'Downton Abbey' Season 6 Release Date News: Hit Drama Ending After 6th Season, Starts November 2015

"Downton Abbey," the hit British period drama will end after its sixth season, but there is a possibility that a movie version will be made. "I think our feeling is that it's good to quit while you're ahead," Executive Producer Gareth Neame said in a recent conference call with reporters.

The sixth and final season of "Downton Abbey" will start airing in November 2015.

Creator and writer Julian Fellowes told Reuters he is nearly done with writing Season 6, and he already knows how everything will wrap up in the drama about an aristocratic British family in the early 20th century.

"We wanted to close the doors of Downton Abbey when it felt right and natural for the storylines to come together and when the show was still being enjoyed so much by its fans," said Neame.

"We can promise a final season full of all the usual drama and intrigue, but with the added excitement of discovering how and where they all end up."

Peter Fincham, ITV's director of television, said the nine-episode sixth series would come to an end with a "concluding special" on Christmas Day.

As to whether there will be spin-offs in the works, Neame said there are no plans. However, he did not deny that there may be a Downton Abbey movie in the future.

The story of "Downton Abbey" began with the loss of the Downton heirs in the sinking of the Titanic. It journeyed through the devastation wrought by World War I, the ever-changing upstairs-downstairs class divisions, the establishment of women's rights, struggles with homosexuality and the diminishing affluence of Britain's landed gentry.

Set in Highclere Castle in Berkshire, England, the series has become one of the biggest international hits for British TV, watched all over the world, with U.S. viewership surpassing expectations.

The cast includes Hugh Bonneville and Elizabeth McGovern, who play the Earl and Countess of Grantham since the show began in 2010. Maggie Smith plays the Dowager Countess of Grantham, the Earl, Robert Crawley's mother. Laura Carmichael plays Lady Edith Crawley.