Anne Lister comes home to Shibden Hall in Halifax in 1832, takes over the running of the estate from her ageing father, opens a coal mine to compete with the Rawson brothers, and sets out to win Ann Walker, the shy heiress on the next estate. Gentleman Jack is drawn from the four million words Lister wrote in her diaries, a sixth of them in a code that was not fully cracked until the 1980s.
Episode 6 And Where It Sits In The Season
By episode six, “Do Ladies Do That?”, the Walker family have worked out what is going on between Ann and Miss Lister. Ann’s health collapses under the pressure, her relatives move her away to Scotland, and Anne Lister has to decide whether to chase her or let her go. It is the episode where the series stops being a comedy of manners and becomes something sadder. Season one runs eight episodes and a second season followed in 2022.
Why Suranne Jones Carries It
Lister talks to the camera, strides through Halifax in a black frock coat and top hat, and refuses to pretend to be anything other than what she is. Sally Wainwright, who wrote Happy Valley, grew up near Shibden and had been trying to make this for twenty years. The series was shot at the real hall.
Watch Gentleman Jack On GoMovies
Episodes run about 60 minutes. Press play above to stream in HD, free, no account.