Being a Guinness is rarely simple, and Ivana Lowell knows this better than anyone. A prominent member of the famed brewing dynasty, she’s now a creator behind the highly anticipated Netflix drama, ‘House of Guinness.’
Dubbed “’Succession’ with beer and brutality” by The Times of London, the series features James Norton and Louis Partridge. It plunges into the tumultuous 19th century, starting with the death of Sir Benjamin Guinness, then Ireland’s wealthiest man, and chronicles his four children’s fierce struggle for control over their stout empire.
The concept for the series sparked in Ms. Lowell’s mind over a decade ago. While enjoying Christmas at her cousin Desmond Guinness’s 12th-century castle in County Kildare – a relative known for his Anglo-Irish aesthetic and his infamous Mitford sisters connection – inspiration struck.
“I was staying with Desmond and many other Guinnesses at Leixlip,” Ms. Lowell, now 59, recalled from London. “We were halfheartedly watching ‘Downton Abbey,’ and I thought, ‘Oh, our family is so much more interesting and eccentric.’”
Back home in Sag Harbor, New York, Ms. Lowell began crafting a treatment. Her vision traced the family’s journey from Arthur Guinness, the inventor proudly featured on every bottle, through to Sir Benjamin, who transformed the enterprise into Europe’s largest brewery.
It took six years for Ms. Lowell to join forces with Steven Knight, the acclaimed creator of ‘Peaky Blinders.’ Together, they sculpted the narrative, propelling ‘House of Guinness’ out of development purgatory and into production.
Ms. Lowell shared a key plot point: “Steve had the idea of starting the show with the reading of Benjamin’s will. Benjamin leaves the brewery and all his money to his two sons, and they have to battle it out.”
Set against the gritty industrial backdrop of 19th-century Dublin (though filmed in Northern England), a city then embroiled in a revolutionary quest for independence from British rule, ‘House of Guinness’ deviates sharply from its genteel period drama predecessors.
“It’s not ‘Downton Abbey’ — it’s gritty,’’ Ms. Lowell emphasized. “I’m nervous about what the family will say.”
However, her concern might be unwarranted. If there’s one trait common among the Guinness clan, famous for their frequent appearances in tabloids, it’s their profound self-awareness. “The thing about my family is that they are all very dramatic and eccentric and have a good sense of humor,” she continued. “These are the stories that I’ve always heard. But it’s a drama, not history, so Steve was free to invent.”
Mr. Knight found the family’s stories to be incredibly rich material. “I felt it was an embarrassment of riches (though the Guinnesses don’t do embarrassment, fortunately),” he commented via email.
One fictional element was entirely Ms. Lowell’s idea: “I wanted a sexy foreman who took off his shirt a lot,” she revealed, referring to the character portrayed by James Norton.
‘House of Guinness’ isn’t Ms. Lowell’s first dive into her family’s past. In her 2010 memoir, “Why Not Say What Happened?”, she candidly recounted a harrowing upbringing in a dilapidated English manor, overseen by parents and guardians whose negligence was nothing short of epic.
Her memoir revealed traumatic childhood experiences, including sexual abuse by her nanny’s husband at age six and severe third-degree burns from a kettle, leaving her with permanent scars. She also discovered that the man she believed to be her father, Israel Citkowitz (second husband to her mother, Caroline Blackwood), was not her biological father. Instead, her father was screenwriter Ivan Moffatt, one of her mother’s many lovers. Tragically, her sister Natayla died of a heroin overdose at 18.
“I have no idea how I survived it all,” Ms. Lowell reflected. “I think because I didn’t know any better or any worse. I was burned and raped and abused, and that’s just how it was. If you don’t know any different, you think this is normal. The Guinness sense of humor helped.”
Indeed, dark humor is a family hallmark. Ms. Lowell shared a memorable Guinness saying for when misfortune struck: “This is bad, even for us.”
In developing the series, she drew extensively from the anecdotes of her grandmother Maureen Guinness and her mother, Lady Caroline Blackwood—a brilliant yet acid-tongued and alcoholic writer, known for her marriages to artist Lucian Freud and poet Robert Lowell, among others.
“My grandmother Maureen and her two sisters, Aileen and Oonagh, known as the ‘Glorious Guinness Girls,’ could have a whole series based on their outrageous antics,” Ms. Lowell explained. “That generation was spoiled and pampered and allowed to get away with whatever they wanted.”