Based on the 1931 stage play by Noel Coward, Cavalcade is the undeniable inspiration for both Upstairs Downstairs and Downton Abbey. It comes to the screen in this epic production by Fox Film Corporation two years before their historic merger with 20th Century Pictures to form 20th Century Fox. The story opens with a closeup of a medallion featuring King George V, who was the current ruler of the United Kingdom and British Dominions, as well as Emperor of India. After the main titles, the following text appears on screen:

“This is the story of a home and a family … history seen through the eyes of a wife and mother whose love tempers both fortune and disaster …”

After several additional text cards, we learn that it’s New Year’s Eve in 1899, and the Marryot family of London “awaits the headstrong cavalcade of the Twentieth Century.” While Pomp and Circumstance is played, a second medallion fills the screen, that of Queen Victoria. We are now back in another era, 34 years before the making of this film.

The four principal cast members of “Cavalcade.” Left to right: Herbert Mundin as Bridges, Diana Wynyard as Jane Marryot, Clive Brook as Robert Marryot, and Una O’Connor as Ellen.

The Marryots are a genteel, upper-class family—Robert, his lovely wife Jane, and their two young boys Edward and Joey. Robert and Jane are played by Clive Brook and Diana Wynyard. Both were major stars of the British theatre with occasional forays into film. But first we are introduced to the “downstairs” cast, headed by one of my favorite character actresses—Una O’Connor, best remembered by movie fans for her quirky and often campy roles in The Bride of Frankenstein, The Invisible Man, and Witness for the Prosecution. She is a delight and lights up the screen in every scene. Here, she’s the Marryots’ maid Ellen Bridges, a role she originated in the play. Ellen is married to Alfred Bridges, the butler, played by Herbert Mundin, whose brief but memorable career as a character actor was cut short by a fatal automobile accident at the age of 40. He and Una again shared the screen in The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938). Herbert was also featured in another Oscar-winning Best Picture, Mutiny on the Bounty, in 1935.

This appealing “downstairs” duo is joined by a dotty cook (Beryl Mercer, who was so effective and touching three years earlier as Lew Ayres’ mother in All Quiet on the Western Front), and the newest servant of the household named Annie (Merle Tottenham, also from the original play), a gawky scullery maid. Bridges (note: butlers are traditionally called by their surname) sports a soldier’s uniform and is heading off to the Boer War in South Africa.

“What’s the sense in a war? Nobody wanted a war,” says his tearful wife Ellen as she fears for their baby’s future.

“We have to have a war now and then just to prove that we’re top dog,” says Bridges, and it becomes all too clear in the following “upstairs” scene as well that this saga will have a lot to say about war, its social impact, and the toll it takes on families both above and below the stairs.

We cut to a massive ship, moments before it sails away from the crowd-filled pier with hundreds of uniformed troops heading off to Africa, including Bridges and Mr. Marryot. There’s no CGI here even if it evokes a similar embarkation scene from James Cameron’s Oscar-winner Titanic. This time it is achieved with a real vessel populated by real extras, and it’s quite impressive.

“Isn’t it a wonderful sight?” says Jane’s best friend Margaret, played by Irene Browne (memorable in 1948’s The Red Shoes), as they watch from the landing. Browne is a holdover from the original play as well.

“I wonder how many of them will come back alive,” Jane replies with a haunted expression.

The passage of time is depicted throughout this story by showing a medieval army of knights on horseback. They parade across the screen in capes and armor, carrying flags, accompanied by occasional title cards that flash the year of the next scene. A repeated musical fanfare underscores the pageantry. This theatrical device is a symbol of mankind crusading into the future. It’s a bit heavy-handed and religious in tone, but it’s still effective in this early period.

After the war and Queen Victoria’s passing, we learn at a celebratory ball that Robert has been knighted. Alfred and Ellen Bridges have left the Marryots to open a local pub. Despite being the proprietor of a successful business, Alfred is now an alcoholic. Their baby daughter Fanny Bridges has grown into a beautiful little girl (future film star Bonita Granville in one of her earliest roles) who loves to dance and is oblivious to the troubles around her. Even Annie, the Marryots’ new scullery maid at the start of the film, has left service to marry a retail merchant. She now sports a phony, upper-class accent, and it’s clear the social classes are not as defined as they once were. It’s possible with hard work and luck to rise above one’s station in life.

Edward (John Warburton) and Edith (Margaret Lindsey) aboard an ill-fated vessel on their honeymoon.

More changes, some of them drastic, occur in the lives of the Marryot and Bridges families. In an inebriated state, Alfred is killed by a firetruck on the street. His young daughter Fanny wins a dance competition. The Marryot’s oldest son Edward, now fully grown, falls in love with Margaret’s daughter Edith, and the two childhood friends become newlyweds. They set sail for a romantic honeymoon voyage, and after a sweet on-board scene that’s a tad too long, the camera pulls away from the deck’s railing to reveal a life preserver bearing the ship’s name: Titanic. Both young lovers perish in the tragic sinking.

Another transition of crusading knights invades the screen, and it’s 1914. The world is on the brink of the Great War. Robert and Jane and their friend Margaret have just returned after traveling abroad. One can only imagine it was to help them cope with the tragic deaths of their children. Everyone has aged a bit, and it must be noted that the costumes in this scene and throughout the decades-long story are magnificent. The Academy offered no honors for Best Costume Design back in 1933, but Earl Luick, who isn’t even given a screen credit for his efforts, would surely have been recognized with the award.

Before the scene ends, a town crier from the street below announces that “war is official” as we hear people cheering through a large window in the parlor. Their son Joe (Frank Lawton) attempts to make light of the situation by suggesting they should all get drunk and go roaring about the street, but Jane sinks into a chair, devastated by the news.

“At least Edward died when he was happy,” she remarks. “Before the world broke over his head.”

Robert tries to comfort her. “Jane, dear, we’ve had wars before without the world breaking.”

“My world isn’t that big,” she replies.

In the scene ahead, we see Joe in uniform and on leave at a supper club. A theatre star takes the stage to help recruit soldiers for the army, and it is none other than Fanny Bridges (Ursula Jeans), the girl who used to live in Joe’s own house below the stairs with her mother and father when they were in service to his family. After a rousing performance, he sneaks backstage into her dressing room. The two soon fall in love, although the dialogue in their subsequent love scenes doesn’t help their cause any. It’s the most stilted in the film, salvaged only by the appeal of the two actors.

An extended war montage follows with cross-dissolving newspaper headlines, exploding bombs ripping through the screen, and battle scenes fought with small-scale models, all conceived by William Cameron Menzies, who would serve as production designer on Gone with the Wind six years later.

News arrives that the Armistice is signed, and Ellen Bridges turns up at the Marryot household. She is dressed from head to toe in furs and finery, and the reason for this unexpected visit becomes clear. Ellen has discovered that Fanny and Joe are in love after reading a private letter belonging to her daughter. Jane thinks they should let the young couple decide for themselves and doesn’t approve of meddling in other people’s affairs. Ellen presumes that Jane won’t think Fanny is good enough for the Marryot family, despite being received everywhere and knowing all the “best people.” It’s ultimately a case of reverse snobbery, and Jane asks Ellen to leave just as a telegram arrives. Jane turns ashen as she reads it.

“You needn’t worry about Fanny and Joe,” she says to Ellen. She then reveals that Joe was killed in the war. The Marryots have lost both sons to untimely deaths.

More time passes with another extended montage, this one quite powerful: images of the Young Communist Party, a radio host proclaiming that “God is a superstition too crude to impose upon a child,” and a minister delivering his grim sermon to a nearly empty congregation. Some of these sentiments wouldn’t pass the censors a year or two later, but this is before the Hays Code was being widely enforced, and the candor is surprising but also refreshing.

We end up in the modern era of the 1930s for the final segment of this story. Fanny Bridges delivers a world-weary torch song entitled “20th Century Blues” ala Helen Morgan in a swanky Art Deco nightclub before we find ourselves back at the Marryots’ front parlor again.

Subtle but effective makeup has transformed Jane and Robert into a quiet, elderly couple. It’s New Year’s Eve once more, some 30 years after the first celebration at the start of the film. Robert pops the cork on a champagne bottle.

“Let us drink to our sons and our hearts that died with them,” says Jane. “Let us drink to the spirit of gallantry and courage that made a strange Heaven out of unbelievable Hell. Let us hope that one day our country will find dignity and grace and peace again.”

A montage of wounded soldiers, blind basket weavers, military graves, bellowing politicians, preaching ministers, showgirls, nightclubs, bombs exploding, trains, ships, and music overlaps.

The Marryots stare into the distance as Robert repeats, “Dignity, grace, and peace.”

This movie has its flaws, but it also speaks volumes to the ravages of war in the name of human progress. I find it a valid and valuable choice as the Academy’s Best Picture of 1932-33.

Cavalcade