Matthew Macfadyen to play George Smiley in new John le Carré TV show
Various trade publications including Variety and Deadline reported on Thursday that the 50-year-old Succession star will play le Carré's most famous spook in a TV show called Legacy of Spies, which will draw on storylines from several novels, including The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and The Honourable Schoolboy.
Le Carré's bestselling novels were inspired by the author's own experience of working for British intelligence in the 1950s and 60s.
Some unpublished work by le Carré – the pen name of David Cornwell, who died aged 89 in 2020 – will also be used in the show, Variety reported.
Legacy of Spies – drawing on the title of the final Smiley novel, A Legacy of Spies – will be produced by The Ink Factory, a production company founded by two of le Carré's four sons, Stephen and Simon Cornwell. The Cornwells also produced the award-winning adaptation of his novel The Night Manager, and are currently working on two sequel series to the hit show.
If Legacy of Spies goes ahead, Macfadyen – known for his performances as Tom Wambsgans in Succession and Mr Darcy in Pride and Prejudice – will join hallowed ranks: Gary Oldman, Rupert Davies, Alec Guinness and Denholm Elliott have all portrayed Smiley on screen. A middle-aged, podgy, balding man described by his own wife as 'breathtakingly ordinary', Smiley is also a ruthlessly clever spymaster working in the British secret service during the cold war.
'Short, fat, and of a quiet disposition, he appeared to spend a lot of money on really bad clothes, which hung about his squat frame like skin on a shrunken toad,' le Carré wrote in the first Smiley novel, Call for the Dead. Playing short might be a challenge for Macfadyen, who is 1.91 metres tall.
Le Carré was very fond of Guinness's portrayal of Smiley in 1979's Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and 1982's Smiley's People, once saying that he 'so beautifully represented Smiley and left the character intact'. He also reportedly enjoyed Oldman's 'beautiful performance' in the 2011 Tinker Tailor. But a sequel starring Oldman was reportedly blocked by le Carré's sons, with Oldman's manager Douglas Urbanski telling the Radio Times in September: 'We've reached out … to le Carré's sons and – the damnedest thing – they have no interest in Gary playing Smiley again. I don't know why.'
The explanation may well be the new show, which Variety reports has already been shopped around to various interested buyers in the US and UK.
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