Freddie Prinze Jr. joins cast as head of CTU Field Ops

Sources said Prinze is joining the cast of Fox’s “24” as a regular, playing Davis Cole, a recently returned Marine who runs CTU Field Ops and wants to follow in Jack Bauer’s (Kiefer Sutherland) footsteps.

On the real-time drama, whose upcoming eighth season started production Wednesday, Prinze joins fellow new cast additions Anil Kapoor, who plays a Middle East leader; Chris Diamantopoulos, as the president’s new chief of staff; and John Boyd as a CTU systems analyst. All of them are regulars, while Jennifer Westfeldt has come aboard as a recurring, playing a a journalist.

Also cast as a recurring on the 20th TV/Imagine series is Nazneen Contractor as Kapoor’s daughter.

Prinze, repped by ICM and Brillstein, recently co-starred on the ABC comedy pilot “No Heroics.”