Our eyes met across a crowded room. Actually, it was a foyer. My wife, who can spot a celeb­rity at 100 metres, had identified Ioan Gruffudd at the Playhouse, QPAC, on opening night of last year’s Brisbane Festival. “That’s Hornblower,” she said, and when I looked at the tall, rather dashing bloke standing nearby, I realised she was right.

So, being a bit forward, I caught his eye (he noticed me staring at him, that is) and then wondered over. “Hornblower, I presume?” I said. Gruffudd smiled and ­nodded. “That was a long time ago,” he replied. “Yes, but it was memorable,” I said, explaining it was my wife who had recognised him and he seemed chuffed at that.

The 44-year-old Welsh actor with the tricky name (it’s pronounced Yo-an Grih-fith) played officer Horatio Hornblower in the acclaimed historical naval television drama Hornblower (1998-2003). It was his breakthrough role and he says he’s still recognised for that part, ­although he was also in 1997’s Titanic (he played Fifth Officer Harold Lowe) and 2001’s Black Hawk Down (Lt. John Beales). He also played former British PM Tony Blair in the 2008 film W., about George W. Bush.

Younger viewers will know him as Mr Fantastic (Reed Richards) in the 2005 movie Fantastic Four and its 2007 sequel, Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer.

“But when I go to those weekend comic book ­conventions in the US on the back of Fantastic Four, I still get all these people wanting to have their photo taken with Hornblower,” Gruffudd explains over the phone from his home in Los Angeles. He’s back there now with wife Alice Evans and daughters Ella, 8, and Elsie, 4, but he confesses he’d love to still be in Brisbane where he spent half of last year shooting Harrow, a gritty new TV series starting next week, about a brilliant forensic ­pathologist who lives on a yacht on the Brisbane River.

Gruffudd has high hopes for the series. “I’m going to London to help promote it as they are trying to sell it worldwide,” he says. “And I will be coming back to Australia to help promote it there too. We will wait and see what the response is but I hope it’s a success because I want to come and shoot a second series. I’ve signed on for three years.”

Gruffudd, who played a vaguely similar role in the 2014-15 US TV series Forever (he was a New York City medical examiner), was a rather ubiquitous presence while shooting here between July and December last year. After running into him at the theatre, we saw him again a few weeks later at a Brisbane Festival Sunsuper Riverfire cocktail party and he was all smiles, happily posing for photos and being very gracious about all the attention he seemed to be getting. “The people were amazing and I fell in love with Brisbane,” Gruffudd says. “And you have the best coffee in the world.” He says he was charmed and faintly amused by the ­“incredulity” that greeted him at times. People seemed surprised to have a Hollywood star in their midst and there were, he says, more than a few double-takes. “Everyone was just so nice and happy to see me.”

Gruffudd had previously been based on the Gold Coast briefly while starring in two movies – Sanctum (2011) and San Andreas (2015),which featured southeast Queensland locales. The difference was that in the disaster movie San Andreas, in which he played Daniel Reddick, a wealthy real estate developer, the location was supposed to be California. In Harrow, Brisbane stars as Brisbane and in some scenes, with the river shimmering in the sunset or with the CBD ­glittering by night, you almost expect the anthemic Love You Brisbane song to swell up from the background. But it’s not that sort of show, and is darkish by nature.

Gruffudd’s character, Dr Daniel Harrow, has a complicated professional and personal life – a broken marriage, a troubled relationship with his daughter. His work has him delving into the seamier side of the River City. He also has his dark secrets and the first episode sets him up as a conflicted individual.

BRISBANE HAS A CO-STARRING ROLE

Harrow, which also stars a string of Australian ­actors (there’s the obligatory role for Gary Sweet, for example), was co-created by Brisbane writer Stephen M. Irwin and producer Leigh McGrath. Irwin is unapologetic about making Brisbane a major character. “There is an old writing axiom that says write what you know,” Irwin says. “I have lived in ­Brisbane almost all my life and it was a real no-brainer for me to want to set this show in Brisbane. Because I know it, I know its attractive parts, I know its darker side. And the river that runs through it is visually ­fascinating and plays a strong part in Harrow.”

Gruffudd says he was instantly attracted to the role. “Harrow’s a stunningly complex character,” he says. “He’s eccentric, bright, he’s very learned. He’s also ­incredibly passionate, slightly quirky, stuck in his ways, belligerent, Stephen has written an incredibly three-dimensional character that you could really get your teeth into.” And it’s the sort of role he says he is now more qualified to play. “I wouldn’t have looked the part a few years ago and wouldn’t have had the ­experience,” he says. “Now, being older and a dad and having gone through a lot, I’m a bit rougher around the edges and have experienced life a lot more. So I’m at the right age, I think, to play Harrow.”

His life experiences include some tough times, which may be why he’s so happy to be making further plans. There was a point in his career a few years ago when the work dried up and he became depressed, ­sitting at home in Los Angeles waiting for the phone to ring. “Yes, there was a time in my career when there wasn’t much forward momentum,” Gruffudd admits. “But it’s always incredible how the universe can ­present you with a gift.”

He says his roles in Sanctum and San Andreas helped break the drought, and then there was his ­acclaimed appearance in ITV’s psychological drama Liar, which screened in Australia on the Seven Network last year. Writer Irwin says finding the right actor to play Harrow was critical and “there were very few people on the list”. “I remember very well the ­Sunday morning when I was on the telephone with Ioan at his home in California, hearing that he’d liked the pilot script,” Irwin says. “I knew that he would be perfect for the role and he’s proved to be.”

For Gruffudd it was a revelation spending half a year in Brisbane, falling in love with a city he reckons he once would have had trouble finding on a map. “Brisbane was a surprise,” he says. “I thought it was much smaller and more provincial but it’s not at all. It has so much energy and vitality, and the people seem very happy and to be enjoying life and the lifestyle.”

As a keen golfer, Gruffudd says he enjoyed playing at Royal Queensland Golf Club (in Eagle Farm) and spent quite a bit of his downtime at the driving range at the Victoria Park Golf Complex (also in Brisbane’s inner north), where he hit balls and posed for happy snaps with fans. Which he didn’t mind at all.

The only negative aspect of his time in Brisbane was being away from his wife and daughters.

“They did come out for a fleeting visit but couldn’t spend too much time here because of school,” Gruffudd says. “I wished they could have been here with me for the whole time. It was great fun when the kids ­arrived … (but) heartbreaking when they left.” ■

EPISODE 1 OF HARROW SCREENS ON ABC-TV ON FRIDAY AT 8.30PM