Victorian Farm
Largely due to its period buildings, rural heritage and picturesque location, the Acton Scott estate was chosen as the film location for BBC2's hugely successful TV series, 'Victorian Farm' and 'Victorian Farm Christmas'.
Produced by Lion Television, the documentary saw a team of three historians, Alex Langlands, Peter Ginn and Ruth Goodman, recreate rural life as it might have been in 1885. It was filmed through four seasons in 2007 and 2008, and broadcast early the following year accompanied by a best selling book.
With viewing figures of some six million, the first series of 'Victorian Farm' proved enormously popular. To build on this success, BBC2 commissioned a three part series, 'Victorian Christmas', accompanied by a 'Make your own Victorian Christmas' website. This involved Ruth, Alex and Peter returning to the estate in 2009 to tackle an array of new farming tasks and discover how the Victorians created the celebration of Christmas as we know it today.
'Victorian Christmas' transmitted on BBC2 in December 2009.
Explaining why he chose the Acton Scott estate, David Upshal, Executive Producer, said: “In an age when most landowners were busy obliterating all traces of the past to modernise their land and buildings, the Acton’s lovingly preserved much of the history and heritage of theirs."
Rupert Acton added: “Every now and again we are approached by TV and film scouts. On this occasion, I was able to offer a number of period buildings, including Glebe Farm and Henley Cottage, together with all the domestic bygones, tools and machinery of the Victorian era that met the producers’ needs.”
The production team behind 'Victorian Farm' returned to the estate in Autumn 2009 to film 'Escape in Time'. It is a new BBC2 daytime series of twenty episodes, presented by Ben Fogle. Featuring everyday families who spend a week living on the estate to rediscover lost skills while competing against each other mastering tasks and crafts from the Victorian age. 'Escape in Time' is scheduled to transmit in Spring 2010.