Meghan in talks for role in Netflix series The Gentlemen, BBC understands

The Duchess of Sussex is in talks to return to acting with a role in Netflix series The Gentlemen, the BBC has learned.

Discussions are in their early stages but this would be Meghan's first significant acting role since her marriage to Prince Harry.

Much of the two previous series of The Gentlemen, which was created by Guy Ritchie, have been filmed in the Cotswolds - the area it is rumoured Harry and Meghan will set up home when they return to the UK later this month.

The Gentlemen, starring the actor Theo James, is a comedy series about a duke who becomes a drug baron.

The details of the discussions and any role Meghan might be offered have not yet been revealed.

Actors Hugh Bonneville and Vinnie Jones have appeared in previous series of the show.

Meghan was best known in acting for her part in the US legal drama, Suits, in which she played lawyer, Rachel Zane, for seven seasons. Her last episode aired in 2018.

The duchess put her career on hold after her marriage to Prince Harry in May 2018. At the time, she told the BBC she did not view quitting acting as giving anything up, but rather as "a new chapter".

She recently returned to acting for the first time in nearly a decade, with a cameo as herself in forthcoming comedy Close Personal Friends, which stars Lily Collins and Brie Larson.

A return to acting could be lucrative for Meghan. The BBC understands that while based in the UK she also hopes to expand the global reach of her US-based lifestyle and cooking brand, As Ever.

News of her possible return to acting comes after it was announced that Prince Harry and Meghan are to move back to the UK.

The BBC understands Prince Harry and Meghan intend to relocate from the US later this month to a private, non-royal residence outside London, as first reported by the Daily Telegraph and the Sun.

The couple's children, Prince Archie, seven, and Princess Lilibet, five, are enrolled to start at a British school in September.

There are no current plans for either Prince Harry or Meghan to resume their roles as working royals.

Their plan to move to the UK follows a visit in July by Prince Harry, Meghan and their children to see King Charles III at his Highgrove home in Gloucestershire.

It was the first time the King had seen his grandchildren in person in more than four years, and the couple's first visit to the UK together since 2022.

Returning on a longer term basis has reignited questions over the level of the couple's publicly funded security in Britain.

Their UK security was downgraded after they stopped being working royals in 2020 and moved to the US, where they have paid for their own protection.

The Royal and VIP Executive Committee (Ravec), an independent body overseen by the Home Office, will now have to make a new decision about security as previous arrangements were based on the Sussexes not living in the UK permanently.