‘Smash’ Star Jack Davenport Returns to British TV

Jack Davenport in November 2012. (Photo by Evan Agostini/Invision/AP)

His NBC series Smash might be quickly bleeding viewers, but Jack Davenport need not worry: he’s still capable of booking choice parts. Digital Spy reports that he has been cast as the “brilliant but charismatic surgeon Otto Powell” in the new ITV medical drama Breathless, set in the 1960s. It’s being compared to Call the Midwife and takes place in a London hospital-slash-”cauldron of lies, deceptions and guilty secrets, driven by love, ambition and sex.” Sounds a bit like The Hour in scrubs. Shooting begins in April.

After years of feature films (Pirates of the Caribbean) and American TV roles (FlashForward, Swingtown), Breathless will mark Davenport’s return to his British TV roots. The London-born actor helped defined ’90s Britain as the slightly pompous lawyer Miles on the ensemble drama This Life and served as creator Steven Moffat‘s sardonic surrogate Steve on the original British version of Coupling, which ran from 2000 to 2004.

Most recently, Davenport has been a bright spot on the troubled U.S. series Smash as the sleazeball director Derek Wills (while being regularly subjected to atrocities like this):