one of love. and it was one of real money and this wonderful thing called cash. >> reporter: armed with daddy's dollars, almina transformed highclere into a model of the modern