From Teesside to Ted Lasso – Jeremy Swift’s acting journey

It has been confirmed that the 66-year-old actor will return to his role as Leslie Higgins, the club’s mild-mannered director of football operations.

As well as starring on Apple TV in one of the platform’s most streamed shows, the actor has also starred in Downton Abbey as a butler – and he may well be one of Teesside’s most quietly successful exports.

Swift was born in Stockton, the son of two music teachers, in 1960 and grew up in the region before training at the Guildford School of Acting in the late 1970s and early 1980s.

He spent much of the 1980s working almost exclusively in theatre, including stints with Deborah Warner’s Kick Theatre company and the comedy performance-art group The People Show, alongside numerous television commercials.

Building a screen career

Swift’s early screen credits included a notable role in Mike Leigh’s acclaimed 1990 film Life Is Sweet, which brought him critical praise, followed by a memorable villainous turn in 1997’s The Borrowers.

He continued building his profile through the 1990s and 2000s with roles in productions including Dalziel and Pascoe, The Smoking Room and Casualty, as well as film parts in Robert Altman’s Gosford Park and the 2005 adaptation of Oliver Twist, in which he played Mr Bumble.

His profile rose further with roles in Michael Apted’s Amazing Grace and the family favourite Fred Claus, before he became a familiar face to costume drama fans as election agent Glenvil Harris across the final two series of Foyle’s War.

Spratt, Higgins and household names

Swift found wider recognition playing Septimus Spratt, the calculating butler to the Dowager Countess, across three seasons of Downton Abbey – a role that made him a recognisable face on both sides of the Atlantic.

It was his casting as Leslie Higgins, the loyal Head of Football Director at AFC Richmond, in Apple TV’s Ted Lasso that brought Swift his biggest international audience.

The role, which he played across all four seasons of the hit comedy, earned him a Primetime Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series in 2021.

Swift has described Higgins as a character who changed the least over the show’s run, something he considers no bad thing given the warmth audiences felt for him.