Cosmo Jarvis was virtually unknown to audiences prior to his casting in the miniseries Shōgun, in which Jarvis plays John Blackthorne, an English sailor who unexpectedly lands on the shores of feudal Japan in 1600. However, Jarvis’s newness has enabled Shōgun, which is based on James Clavell’s epic 1975 novel of the same name, to take a much broader view of its story than would have been possible if an established star had been cast in the role of Blackthorne.