Executive Producer Addresses Whether 'Downton Abbey' & 'The Gilded Age' Exist in the Same Universe

The Gilded Age is in many ways the spiritual successor to Downton Abbey – but do the shows exist in the same universe?

The new HBO series takes place 1882 at the start of the American Gilded Age, three decades before the events of Downton Abbey. The two series also come from the same creator, Julian Fellowes, and feature tons of upstairs/downstairs drama.

In a new interview, an executive producer from The Gilded Age who also worked on Downton Abbey addressed whether or not there’s a connection between the two shows.

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“[A crossover is] not in the thinking at all,” Gareth Neame told TV Line. “It’s a separate universe, but they’re both fictions set in the 1880s. Downton Abbey, in its own fiction, was definitely there. A younger version of the Maggie Smith character would be living there, I guess. But it’s not really planned.”

He went on to joke that since crossovers and reboots are so big these days, it “will only take a decade or so for HBO or Universal to say, ‘Great, let’s do a Gilded meets Downton mashup!’” But Gareth added that it’s “not currently on the slate.”

The Gilded Age begins in 1882 with young Marian Brook (Louisa Jacobson) moving from rural Pennsylvania to New York City after the death of her father to live with her thoroughly old money aunts Agnes van Rhijn (Christine Baranski) and Ada Brook (Cynthia Nixon).

Accompanied by Peggy Scott (Denee Benton), an aspiring writer seeking a fresh start, Marian inadvertently becomes enmeshed in a social war between one of her aunts, a scion of the old money set, and her stupendously rich neighbors, a ruthless railroad tycoon and his ambitious wife, George (Morgan Spector) and Bertha Russell (Carrie Coon). Exposed to a world on the brink of the modern age, will Marian follow the established rules of society, or forge her own path?

The show is set to debut tonight on HBO and you can check out the trailer here!