More drama offscreen at the rebooted PBS drama 'Upstairs Downstairs.' It's been announced that star and co-creator Jean Marsh will miss the first few episodes of Season 2 due to illness.

The BBC reports that Marsh has suffered a minor stroke and that scripts are being rewritten to accommodate her absence before filming starts next week.

Marsh, who plays maid Rose Buck, is the only cast member from the 1970s original series to appear in the rebooted version. She won Emmy nominations for her work in the role in 2011, 1974 and 1976, winning the award in 1975.

The runaway success of 'Downton Abbey' has led to big shakeups at rival PBS period drama, the rebooted 'Upstairs Downstairs.'

Following news that co-creator Eileen Atkins has quit the series, comes the announcement that 'ER' and 'Doctor Who' star Alex Kingston has signed on for a major role in the upcoming season.

The BBC announced that Kingston will play the younger sister of Atkins' character, Lady Holland, the racy-sounding archaeologist Blanche Mottershead.

"I simply couldn't resist the opportunity to get inside the iconic 165 Eaton Place," said Kingston, adding that Blanche is "a wonderfully, intriguing character ... who will over time reveal some secrets of her own."

Created during the Nixon Administration, in existence longer than CNN and HBO, 'Masterpiece Theatre' began 40 years ago last week on public television stations. It earned its very first Emmy for Best Miniseries in its second season, for 'Tom Brown's Schooldays.'

That show was very much a part of the golden age of the miniseries in the mid-1970s, with such blockbusters as ABC's 'Rich Man, Poor Man' and 'Roots', and 'Masterpiece Theatre's own 'Upstairs, Downstairs'.

BBC Worldwide and PBS have decided that it's time for a new 'Sherlock Holmes.' The 1984 series, which ran ten years and 41 episodes, had Jeremy Brett as Sherlock and is still widely regarded as the best Holmes since Basil Rathbone's incarnation in the movies, but after the success of Guy Ritchie's kinetic Robert Downey Jr. version last Christmas, the people in a position to make things happen are ready to give us a 21st century variation on Holmes and Watson and 221B Baker Street.

Thus far the casting is promising. Martin Freeman, who is best known as the British version of Jim in the UK 'The Office,' will play Dr. Watson. In the role of Sherlock, the actor chosen is named Benedict Cumberbatch. That's a great name for an actor cast as Holmes; it just sounds so British. But Benedict also has the look of a Holmes, and he was in 'Atonement' and was nominated for a BAFTA playing Stephen Hawking in a BCC drama.

Before Dallas and Dynasty and Falcon Crest and Knots Landings captured the imaginations of American viewers, there was a British soap import that was even more compelling.

From 1971-75, PBS aired the British upper crust soap Upstairs Downstairs. And now Upstairs Downstairs is going to be remade. It'll be filmed and shown in England first before coming to America in 2011.

What made Upstairs Downstairs classic television – it won Emmys, BAFTAs and Golden Globes – was the way it depicted of the British class system. Upstairs you had the rich, privileged Bellamy family. Downstairs there were the servants who worked for them. The lives of all these characters intertwined in a well-written, brilliantly acted drama series.

This seems like an odd one. ABC is bringing the 2002 Jennifer Lopez movie Maid in Manhattan to the small screen.

I'm a sucker for romantic comedies, and I actually liked the movie (probably one of the few who did). But even I think it's a weird project to be adapting into a TV series.

The movie features Lopez as Marisa Ventura, a struggling single mom from the Bronx who works as a maid at a posh Manhattan hotel. Ralph Fiennes plays a rising politician who mistakes her for a wealthy socialite. They fall in love, yada, yada, yada. Those two stars had very little chemistry (and yet I still liked the movie).