‘The Buccaneers’ Creator on How New Period Drama Feels ‘Modern’ (Exclusive)

The Buccaneers is the last novel written by Edith Wharton before her death in 1937. When she did, she hadn’t finished the novel, so it was published in its original form in 1938. The Buccaneers was finished by Marion Mainwaring in 1993, and now the story is getting its own series on Apple TV+. PopCulture.com spoke to The Buccaneers creator Katherine Jakeways who revealed that the show will have a modern feel despite taking place in the 1870s. 

“I think fans of period drama will, I hope, be drawn to it anyway because it’s such a sort of sumptuous example of all their elements of period drama that we’ve come to love,” Jakeways told PopCulture. “The locations are beautiful and the costumes are fantastic and it’s kind of a gorgeous young cast and gorgeous older cast as well who are sort of playing out these stories and these romances.”

“But I also hope that people who are a bit less traditional fans of period drama will find loads to enjoy about it. We hope that the experience of watching it is very similar in a lot of ways to watching a contemporary drama in terms of the fact that the characters are relating to each other and behaving around each other the way people in 2023 do more than a typical period drama. And that the storylines feel quite modern and the relationship stories that are being played out are in many cases different from ones that you will have seen in period dramas before. So I hope there’s something for everybody, whether you’re a fan of period drama or not, or no matter your age or gender.”

The Buccaneers focuses on five American girls — Nan St. George (Kristine Froseth), Jinny St. George (Imogen Waterhouse), Conchita Closson (Alisha Boe), Lizzy Elmsworth (Aubri Ibrag) and Mabel Elmsworth (Josie Totah) — who travel to secure titles. However, their hearts are also set on love, friendship and adventure, and their personalities clash with young dukes, and lords of London along with their family members. 

But if there is one thing the show focuses on more than anything else, it would have to be a bond between the five girls. “It’s the absolute heart of the show is the female friendships,” Jakeways said. “And there are lots of romances in the show and lots of love stories but the absolute central love story and the one that’s the kind of touchstone of the entire show in the entire season is the love story between these five girls who, although they mess up and make mistakes and have rivalries and don’t always treat each other well. As all female friends know, that’s a realistic depiction of female friendship. But the bottom line is they absolutely always have each other’s backs and will always look out for each other and put each other above romantic love.”

And while the five girls got along on screen, they became very good friends when the cameras weren’t rolling despite not knowing each other before filming. “They were cast and they all came from different parts of the world,” Jakeways revealed. “Aubri is Australian, Imi is from London, and Kristine, Alisha and Josie are all from America. So they all arrived in Edinburgh in Scotland the first time that they’d all met and we were all there together to spend this seven- or eight-month shoot together.”

“They lived together in the same building,” she continued. “We all lived together in the same sort of apartment block for the whole time in this foreign country effectively for most of us. And they were such a great sort of gang of young, vibrant, intelligent, talented young women. We were very lucky to have all of them. They were all very different and all in some ways had similarities to the characters in some ways were very different from the characters. But they were all invested in getting it right and they enjoyed themselves. I mean, it was a bit like precious week for nine months apart from the fact that we worked really hard that they got out and enjoyed Scotland and enjoyed getting to know each other.”

The first three episodes of The Buccaneers will premiere on Apple TV+ on Nov. 8 with new episodes streaming weekly every Wednesday through Dec. 13.