It is hard to imagine now but 27 years ago Brideshead Revisited – the TV mini-series that launched 1,000 teddy bears on Oxford quads and came 10th in the British Film Institute's 100 greatest television programmes – was on the verge of being canned.

The producers had completed only the first scenes of the planned £11m flagship production before the 1979 technicians' strike brought the independent network to its knees for four solid months.

The original producer was just one casualty of the delays. His replacement, Charles Sturridge, was given a grim ultimatum by Granada bosses in 1980 – get the show back on track in nine days or Brideshead would be cancelled.

There was only one ray of hope that the most expensive production ever mounted by ITV at the time could be resurrected in such a short period – Castle Howard.

The stately home had become available as the location, so Sturridge and his galaxy of stars hot-footed it up to North Yorkshire and stayed, using the Howard family seat not just as a set but a haven where the production team could rescue some kind of shooting schedule from the chaos.

The rest of the story is TV history. But despite the success of Brideshead on the small screen, when Ecosse Film Productions first floated the idea of a film version three years ago, the reaction was surprisingly lukewarm.

Brideshead has always been a knottier story than suggested by the TV version, which dwelt heavily on the champagne-glugging excesses of privileged Oxford undergraduates – central character Sebastian forever with a glass of bubbly in his hand and clutching teddy bear Aloysius.

Set in England between the wars, it is a poignant story of forbidden love and loss of innocence, coupled with the downfall of the English aristocracy, and concentrates on a love triangle between the son of Lord Marchmain, Sebastian Flyte, his friend, Charles Ryder, and Sebastian's sister, Julia.

Ryder is quickly seduced by this world of money and privilege when he becomes a guest at Brideshead. He becomes infatuated with Julia but finds he cannot fit into the Marchmain family because of its deepest bond – overpowering Catholic faith.

Not the sort of story then that is going to spawn the kind of spin-off merchandising of comics, mugs, T-shirts and quilt covers that are so much part and parcel of a blockbuster these days, whatever it does for teddy bear sales.

Producer Robert Bernstein said: "There is always a time when a film comes together. We tried it three years ago and could not make it work."

But in the meantime, Ecosse had been building its reputation. High-quality productions such as Mrs Brown, the acclaimed drama about Queen Victoria's consort, and the war-time resistance thriller, Charlotte Gray, gave the company the financial clout to get Brideshead on the big screen, and the question then was where to shoot it.

Director Julian Jarrold, whose hits include Kinky Boots, the story of how a Northampton shoe factory is saved by producing fetish footwear for cross-dressers, regarded Castle Howard as too steeped in the original TV series for the fresh approach he was planning to the story.

Chatsworth was mooted as a location. The Hon Simon Howard insists the owners were never even approached, but Mr Jarrold does admit to scouting every possible option before being drawn back to Castle Howard.

So far, in the first few days of principal photography, he has had no cause to regret his decision. The size and period charm of the grounds has got him misty eyed. "It is wonderful countryside. You can shoot 360-degree locations, which is rare in a period drama."

So what about the claim that as well as being a suitable backdrop for filming, Castle Howard was also the real-life model for Evelyn Waugh's iconic stately home in the book which spawned the TV series?

Waugh never actually stayed at Castle Howard but used to visit family in the area. The Hon Simon Howard recalls: "My father says that he never met him but at some stage he came over to look at the house."

Certainly, descriptions of Brideshead in the novel bear a striking similarity to the Howard family home. It first appears in the opening of the novel when the narrator, Charles Ryder, finds his unit unexpectedly billeted there in the closing days of the Second World War.

War scenes are beloved of Hollywood these days – so much so that the Disney version of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe opened with a lengthy and elaborate recreation of German bombers blitzing London, something CS Lewis referred to only briefly in the novel.

So it is something of a departure that Brideshead's new producers have ditched the original opening, deciding instead to set the Second World War scenes right at the end of the film.

How the film will start is still a closely guarded secret. The producers have promised that it will be a stunning opening shot, taken from the pages of Waugh, but appearing out of sequence.

Of course, to some purists it is going to seem like meddling. But Mr Jarrold has made something of a name for himself for a racy approach to the classics. Brideshead is unlikely to be an exception and will certainly be a world away from the cosier approach of the TV series.

Mr Jarrold added: "Times have changed. I do not want this to be a soft-focused nostalgia trip. It is a tough dramatic love story and, at times, very uncomfortable."

No-one is actually saying how saucy Brideshead is going to be. But words like "passionate", "realistic", and "15 Certificate" are being bandied around, suggesting that the 2007 version is going to be showing a lot more intimacy than Sebastian cuddling his teddy bear.

Talking of the teddy, what about all the hoo-hah a couple of weeks ago when it was claimed the bear had been axed from the script? "He is there," Mr Jarrold insists. "He is very much not foreground. It's an interesting part of the set."

But John Mortimer says that the bear is vital, because it shows Sebastian's obsession with his own childhood.

"It is an interesting part of the set. But if you put it in people's faces too much, it becomes an obvious simile," he added.

Potentially obvious simile or not, the part has already been filled by an antique bear. The director added with a twinkle in his eye: "In fact, casting him was the most difficult part of the lot."


Brideshead: The facts

Brideshead is an Ecosse Films Production in association with BBC Films, 2 entertain, the UK Film Council's Premier and Development Funds, Screen Yorkshire, and Miramax Films, who will distribute the film in North America and the UK through BVI for 2 entertain. Worldwide sales are being handled by Dreamachine.

The cast is led by Matthew Goode (Match Point) as Charles Ryder, Ben Whishaw (Perfume: The Story of a Murderer) as Sebastian Flyte, and Hayley Atwell (Cassandra's Dream) as Julia Flyte.

Emma Thompson and Michael Gambon play Lord and Lady Marchmain. Ed Stoppard (The Pianist) appears as Bridey Flyte, Felicity Jones (Northanger Abbey TV) as Cordelia Flyte, Jonathan Cake (Mosley) as Rex Mottram, and Greta Scacchi (The Player, White Mischief) as Cara.

As well as 11 weeks shooting at Castle Howard, principal photography will also include locations in Oxford, London, Venice, and Morocco.

Julian Jarrold (Kinky Boots) directs a script by Andrew Davies (Bleak House TV) and Jeremy Brock (The Last King of Scotland).

Castle Howard and its grounds remain open to the public but visitors may be excluded from some areas during filming.