"Sex and the City" hits the U.K. in the new BBC America series, "Manchild," about four 49-year-old men living out their shagadelic mid-life fantasies in London.

"Manchild" stars "Buffy the Vampire Slayer"'s ANTHONY STEWART HEAD, NIGEL HAVERS, RAY BURDIS and DON WARRINGTON in a search for love, business and the perfect life. ET caught up with Head to get the scoop on "Buffy"'s upcoming season and his new series.

ENTERTAINMENT TONIGHT: How did "Manchild" come to you?

ANTHONY STEWART HEAD: Initially when the pilot was being put together, I was approached and I couldn't do it because I was doing "Buffy." My first reaction was that I didn't want to do a show about four men getting close to their 50s. It's been done. Who cares? Then it came back when they were changing tack with the character. I read the script and just fell in love with it. I said, "I get it."

ET: How are you like your character, and how are you different?

ANTHONY: He's a millionaire, he's divorced his wife and left his children, and he is having problems. He can't get it up. So thankfully, there aren't too many similarities.

I am approaching 50. I guess all men think this is the lifestyle that they would like to pursue. Ultimately, the success of the series is that you see that the life we're crowing about -- this misogynistic, hedonistic, wild time -- and you learn quite quickly that it's a very hollow life indeed.

And what's fun is watching them going through this. It's men having their fantasies. Consequently, it's great fun. It's full of lots of things that you don't normally see on TV.

ET: How do women react to the show?

ANTHONY: One of the many things we were all nervous about at the beginning was how women would receive the show. We had a screening and brought along our spouses and friends. I was intensely nervous to know how my other half would react. She absolutely loved it. There is something about it where women recognize the fact that we are complete "tossers."

ET: Do you think next year will be the last year of "Buffy"?

ANTHONY: It is supposed to be. SARAH MICHELLE GELLAR's contract finishes. JOSS WHEDON needs to move on and work on other stuff. Ultimately, I think it would be good to go out a winner. There are several side bets going down about offshoots, but whatever Joss chooses to do will be born out of wanting to move on and make the best decision. Joss would never be in the position where he got tired of something and threw in the towel. The way he works is to make exciting TV.

[Note: Teeny spoiler removed - full article @ ETOnline]

ET: Any idea of how you would like to see it end?

ANTHONY: I know what Joss has in mind, but I am not going to tell you.

ET: Do you agree with it?

ANTHONY: Yes. It is brilliant.

ET: Will it be open-ended so you can do "Buffy" movies?

ANTHONY: Joss wants to make a movie. I'd love to make a movie. I don't think Sarah does at the moment, but who knows what is going to happen in two years' time. Joss' imagination is so wild, fertile and unstoppable, you know whatever it is going to be is cool.

[Note: another spoiler removed]

ET: Joss and you have been talking about plans for the BBC series, "Ripper," for quite a while now. Is it going to happen?

ANTHONY: Yes. Somewhere down the line. Joss really wants to do it. JANE ASPENSEN [Note: "Espenson"] has already written one script, and they are talking about putting six scripts together. But the main thing that happened is FOX came to Joss and said, "Do you have any uplifting, homegrown patriotic stories? He said, "Well, I have a show about deep space." They said, "We'll have that." So now he is prepping the first episode of "Firefly." It is quite a workload. There has also been a change of show runners on "Buffy," so he has quite a bit on his plate right now. It suits me because I have a fair amount on mine. I think possibly sometime next year, 2003-2004.

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