Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes has addressed Dan Stevens's rumoured exit from the series.

Stevens - who plays Matthew Crawley on the hit period drama - will reportedly depart Downton in 2013 following the fourth series premiere.

"Sometimes actors feel they want to move on," Fellowes told Entertainment Weekly. "Initially, for the first two or three [seasons] you can contract them, but after that, every season, you have to re-contract them.

He added: "If they don't want to come back, there's nothing we can do."

However, Fellowes insisted that he will not recast the role of Matthew should Stevens ultimately opt to quit Downton.

"I can't see us doing that," said the Oscar-winning writer.

Fellowes also claimed that the recently-confirmed fourth series of Downton Abbey will likely pick up soon after the events of series three's finale.

"I think we'll go on jogging quite happily through the '20s," he revealed. "You know there's always a little time jump. We did two years between [seasons] one and two because we only wanted to spend two years in the war so we had to start halfway through the war. Now we don't have those imperatives."

Downton Abbey will return to ITV1 this Christmas for a festive special, with the full fourth series following next year. In the US, the third run will debut on PBS on January 6.

【英劇快訊】熱門英劇《唐頓莊園》已經(jīng)獲得了第四季預定，但關于飾演劇中重要角色Matthew Crawley 的演員丹·史蒂文斯退出傳聞一直喧囂塵上。近日該劇的編劇朱利安·費羅斯在訪談中就談到了這個問題。

朱利安·費羅斯表示，就算丹·史蒂文斯真的退出該劇，他也不打算換角色，找其他的演員來飾演Matthew 這一角色。此外他還證實第四季不會發(fā)生太大的時間跳躍。

此外，英國國寶級演員瑪吉·史密斯（Maggie Smith）在《唐頓莊園》中飾演老爵爺遺孀的角色，此前一直有傳聞稱瑪吉·史密斯會因為身體狀況退出，但朱利安·費羅斯承諾：無論瑪吉·史密斯去留，她的角色永遠不會被“寫死”。

《唐頓莊園》將在12月25日圣誕節(jié)當天播出2小時的圣誕特集。