Downton Abbey takes Magnolia for Best Foreign TV Series as Awards \"go global\"

The popular British series Downton Abbey can add China\'s prestigious Magnolia Award to its Emmy and Golden Globe accolades with the announcement of it winning the Best Foreign TV Series at the 18th Shanghai TV Festival.

It is the first time the Shanghai festival has expanded the award category to include European and American productions, thus taking the Magnolias to the world. The silver awards were won by Japan\'s I\'m Mita, Your Housekeeper and  Korea\'s The Moon Embracing the Sun.

The Magnolia Award aims to celebrate excellent works and encourage new creativity. In recent years, the Shanghai festival, China\'s first international TV exposition, has cooperated with other similar foreign events to strengthen cultural exchange and cooperation as well as promote Chinese TV.

From 2008, the festival cooperated with Tokyo\'s International Drama Festival and the Seoul International Drama Festival and set up the "special award for foreign TV series" in the Magnolia Award. It also promoted overseas domestic TV series like Soldiers Sortie, Mawen\'s Battle, Three Kingdoms and A Beautiful Daughter-in-Law Era, which won awards.

Downton Abbey was created by Academy Award-winning screenwriter Julian Fellowes and stars Hugh Bonneville and Elizabeth McGovern. Producer Gareth Neame will visit Shanghai to share his thoughts with audiences at the TV festival.

Japanese TV series I\'m Mita, Your Housekeeper features Matsushima Nanako, an actress who is well known to Chinese audiences. The series achieved the highest ratings on Japan TV in more than 10 years.

The Korean series The Moon Embracing the Sun is adapted from the novel of the same name. Directed by Kim Do Hoon, it stars Han Ga In and Kim Soo Hyun in a romantic love story involving a "king" and a "witch".