HARPER’S BAZAAR – Five series in, and Downton Abbey remains one of the most successful and captivating dramas on TV, with 120 million viewers worldwide. In our August issue, we catch up with its stellar cast of actresses.

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Whatever their place in the story – upstairs, downstairs, or in a lady’s chamber – women reign supreme in this most triumphantly successful of television dramas. Bazaar meets the stellar cast of actresses as they gather together again for a fifth series of the globally acclaimed show

The room is suddenly alive. ‘Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It)’ is pulsing through the speakers and the ladies of Downton Abbey have started to foot-tap and hip-sway and, in the case of Mrs Hughes the housekeeper, perform an impressive shimmy, arms swinging at her sides, not quite the full Beyoncé but not far off. Except she isn’t Mrs Hughes today, she’s herself, the actress Phyllis Logan, and for once she gets to wear a posh frock and be in the same room as her mistresses, Ladies Cora, Mary, Edith, Rose. They have all (well, nearly all; just Maggie Smith and Penelope Wilton are missing) been meticulously arranged for a group photograph in the drawing-room of Firle Place in Sussex. Logan to the left, Michelle Dockery (Mary) central, Lily James (Rose) elegantly stretched on the floor – nine women in floor-length gowns – and the sudden wave of movement is like a painting coming to life. Finally, they are still and – click – they’re captured.

When you see all these women together, you realise how, both upstairs and downstairs at Downton Abbey, it is the women who rule. Carson and Lord Grantham are officially in charge of their respective domains, but there’s a growing sense in both places that the women are staging a kind of benign takeover, finding their roles in a mid-1920s Britain that is very gradually warming to the idea that women might, after all, have something to offer beyond child-bearing and adorning a dinner table, that they might have something to say.
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As you know, Lily is in the June issue of Vanity Fair magazine and I have added the photoshoot in our gallery.

Lily James (right)
Hometown: London. Age: 25. Up next: The lead in Cinderella, with Cate Blanchett. Favorite app: Cycle Planner. Last TV binge watch: Breaking Bad. Starbucks order: Black coffee. Favorite sneakers: Converse. Miley Cyrus or Taylor Swift: Miley. Can’t live without on set: A book.

A gorgeous new photoshoot of the lovely Lily can be found in our gallery!

On the July issue of Vanity Fair, cover star Shailene Woodley headlines a portfolio of up-and-coming stars we like to call “The New Wave.” Photographed by Miguel Reveriego, these rising talents have a huge variety of major projects on the horizon, from new spins on classic fairy tales to high-profile sequels to some of the summer’s biggest potential blockbusters. And they come with just as much variety in their backgrounds; some, like Jaden and Willow Smith, are children of Hollywood royalty, while others, like Jack Reynor and Eve Hewson, have traveled from overseas to work with some of our biggest directors. No matter where these actors and actresses came from, we only see them going one place from here: Up. And up. And up. See them all in the July issue—available this week on newsstands in New York and L.A. and for download in the digital edition—and scroll down for a sample of what’s inside.

As you know, Lily was seen in Cannes during its film festival and Vanity Fair took some portraits including one of the lovely actress. I have added this stunning photograph in our gallery.

TOWN & COUNTRY – When I sat down to talk to Lily James, I found that it was impossible to be cynical about the value of enchantment,’ says Andrew O’Hagan, who interviews our cover star for Town & Country’s inaugural issue. The Surrey-born actress, best known for her role as Lady Rose, the loveable, naughty niece to Lord and Lady Grantham in Downton Abbey, battled the elements for our covershoot at Boughton Monchelsea Place, an Elizabethan manor house in Kent, dressed in Ralph Lauren.

James confesses that her own relationship with Lady Rose MacClare has been a love-hate one: ‘She seemed shallow. But she changes. Even though her values were about privilege and having a good time, she learned to care about bigger things.’

James is soon to star in another transformative role, as the title part in Disney’s Cinderella, directed by Kenneth Branagh. ‘It’s wonderful to have these chances,’ she says. ‘I would like to be a decent example to other girls and that probably means believing in their belief in me. I want to respect the dream we’re all having.’

She is an actress on the brink of superstardom, but with true British modesty maintains: ‘I never want to be one of those actors who sits around pretending it isn’t totally exciting.’ We agree Lily, it’s all very exciting.

Read the full interview with Lily James in the June 2014 issue of Town & Country, out now.

Added first outtake from Town & Country UK magazine in our gallery. We can only hope to see more of it soon!