The doors of Downton Abbey are opening again, just in time for Christmas.
The second movie to serve as a sequel to the hit Julian Fellowes TV series will hit theaters on Dec. 22, Focus Features announced Monday.
The original cast, including Hugh Bonneville, Michelle Dockery, Imelda Staunton and Maggie Smith, will all return, joined by newcomers Hugh Dancy, Laura Haddock, Nathalie Baye and Dominic West.
Lily James, who appeared in 21 episodes as Rose Aldridge, the cousin of Robert Crawley, Earl of Grantham (Bonneville), was not listed in the casting news. She was also absent from the first movie after her character moved to New York.
“After a very challenging year with so many of us separated from family and friends, it is a huge comfort to think that better times are ahead and that next Christmas we will be re-united with the much beloved characters of ‘Downton Abbey,’” producer Gareth Neame said in a statement.
The six-season series, which ran from 2010 to 2015, followed the aristocratic Crawley family and their servants in an upstairs-downstairs drama about early 1900s England.
The show scored 69 Emmy nominations and 15 wins, including acting wins for Smith and outstanding miniseries in 2011.
The first movie was released in September 2019 and grossed nearly $200 million globally.
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