Ewan McGregor commits to HBO series

Ewan McGregor has explained his decision to change from making films to working in television.

The actor is to play troubled academic Chip in an HBO pilot The Corrections, which is adapted from Jonathan Franzen's novel.

He told Collider: "We shot the pilot in 15 days [and] I enjoyed it very much.

"If it goes, we'll go back in June and shoot the series for four months in New York."

The Scottish star admitted that initially he was wary about committing to a TV show.

He said: "I did have one week of [saying] 'Oh my God, it's TV... should I do TV?'.

"[But] after I went over to meet the director and Jonathan Franzen and Scott Rudin, the producer, I was totally in. I just think it's a quality piece of work.

"Having the opportunity to play a character at that length will be really interesting. Over four years... I'll be exploring this guy Chip in that story - it'll be great."

McGregor also criticised the movie industry for focusing on ideas "that we already know".

He said: "Films about people in real situations - it's the [genre] that's taking the biggest kicking after the financial crisis.

"It just seems in the last three or four years that it's harder to find that kind of drama.

"The big-budget films are about superheroes or fairytales or [they're] kids' films - branding that we already know. I'm always interested in original stuff."

The Corrections follows the lives of a Midwestern couple and their three children from the 1950s to the millennium.
Source: STV

Also reported by Forbes