Watch out for Dennis the Menace:

Deadly new role for Dennis Quaid.

“Nobody gets out alive,” says Michael Lennox, the character played by Hollywood star Dennis Quaid in a typically disturbing scene from the second series of SoHo’s Fortitude, a drama that is darker than the Arctic Circle during winter.

Welcome back to Fortitude, the northernmost town in the world. Situated on Svalbard, a Norwegian archipelago in the Arctic Ocean, it has a population of just 300 people and 700 polar bears, but it is rapidly turning into the murder capital of the world.

In the second series of Simon Donald’s intriguingly complex and beautifully photographed drama,

Fortitude is once again in the grip of tumultuous events, after a new murder shocks the close-knit Arctic community and throws it into fresh disarray.

Quaid, 62, a super keen golfer, says he had no hesitation about accepting the role of Lennox in the second series, which also stars new

cast members Michelle Fairley (Game Of Thrones,) Parminder Nagra (The Blacklist), Robert Sheehan (Misfits) and Ken Stott (The Missing).

“I watched the first season all at once and was so taken by the story and I just wanted to be a part of it. It was an easy yes for me.”

The actor, who has starred in such memorable Hollywood movies as The Right Stuff, The Big Easy, Enemy Mine, Great Balls Of Fire!, Wyatt Earp, Frequency, Any Given Sunday and Far From Heaven, reveals that his character in Fortitude, “Has always been living on the island. He is a fisherman. His wife is dying of Lou Gehrig’s disease and his whole quest is to save her.”

But when pressed for further revelations about the plot, Quaid’s lips are sealed.

Despite having to work in a remote, storm-tossed location, Quaid did not let this prevent him from indulging his passion for golf.

“I did play there,” reveals Quaid, who also had a memorable role as President Bill Clinton in The Special Relationship.

“But let me tell you about the eighth hole. It’s very interesting. A river came through and washed the green out and all that was left was mud.

“So they stuck a flag on a stick, and then they made a mound of sticks and rocks to prop it up.”

True golfers would never let anything as minor as a flooded course get in the way of playing a round.

Fortitude is as black as night, but Quaid says that in future he would be happy to do something which overturns his threatening “Dennis the Menace” image.

“I love stupid, silly comedy. I don’t know why I haven’t been put in more. That’s really where I shine.”

Quaid, who also has a starring role in the CBS period crime drama Vegas, thinks that shows such as

Fortitude underline that we are in a golden age of TV right now.

“What’s going on in TV now is what was happening in the movies back in the 1970s.

“It feels like the inmates have taken over the asylum. It’s great how you can develop a character over several seasons or episodes. You don’t have to spill your guts all in one scene.”

The actor adds that, “It’s like making an elongated movie. It’s all about binge watching. Everybody’s becoming guilty of that. It’s the thing to do. There’s a lot of insomnia and a lot of sleep deprivation going on in this country now because of binge watching. “I really discovered that with

Breaking Bad because I had never seen it and it was almost over. I watched all four seasons in two weeks with my wife, laying in bed. What could be better?”

Next up, Quaid is reprising his role as Samuel Brukner, a libidinous real estate tycoon with a fabulous art collection in The Art Of More, a drama about the shenanigans at a fictional auction house.

The actor, who also acts as executive producer on the show, admits that when he was developing the character in 2015, he did not have to look too far for inspiration for the character of Brukner.

“The comparison to Donald Trump in 2015 was very obvious.

“My character was running for governor at the time when Donald Trump announced he was running for President, and the words that were coming out of his mouth sounded like my dialogue.

“I guess we were getting something right there.”

“I love stupid, silly comedy. I don’t know why I haven’t been put in more. That’s really where I shine.” – Dennis Quaid