Roger Cross as Curtis Manning
Agent Curtis Manning was portrayed by Roger Cross on the television series,
24. Prior to working for the Counter Terrorist Unit, Curtis was part of the Boston Police Department’s SWAT team and was enlisted as one of the United States Army’s Green Berets at the time of Operation Desert Storm. He began working with the CTU in its Boston Office, where he was initially a field agent and was eventually promoted to Assistant Director of Field Operations. Manning was a graduate of the University of Massachusetts, where he majored in Sociology.
Before he became the Chief of Staff of CTU- Los Angeles, Manning held the positions of Head of Tactical and Assistant Director of Field of Operations in the same division. When Ronnie Lobell, who had replaced Jack Bauer as the Director of Field Operations, died during one of their missions, Curtis was tasked to take over the directorial duties. Throughout Day 4, Curtis assisted Jack Bauer and facilitated operations that were aimed to catch terrorist Habib Marwan. He also got involved with CTU analyst Marianne Taylor for a short period of time. Marianne was later discovered to be a traitor.
Despite having worked with Jack on Day 4, Curtis started to become suspicious of the former CTU agent and began to link him to the murders of former President David Palmer and Michelle Dessler. However, Curtis found Jack trustworthy again during the Ontario National Airport hostage crisis. At around the same time, Lynn McGill came to CTU- Los Angeles to head the investigation regarding the Sentox nerve gas canisters, but Cutis removed McGill after the latter proved to be mentally unstable.
After Curtis and Jack successfully captured Vladimir Bierko, the terrorist behind the nerve gas attacks, Curtis took Bierko to CTU Medical, and was consequently away from the CTU office when Homeland Security, led by Karen Hayes, took over CTU- Los Angeles. Towards the end of Day 5, Curtis and Jack found out the location of Bierko’s final target.
Curtis was reunited with Jack after the latter was freed from the clutches of the Chinese government. However, shortly after their reunion, Jack was forced to shoot and kill Curtis after Curtis tried to kill former terrorist Hamri Al-Assad, who had been responsible for murdering five of Curtis’ fellow special forces fighters during Desert Storm.
(Photo courtesy of FOX)