Photo: PBS Masterpiece

Set in the dark underbelly of Victorian London, Miss Scarlet and the Duke is headed to Drama Sundays on PBS. Starring Kate Phillips (Peaky Blinders, The Downton Abbey Movie, Wolf Hall and The Crown) as Eliza Scarlet, and Stuart Martin (Jamestown, Babylon, Medici) as The Duke, Miss Scarlet and the Duke comes to Masterpiece beginning January 17 at 8pET/7pCT on PBS.

When headstrong Eliza Scarlet is left penniless after the death of her father, she has two choices for financial security: marriage or her father’s private detective agency and the opportunity to be the first female detective in Victorian London. But no matter how well she knows the tricks of his trade, the trade itself is deemed entirely inappropriate for a genteel lady of the 1880s.

Enter the “Duke,” Scotland Yard’s Detective Inspector William Wellington, a notorious drinker, gambler, womanizer…and a partner in running the agency and solving crime, all with a dash of will-they-won’t-they energy, wit, and moxie!

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While it reads a bit like the BBC’s Shakespeare and Hathaway: Private Investigators set in Victorian London, Miss Scarlet and the Duke will follow more along the lines of Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries with their own Victorian version of a smoldering will they/won’t they romance alongside some appealing mysteries and a dash of witty feminism.

Filmed primarily in Dublin which, I guess, must resemble Victorian London, Miss Scarlet and the Duke was created by Rachael New (Grantchester, The Mallorca Files). After being told that the series had been described as a Victorian Remington Steele, series director Declan O’Dwyer (Robin Hood, Merlin) described the show more as “a Victorian Moonlighting”, but did say he loved Remington Steele. In an interview with Andrew-Gower.co.uk, O’Dwyer said that the series “…doesn’t take itself too seriously – but it does expose the prejudices society put on women in the Victorian era and draws many parallels to society today.”

Miss Scarlet and the Duke is set to premiere on Masterpiece beginning January 17, 2021 on PBS!