It’s May 27, 1868, in Dublin, Ireland, and Sir Benjamin Lee Guinness’ funeral is kicking off with fire, mayhem, and a mob of angry Irish folk. That’s what you can expect in the opening minutes of Netflix’s new eight-episode drama House of Guinness, from creator Steven Knight (Peaky Blinders), inspired by true stories of the legendary beer family, whose empire still reigns today.
The real-life family are actually the ones who brought the idea to light, says Knight, who admits the Guinnesses are “so supportive of [House of Guinness].” The initial concept was first written up by heiress Ivana Lowell, the great-great-great granddaughter of Sir Benjamin. Eventually, it came to Knight, and he and Lowell had lunch — with beer and champagne — so he could “hear about all of the family and the stories and the legends and the myths and the rumors within the family,” he notes. But he also wanted to observe what he calls “that Guinness attitude.”
“It’s sort of amused — we live in these huge houses and there’s no food in the house — I think the thing is, they’re aware of their own absurdity,” he says.
Knight and Lowell have at least one thing in common. The Oscar-nominated creator actually owned his own brewing biz with his family called Freedom Beer Company in the mid-late 2010s. It’s no Guinness, but the love of brewing and beer is clear in his creation and highlighted in the show as early as the show’s title graphics. Fun fact: In any scene with Guinness beer being consumed, the actors were actually drinking Guinness 0, the non-alcoholic version of the draught.
When the drama begins, Guinness Brewery isn’t the worldwide operation folks know of today. It starts at a tumultuous time for the Guinnesses, as they are attempting to expand their horizons beyond St. James’s Gate in Dublin. But Irish nationalism is simmering — and causing problems for the Unionist Guinnesses. “I always want to not have the characters go and seek out the history — history comes to us,” says Knight.
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While the story nails its historical angle, with some fictional flair, there’s unfortunately not a lot of Dublin left that looks like it did in the 1860s, so, much of the production’s rich atmosphere was shot in the north of England around Liverpool. Still, Knight finds a match for the era in nearly every way.
Even the actors who play Sir Benjamin’s brood squabbled like a family in between every take, he says. In the premiere, the heirs and siblings — eldest and disinterested brother Arthur (Anthony Boyle), motivated Edward (Louis Partridge), pious Anne (Emily Fairn), and drunkard Ben (Fionn O’Shea) — prepare for the reading of Sir Benjamin’s will. They don’t know it yet, but their lives are about to drastically change. “The will is the starting gun,” teases Knight. “None of them get what they want.”
Some may even receive nothing. The reading of the will is especially disastrous for Edward, simply because you immediately see how badly he wants full control of the empire. But this is the 1800s, and he’s not the eldest. He and his older brother Arthur — who is gay and happily living in London with his paramour — will absolutely butt heads. Yet, there’s hope the two can work together, says Knight. “Edward had this drive that probably is a family characteristic, but Arthur finds a reason to believe in it, too.”
Holding the family together is James Norton‘s enforcer Sean Rafferty, who works in the Guinness factory. His ties to the family are strong — they lean on him through their adversities to do their dirty work — and he becomes romantically involved with one family member. “Rafferty was a real person,” notes Knight. “He was the foreman and much more for the Guinness family at the time. And then, of course, love steps in and gets in the way. Rafferty’s [role in the story] is one of the most fascinating bits of the whole thing.”
And though we know that, eventually, the Guinnesses will be successful as they aim to distribute their beer around the globe, the triumphs are still exhilarating to watch unfold onscreen. “To see, through the eight episodes, how [the siblings] reconcile themselves and actually do well….like, with a lot of things, you make a lot of stupid mistakes. It all goes wrong. Everybody’s miserable,” Knight says. “And then, ‘Oh my God, it worked.’”
We’ll raise a pint to that any day.
House of Guinness, Series Premiere, Thursday, September 25, Netflix