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Critically acclaimed US comedy Nurse Jackie is to be screened for the first time on UK television on ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Two and ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Four early next year.

This highly anticipated dark comedy stars multi Emmy and Golden Globe award winner Edie Falco (The Sopranos) as the title character, Nurse Jackie Peyton, a strong-willed nurse in a New York City emergency room.

Janice Hadlow, Controller, ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Two, says: "It's great to be able to bring one of the best quality, intelligent US comedies featuring actors of the very highest calibre to a discerning British audience."

A lapsed Catholic with a weakness for prescription drugs, Jackie keeps the hospital balanced with her own kind of justice.

Every day is a fine juggling act of balancing the needs of her patients, doctors, fellow nurses, and her own indiscretions.

Fellow nurse Mohammed "Mo-mo" de la Cruz (Haaz Sleiman, The Visitor), hilariously droll Brit Dr Eleanor O'Hara (two-time Tony nominee Eve Best) and pharmacist Eddie Walzer (Paul Schulze, Laws Of Gravity, 24) are her confidantes, while impressionable first-year student Zoey Barkow (Merritt Wever, Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip), and seemingly perfect Dr Fitch Cooper, aka "Coop" (Peter Facinelli, Twilight, Damages), are sent to test her.

By-the-book ER Administrator Gloria Akalitus (Anna Deavere Smith, (The West Wing, The American President) is Jackie's boss/nemesis.

The first season also boasts several notable guest stars including Eli Wallach, Swoozie Kurtz, Blythe Danner and Victor Garber.

Sue Deeks, Head of Programme Acquisitions, ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳, secured the rights from CBS Studios International.

She says: "Nurse Jackie is at turns outrageous, heartbreaking and funny – Edie Falco brings to life a compelling, complicated character that I'm sure ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ viewers will warm to and want to get to know better."

When Nurse Jackie premiered on Showtime, a premium TV network in the US, it became the channel's most successful new series ever and was renewed for a second season after only one episode.

The series was created by Liz Brixius, Linda Wallem and Evan Dunsky, with Wallem and Brixius also serving as executive producers with John Melfi and Caryn Mandabach.

The series is directed by Alan Coulter, Steve Buscemi, Craig Zisk, Scott Ellis and Paul Feig and is a co-production of Showtime Networks Inc and Lionsgate.

TD