The Duchess 2008

Like Princess Diana, her direct descendent, Georgiana Duchess of Devonshire was beautiful, glamorous and adored by the public. But while her beauty and charisma made her a household name, one thing always seemed to escape her: love.

Beneath Georgiana’s glamorous façade lay an intelligent, vulnerable woman stranded in a loveless marriage to the Duke, one of the richest men in England. Frustrated by the limitations imposed on her by virtue of her sex and her class, she rebelled, entering into an intense relationship with the beautiful Bess Foster, thereby upsetting the cool balance of her marriage to the Duke and leading to a complex ménage a trois. Georgiana’s rebellion extended to the public sphere where she tore down the conventions, becoming a political campaigner for the liberal party and galvanising the nation. In so doing she fell in love with Charles Grey, the future Prime Minister, finally discovering the meaning of true love. But could true love survive the strictures of the Duke, of Bess and of Society – the pressures of marriage and motherhood, of friendship and loyalty, of class and celebrity?