Introducing Outlander

The new Starz drama Outlander will debut on August 9 at 9 PM.

The much-anticipated series, which is based on the best-selling novel by Diana Gabaldon and adapted to the small screen by Ronald D. Moore (Battlestar Galactica, Helix and the Star Trek franchise), follows the story of Claire Randall (Caitriona Balfe), a married combat nurse from 1945 who is mysteriously swept back in time to 1743, where she is immediately thrown into an unknown world where her life is threatened. When she is forced to marry Jamie Fraser (Sam Heughan), a chivalrous and romantic young Scottish warrior, a passionate affair is ignited that tears Claire’s heart between two vastly different men in two irreconcilable lives.

The cast of Outlander includes Tobias Menzies in the dual role of Frank Randall, Claire’s husband in 1945 and Jonathan “Black Jack” Randall, a Captain of His Majesty’s Eighth Dragoons in 1743, who is also an enemy of the clan MacKenzie (Jamie’s family); Graham McTavish as Dougal MacKenzie and Gary Lewis as Colum MacKenzie, Jamie’s maternal uncles who are the chieftans of MacKenzie clan. Dougal is the War Chieftan while Colum is the ruling Laird of the clan; however Colum must rely on his brother Dougal to be the true muscle of the clan because he suffers from a condition now known as Toulouse-Lautrec Syndrome, a degenerative disease that renders his legs immobile at times and fills his days with great physical pain and Lotte Verbeek as Geillis Duncan, the wife of the procurator fiscal, Arthur Duncan, who lives in Cranesmuir, a village near Castle Leoch, the homestead of the clan MacKenzie.

The first eight episodes of the 16-episode debut season of Outlander will air consecutively from Saturday, August 9 through Saturday, September 27. Then the show will go on winter hiatus with the remaining eight episodes set to air on Starz in early 2015.