Eddie Izzard’s American TV career is taking off, as his new crime drama has been commissioned for a 13-episode series.

The FX channel has given the green light to The Riches, following a successful pilot ordered in December.

Originally called Lowlife, the show co-stars Minnie Driver as Izzard’s wife. The pair are con artists who find an upper-middle-class family killed in a car accident, and assume their identities in the suburbs.

Production should start in December, with the series due to launch on the Fox-owned cable channel next summer.

FX chief John Landgraf sent the fist cut of the pilot back for re-shoots to lighten the show's tone.

The Riches will be the first family drama for FX, but Landgraf said: ‘albeit a show and a family unlike any television viewers have seen before’.

He added: ‘Izzard is a world-class comedian and here people will see he's a world-class actor.’

Izzard said: '‘I am thrilled, this is the part I have been waiting for all my life '

The show depicts Izzard’s character Wayne Malloy starting his new life with wife Dahlia lead and their three children, after she is released from a two-year prison stint and battles a drug habit.

The comic is also one of the six executive producers on the show.