Television: Overseas Delivery

Becoming a TV star these days takes good looks, strong acting chops and a lot of luck.

It also helps to carry a foreign passport.

Of the more than two dozen scripted series scheduled to premiere on the networks this season, almost half have provided lead roles to performers hailing from Europe and Australia and having little to no prior experience in the United States.

Some industry insiders chalk up the trend to coincidence, but the pressure on executives to discover fresh faces, the decline of juicy opportunities overseas and the shrinking of our world appear to be playing a part in Hollywood's foreign love affair.

Not that you could tell by the way these newcomers talk.

Many speak in crisp American accents which suggest that their only international ties are a passion for French fries.

"It seems like these actors from Britain and Australia just kind of effortlessly do these accents to the point where you say, 'Let them be American. What's the difference?' said Darren Star, who cast England's Frances O'Connor and Australia's Miranda Otto as die-hard New Yorkers in his upcoming ABC series, "Cashmere Mafia."They fall into it so naturally."

Shows are hesitant to allow these "out-of-towners" to speak in their homegrown accents, if only because it forces them to provide a possibly confusing back story. NBC's "Journeyman," which stars Scot Kevin McKidd, asks the audience to believe that a San Francisco journalist can travel back in time. That's apparently a lot easier than trying to explain where he got that brogue.

"It's just another hurdle you have to jump over," McKidd said.

Fortunately, this breed is more than prepared to slip into a new voice. Michelle Ryan, imported from England to take on the title role in NBC's "The Bionic Woman," said nailing our speech patterns is all part of making it big.

"I started working on mine a few years ago because I always hoped I would have an opportunity over here," said the 23-year-old actress.

Ryan and her peers are more eager than ever to come stateside at a time when great parts in their native countries have gotten scarcer.

"In England, our country isn't putting any money into film. We don't really have an industry there anymore," said Sophia Myles, who plays a vampire in CBS' "Moonlight."As an actor, you have to travel where the work is. So here I am."

Yvonne Strzechowski, who portrays a government agent in NBC's "Chuck," said the same thing is happening in her native country.

"The Australia film and television industry is dying a bit," she said. "A lot of Australians are coming over here for that reason."

No single show can take credit for the Flight of the Foreigners, but Fox's "House" comes close. The Emmy-nominated drama took England's Hugh Laurie, a BBC star, and turned him into the most popular all-American grouch since Archie Bunker.

"What drew me, and what's drawing them, is a stunning script," Laurie said. "It could have been a Latvian circus piece. It didn't really matter in that regard. It's sort of like sprinkling bread crumbs. Actors will flock to stunning pieces of writing, and I suspect that's what happened."

CBS entertainment president Nina Tassler said she hears the same reasoning from a lot of international talent.

"You've got actors overseas watching our shows that are really, really impressed with the quality and want to throw their hats in the rings," she said. "I really believe that's what it is."

Just as actors look more and more to America, networks are also expanding their horizons. David Nutter, who directed the pilot of the upcoming Fox series "The Sarah Connor Chronicles," starring Brit Leana Headey, said fare on BBC America and HBO series such as "Rome" have helped fatten casting agents' Rolodexes.

"These wonderful actors from abroad are getting more notice, and people can say, 'Oh, look at this person. Let's try to get them on this show,'" he said.

That was certainly the case with Ryan, a nobody in the States, but a familiar talent in Europe thanks to the international phenomenon "The EastEnders."

But producers didn't pick her because they were obsessed with that soap opera. They fell for her over an audition via the Internet.

"It's the worst way to cast because you're looking at someone on a tiny screen, but there was something about her that sort of grabbed you through that screen and made you pay attention to her," said David Eick, co-creator of "The Bionic Woman."

Adhir Kalyan also owes a lot to the computer. When producers of CW's "Aliens in America" were having a hard time finding someone to play a Pakistini exchange student, they called a casting agency in London. The agency zapped over a tape of the South African native, who was then living in England.

"We watched his audition on a postage-stamp size image on our screen back here in Los Angeles and we immediately knew we had found the guy that we were looking for," said "Aliens" co-creator David Guarascio. "It's an amazing invention, that Internet."

Technology, dwindling opportunities elsewhere and the excitement of tapping fresh sources all provide plausible explanations for the influx of foreign actors, but England's Damian Lewis, star of NBC's "Life," may have the simplest and best theory of them all.

"Why are there are a lot of Brits over here? Because you keep asking us," he said. "Thank you very much."

njustin@startribune.com • 612-673-7431