Claire Danes Filming Showtime Pilot 'Homeland' in Charlotte, NC

Emmy Award-winning actress Claire Danes is filming a new Showtime pilot called "Homeland" in and around the Charlotte, NC area.

Fox is producing the potential TV series, which also stars British actor Damian Lewis. Lewis is a US Marine named Scott Brody who has spent eight years as a prisoner of war in Iraq and has returned a hero after being presumed dead.

Danes' CIA agent Carrie Anderson, however, suspects that Lewis is not what he seems and is actually plotting a terror attack on the USA.

"The questions is, 'Is he the hero he appears to be?'' said producer Michael Click, veteran of the Fox action drama "24." "It's a little bit of a whodunit. It has a lot of timely aspects to it, in terms of fears of terrorism, prisoners of war, internal threats to the government. There are a lot of threats explored in a family-drama situation."

So far filming for the "Homeland" pilot has taken place in the Mountainbrook neighborhood in south Charlotte.

Click said Fox picked North Carolina to film the pilot in part because the state offered better tax breaks than other locations. The architecture and structure of the south Charlotte area also closely resembles suburban Virginia where "Homeland" is set. Uptown Charlotte could also double as Washington D.C.

"It was a good match," said Click. "It's a very nice downtown - modern, a lot of good looks to it. It doesn't have the broad boulevards that D.C. has but it will make a good double. There are a number of governmental buildings we could use in terms of walk-and-talk conversations. And if you need to go to Washington, it's a two-hour flight up the road."

Casting calls by Fox in the Charlotte area were used to pick hundreds of extras and stand-ins. Filming was shut down for a few days during the winter storm but quickly resumed.

Showtime is likely to make a call on the series in late March and it could end up on the cable network's schedule next fall.

"They decide if they want to produce the show," said Click.

If Showtime picks up the pilot then pre-production would start in April and the crew would begin filming in Charlotte from June to October.

"It's got a good script, good cast, good director, good location," said Click. Claire Danes is a 31-year old actress who has had a series of diverse roles in her career, from staring in the series "My So Called Life" to movies like "Romeo and Juliet" and "Terminator 3."

Danes received a 2010 Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress as Temple Grandin in the HBO film "Temple Grandin" and continues to rack up awards for her work in that biography.