All this romping? It’s so exhausting!

DOMINIC COOPER didn’t know whether to be flattered or insulted when he was first approached about portraying the louche second earl of rochester ten years ago.

‘they said: “you simply must play this part!” ’ Cooper recalled.

‘Whenever someone says that to me, i wonder what they’re insinuating,’ the dashing actor said, straight-faced, before bursting into laughter.

Cooper, who was in the original company of the History Boys at the national theatre (he reprised his role of dakin on Broadway and later on the big screen), read up on John Wilmot, earl of rochester, over the years and enjoyed the tales of his bawdy antics.

now, he’s ready to portray him in stephen Jeffreys’ play the Libertine, which will run at the theatre royal, Bath, for two weeks from August 31. it will move to the theatre royal, Haymarket from september 22 for ten weeks.

By that time, Cooper may well be worn out. He smiled and said that after he did the photographic session (left) for the play — with three actresses in his arms — he felt ‘exhausted’.

‘i like Wilmot’s outlook on life,’ he said. ‘He decided that the country had been through enough repression, so he was going to have a good time. He hit the bottle and was constantly rollicking around. As a consequence, he became ill very quickly. But i believe he enjoyed the sensation of trying everything.’

Cooper lamented the fact that he hasn’t been on stage since he appeared with Helen Mirren in Phedre at the national theatre back in 2009.

He has been shooting movies and tV dramas (he can be seen now in the second season of Agent Carter, on Fox uK, as playboy inventor Howard stark opposite Hayley Atwell).

this weekend he goes to new Mexico to work on a new series, Preacher, playing a minister who returns to his rather corrupt, dysfunctional texas town.