Wading into the cold Atlantic ocean, waves crashing over her head, her lips slowly turning blue, there were moments when Jessica Brown Findlay feared for her life.

The actress known around the world as Downton Abbey’s elegant Lady Sybil found herself gasping for breath as she filmed the BBC’s gritty new three-part adaptation of Daphne du Maurier’s Jamaica Inn.

Yet despite the danger and discomfort, she was having the time of her life playing headstrong Cornish girl Mary Yellen.

“Filming in the sea was ridiculous,” she tells me, she tells me with her distinctive, throaty laugh.

“It was exhilarating and special because you were able to get to a place so far beyond where it feels ‘pretend’. It was very real and there was a certain level of fear. You were in the sea, everyone disappeared and you may drown.

“The waves were so big – you’d go under and for a few seconds you couldn’t see which way was up.”

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Jessica Brown Findlay’s new TV show might be a period drama, but that’s where all comparisons with Downton end. In upcoming BBC series Jamaica Inn – adapted from the novel by Daphne Du Maurier – Brown Findlay will star as feisty heroine Mary Yellan living on a bleak 1820s Cornish coast. The drama, which will air at Easter – will also star Matthew McNulty (The Paradise) and Ben Daniels (House of Cards).

This year is set to be a very busy one for Ms Brown Findlay. In September she’ll appear in the hotly tipped big screen adaptation of the play Posh with Sam Claflin and Douglas Booth (lucky girl), followed by Frankenstein with James McAvoy and TV drama Lullaby with Amy Adams. Welcome back Jessica!

We have added x3 new promotional stills from Jamaica Inn to the galleries …

  

We found one (very small) promotional pic of Jess for BBC’s Jamaica Inn 3 part series.

Jessica Brown Findlay (Downton Abbey) and Matthew McNulty (The Paradise) take on Daphne du Maurier’s classic novel, which comes to BBC1 this summer. In 1930, after a visit to the Jamaica Inn on Bodmin moor, du Maurier came away compelled to write a dark and eerie tale of smugglers and murderers in the 1820s. The result? The tale of Mary Yellan (Brown Findlay), an orphan who goes to live with her aunt (Joanne Whalley) and brutish husband (Southcliffe’s Sean Harris), the landlord of the Inn. Why are there never any guests? And who can Mary trust?

Hundreds of people descended on Kirkby Lonsdale to watch the filming of drama Jamaica Inn.

The town underwent a complete transformation to turn it into 1820s Cornwall, with period market stalls, horses and carriages and hundreds of tons of mud.

“It’s been such a great week for the town,” said Allan Muirhead, chair of the town council.

“It’s been fascinating to watch what’s gone on and brilliant that so many people have come to Kirkby to see it all unfold.”

Filming for the BBC adapation of the Daphne du Maurier classic began on Monday morning and has continued until 10.30pm every night this week. Market Square has been almost unrecognisable since it was turned into the Cornish town of Launceston, where parts of the book are set.

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We have added some new photos of Jessica Brown Findlay as she films a BBC drama at Holywell Bay near Newquay (just 15 minutes away from me! I wish I had known, boo)  Jess, who played Lady Sybil in the ITV costume drama, is to star in a BBC adaptation of Jamaica Inn – penned by Fowey’s legendary author Daphne du Maurier.

The actress, who is cast as Mary Yellan, the main character in the 1936 novel, can be seen on the north Cornwall beach with her fellow cast members and crew as they film scenes for the three part 60 minute drama, which is set to hit ours screens next year. It is being directed by BAFTA-winning Philippa Lowthorpe, whose previous hit shows include Call The Midwife and Five Daughters, and other scenes are set to shot on Bodmin Moor in the coming days.

Set in 1820 against the backdrop of the windswept Cornish moors, the story follows Mary’s journey when she is forced to live with an aunt at the eponymous inn after the death of her mother and discovers it to be the hub of a smuggling ring.

Other cast members include Matthew McNulty (The Paradise, Room At The Top) as Jem Merlyn, Sean Harris (The Borgias, Southcliffe) as Joss Merlyn and Joanne Whalley (The Borgias, Gossip Girl) as Aunt Patience.

Daphne du Maurier lived at Readymoney cottage in Fowey, with her three children, from 1942 to 1943, before moving onto the grander Menabilly house near Par. The author arrived in Fowey with her three children under a storm of controversy. Whilst living there du Maurier wrote the family saga, Hungry Hill, based on stories she was told by an illegitimate male partner, but the novel was badly received by critics in 1943.

In letters to a friend at the time, a 34-year-old du Maurier admitted suffering from “many probings and thinkings” and needed to move to Cornwall in order to “sort myself out”. Not only was Cornwall the home of her mother and sisters, but it had already served as inspiration for two of her best-loved novels, Rebecca and Frenchman’s Creek. When the Readymoney lease ran out in 1943, the author moved to the nearby Menabilly.

Filming of Jamaica Inn will also take place in Yorkshire and Cumbria.

  

The former Downton Abbey actress Jessica Brown Findlay is to star in a BBC adaptation of Daphne du Maurier’s Jamaica Inn. She has been cast as Mary Yellan, the main character in the 1936 novel.

Set in 1820 against the backdrop of the windswept Cornish moors, the story follows Mary’s journey when she is forced to live with an aunt at the eponymous inn after the death of her mother and discovers it to be the hub of a smuggling ring.

After leaving Downton Abbey last year when her character died in childbirth, Brown Findlay admitted she had been afraid of becoming “too comfortable in the role”. She said she had not wanted to play Lady Sybil for years and then “discover it was the only thing I could do.”

Since leaving the show, she has also appeared in Labyrinth, the glossy Ridley Scott-produced adaptation of Kate Mosse’s international best-seller. She has also nabbed lead roles in the upcoming Winter’s Tale and Frankenstein both due in Cinemas 2014.

Filming of Jamaica Inn begins this week on location in Cornwall, Yorkshire and Cumbria.

Philippa Lowthorpe, the director, said: “I love Jamaica Inn because it is an exhilarating adventure story set in a wild landscape with brilliant characters, and at its heart is Mary Yellan, a fantastic female heroine. “I am delighted that Jessica Brown Findlay is going to play this bold and opinionated, courageous but naive young woman, whose curiosity and fiery nature get her into big trouble.”