Also in attendance was Michelle’s fiance, Jasper Waller-Bridge.

The series is set to premiere April 15th.

Michelle Dockery and her boyfriend of three years Jasper Waller-Bridge are getting married.

The couple announced the happy news of their engagement in The Times newspaper in a placement that read,

“The engagement is announced between Jasper, son of Michael Waller-Bridge of King’s Lynn, Norfolk, and Teresa Waller-Bridge of Battersea, London, and Michelle Dockery, younger daughter of Michael and Lorraine Dockery of Gidea Park, Essex.”

The Downton Abbey actress first met Waller-Bridge through mutual friends in 2019. They made their first public appearance together later that year at the 2019 Rome Film Festival. Waller-Bridge is the brother of Fleabag creator Phoebe Waller-Bridge and the creative director of James Grant talent agency, and was once the manager of former One Direction member Louis Tomlinson.

When the couple first got together, a source told the Daily Mail, “It was all taken slowly and in a considered manner but they are really enjoying being together. Michelle has been traveling a lot to promote the Downton movie but they have been in constant contact. Their friends and families are very happy for them. It is just so lovely. Jasper is a bit younger than Michelle but he has dated other older women in the past and it appears to be working for both of them. She remains a down-to-earth woman, dating an A-lister has never been her thing.”

Dockery was previously engaged in to John Dineen, who died following a battle with cancer in 2015. During an interview with The Guardian, the actress discussed how her fiancé’s passing rocked her world and impacted her career. “I don’t have the vocabulary to describe what it felt like. And what it still feels like,” she said. “I’ve never been more committed to anything in my life than to him. So at the time everything just shut down. Work, everything. Work didn’t matter. You suddenly become an [oncological] expert. This stuff becomes your world, and that of course was my priority.” She added that she does “refer to myself as a widow. We were engaged, and married at heart, and so I do consider myself a widow.”

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Fans will have to wait a little longer to return to Downton. Focus Features is pushing the North American release of “Downton Abbey 2” from Dec. 22, 2021, to March 18, 2022.

The film will now compete against “Unbreakable Boy,” a drama with Zachary Levi, Meghann Fahy and Patricia Heaton. The following weekend will bring the juggernaut that is “Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness,” but “Downton Abbey 2,” which appeals to older audiences should be some nice counter-programming to the younger-skewing Marvel release. In its former slot, “Downton Abbey 2” would have been up against the likes of “Matrix 4,” “Sing 2” and “The King’s Man.”

The follow-up to the hit 2019 film, itself a spinoff of the popular TV show, will bring back most of the upstairs/downstairs cast. That includes both members of the key Grantham clan, played by the likes of Hugh Bonneville, Maggie Smith, Elizabeth McGovern and Michelle Dockery, as well as actors Jim Carter, Joanne Froggatt and Brendan Coyle, who play their butlers, maids and other servants. New additions to the ensemble include Hugh Dancy, Laura Haddock, Nathalie Baye and Dominic West. The screenplay is written by “Downton” creator Julian Fellowes, with Emmy and BAFTA Award-winning Gareth Neame and Emmy Award-winning Liz Trubridge producing with Fellowes. Simon Curtis (“My Week With Marilyn”) is directing the film, which wraps production next month.

Universal Pictures International will release “Downton Abbey 2” internationally on the same date. The first “Downton Abbey” grossed an impressive $194.3 million and centered on a visit by the Royal Family. No word yet on what posh visitors may get a hankering for a trip to the country in the sequel. “Downton Abbey 2” is a Carnival Films production.

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It’s official! This Christmas we will be graced with a sequel to Downton Abbey, the film. All cast members are returning.