Eileen Atkins, whose character Miss Deborah Jenkyns had been killed off in August 1842 (2007), sent the cast and crew a large crate of oranges on the first day of rehearsals for this season's episodes. Attached to the crate was a note "all sucking to be done in public". This was a reference to her character's quote about oranges in June 1842 (2007), when she said that she loathed the word "suck" and, rather primly announced "We will repair to our rooms... and consume our fruit in solitude".
The brown cape Imelda Staunton (Miss Pole) wears walking along the street is the same costume Joanna David (Mrs. Gardiner) wears to Pemberley in Pride and Prejudice (1995), and Janine Duvitski (Mrs. Bute Crawley) at Queen's Crawley in Vanity Fair (1998).
The outfits worn by the railway workers are the same costumes worn by the navvies in Sherlock Holmes (2009).
This reunites Michelle Dockery and Jim Carter who were both regulars on Downton Abbey.