How 'A Gentleman in Mosvow' TV Show Is Different From the Book (2024)

In the 1932 all-star film Grand Hotel, a sage observer of the human condition intones “What do you do in the Grand Hotel? Eat. Sleep. Loaf around. Flirt a little, dance a little. A hundred doors leading to one hall…And when you leave, someone occupies your room…that's the end.”

Well, maybe at that hotel. A similar course of events, albeit with higher political stakes, unfolds at Moscow’s Hotel Metropol, home (and prison) to another sage observer of the human condition—the aptly named Count Alexander Ilyich Rostov, a patronymic which is the first of many tips of the hat to Tolstoy.

Count Rostov was first introduced to audiences in Amor Towles’ 2016 boffo bestseller A Gentleman in Moscow. Now, it’s been adapted into a Showtime limited series and the eponym is played with old-world panache, charm, and sparkle by a mustachioed Ewan McGregor.

In both iterations of A Gentleman in Moscow, you’ll find much to marvel at. But, it’s not all joy. There is death, contemplation of suicide, famine, the onset of war and other very heavy topics especially given the news today. But coupled with that, and embodied by the singular Count Rostov, is a commitment to finding beauty in the commonplace. That even amidst sadness and privation, there is a persistent glimmer of possibility to cling to. Start by reading and watching the life of Count Rostov unfold. By the time you’re done, you’ll want to, as he does, reach for Tolstoy.

There are, of course, differences between the book and the limited series—and some are of greater import than others. Here are the most important.

Adapt or Die

Mary Elizabeth Winstead as Anna Urbanova in A Gentleman in Moscow.

Both the novel and the series, airing now, begin with Count Rostov as he is charged by a Bolshevik tribunal with house arrest. Fortunately for him, the luxurious Hotel Metropol is home. Unfortunately, the suite he has long been accustomed to is swapped for a very small room, many stories up, at the top of the hotel. Over the course of eight episodes, and several decades, we watch as his life changes inexorably, with the introduction of surprise, surveillance, comedy, catastrophe, and, most unexpectedly, love.

The fidelity to the novel, unspooled over each episode, is really quite something. As you might expect, that fidelity is best exhibited by the attention paid to the hotel. I’m not the only one who felt that way. I had a chance to ask Amor Towles, who is also an executive producer on the series, about his thoughts.

“When I visited the set in Manchester, England for the first time last March, I was a little anxious," he says. "I was met in the parking lot by Sam [Miller, a director and executive producer], Ben [Vanstone, writer] and the production designer, Victor Molero, who wanted to personally introduce me to the set. Entering the vast sound stage… we turned a corner and found ourselves before the façade of the Metropol. We passed through the revolving doors. And looking around the beautifully realized lobby, my first thought was: Everything is going to be just fine.”

Who’s That in the Painting?

A view of Count Rostov’s room in the Hotel Metropol, where a portrait of his sister—who plays a larger role in the novel—is on display.

In the book, Rostov carries regret over the death of his sister, which occurred while he was exiled from Russia after defending her honor in a duel. She, and her legacy, are also featured far more prominently within the pages. There are toasts on the anniversary of her death, frequent reminiscences and an unshakeable grip of guilt around Rostov’s heart. In the show, she is the stuff of indeterminate flashbacks and the subject of a painting which resides in Rostov’s room. "To have one’s book taken up by a large and talented team who share the aim of faithfully translating your story to a visual medium, that’s a whole different level of having a life beyond the binding," Towles says. "Needless to say, it was an exciting development."

A Color-Conscious Cast

Lyes Salem as Andrey with Ewan McGregor in A Gentleman in Moscow.

The Metropol is peopled with a variety of characters who come in and out of Rostov’s life as time passes. In the series, they are brought to vivid life by a cast that reflects the world we live in more than the one of period Russia. This is most evident in three of the characters who enrich Count Rostov’s life at the Metropol: Fehinti Balogun who plays Rostov’s longtime friend Mishka, Marina as played by Leah Harvey and Andrey, touchingly brought to life by Lyès Salem.

Wait, He Still Has a Mustache?

One different between A Gentleman in Moscow the book and its small-screen adaptation? The fate of the title character’s impressive mustache.

See Also

A Gentleman in Moscow: Limited Series | Rotten Tomatoes

Early on in the book, Rostov is accosted in the barber shop and ends up having to cut his mustache as a result. Later, after being seated in the hotel restaurant, a young girl, Nina, the precocious daughter of a diplomat, approaches him and inquires after it. Nina’s acute perception, curiosity and possession of a skeleton key which opens any room in the Metropol bond the two together from that day forward. In the series, he has the whiskers when he meets Nina—but not for too long.

The Truth About Nina

Ewan McGregor as Count Rostov and Alexa Goodall as Nina in A Gentleman in Moscow, streaming now on Showtime and Paramount+.

The young girl with the skeleton key grows from a desire to share mischief to an intense love and trust for Rostov, even as she becomes increasingly pro-Stalin, which is definitely at odds with Rostov. In both the book and the series, Nina leaves her young daughter, Sofia, at the Metropol in order to follow her husband to Siberia, where he is sentenced to a labor camp. Like her mother before her, Sofia and the count became inseparable. Unlike the book, however, we find out explicitly what happened to Nina when we see her body in a mass grave. "Most of the texture of A Gentleman in Moscow springs from the marriage of my imagination with this 30-year interest in Russian culture," Towles says. "In fact, when I began writing the book, I had only been in Russia for a total of 10 days and had never spent the night in the Metropol Hotel. But once I finished the first draft, I flew to Russia and moved into the Metropol where I began the process of revision."

Whose Voice is That?

Daniel Cerqueira as Vasily with Ewan McGregor in A Gentleman in Moscow, the new series based on Amor Towles’s novel.

The book is narrated by an omniscient narrator and peppered throughout with poems and transcripts. The show, however, is narrated by a woman’s voice. It isn’t until the tragic conclusion of the fifth episode that you find out it is a grown-up Sofia who is speaking.