Categories A Spy Among Friends Print Media Review

REVIEW: A Spy Among Friends – Don’t Take Your Eyes Off This Star-Packed Espionage Thriller

The Enigma and His Charismatic Traitor

by Rebecca Nicholson | The Guardian  | December 8, 2022

★★★☆☆

The story of the notorious MI6 agent and Soviet spy Kim Philby has been told numerous times before, but A Spy Among Friends (ITVX) has a fresh bash at it, using Ben Macintyre’s book of the same name as its source and inspiration. The stakes are high. This is one of the flagship dramas to launch ITV’s revamped online player and new subscription service. It comes with a starry cast and what should be an irresistible tale of intrigue, double-crossing and suspense, stretched out over multiple locations from Istanbul, Beirut and London to Moscow and Ohio.

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Categories A Spy Among Friends Podcast Video

Guy Pearce Chats About ‘A Spy Among Friends’ on Pilot Podcast

A Decorated Folder for Kim Philby

by Damianista | damian-lewis.com | December 6, 2022

Guy Pearce was Amon  Warmann’s guest on  Pilot Podcast to chat about A Spy Among Friends, the six-part mini-series arriving on the new streaming  platform  ITVX on  December 8. You can see a glimpse from the podcast in  Amon Warmann’s tweet below and you can listen to the podcast in its entirety here.

Categories A Spy Among Friends Interviews Print Media

Damian Lewis on Being Devoted, Loyal and Blinkered in His Latest Role

A Beautiful and Sort of Tragic, Sad Relationship

by Rachael Davies | Herald Scotland | December 6, 2022

A Spy Among Friends’ Damian Lewis and Anna Maxwell Martin tell Rachael Davis about the ITVX series’ true story of espionage and betrayal.

It’s 1963: the height of the Cold War. International politics is fueled by secrecy and duplicity, as psychological warfare, propaganda and espionage – not to mention the latent threat of nuclear attack – keeps world leaders looking over their shoulders and into the shadows.

In England, Nicholas Elliott, played by Damian Lewis, is working for MI6 as an intelligence officer. He has a very close, long-standing friendship with Kim Philby, his colleague in intelligence.

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Categories A Spy Among Friends Print Media Trailer Video

A Spy Among Friends In Dramatic First Look

Exclusive First-Look Clip

by James Hibbs | Radio Times  | December 5, 2022

The launch of ITVX is bringing with it a host of new drama series, with one of the most highly anticipated being the espionage thriller A Spy Among Friends.

The series stars Damian Lewis and Guy Pearce, and dramatises the true story of British spies Nicholas Elliott and Kim Philby, the latter of whom turned out to be a Soviet double agent.

With the show’s debut now just days away, RadioTimes.com has got an exclusive first-look clip from the upcoming series – and it shows things taking a dramatic turn for the two friends.

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Categories A Spy Among Friends Audio Podcast

SpyHards Podcast: A Spy Among Friends

Declassified Preview 

by SpyHards Podcast | Twitter | December 5, 2022

This week’s episode of SpyHards Podcast has Agent Scott and guest operative Jeff Quest from the Spy Write website engage in a little old school espionage while delivering an exclusive declassified preview of the ITVX limited series A Spy Among Friends. In addition to decoding the first two episodes they also talk to author Ben Macintyre and show creator Alex Cary about translating the story from page to screen. Listen to the episode here or any pod app of your choice.

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Categories A Spy Among Friends Print Media

A Spy Among Friends: Kim Philby’s Greatest Betrayal?

A Ruthless MI6 Traitor Ruined the Life of His Closest Colleague

by Ben Macintyre | The Times | December 5, 2022

One winter morning a decade ago, I took a walk on Hampstead Heath with my friend David Cornwell, better known as the novelist John le Carré. I was suffering from what David called “post publicatio tristis”, the strange melancholy that descends after you have published a book and wonder if you will ever write another.

“What is the best unwritten story of the Cold War?” I asked him, blatantly fishing for inspiration.

Without hesitation he replied: “The relationship between Kim Philby and Nicholas Elliott.” I knew of Philby, of course, the notorious KGB spy, but I had never heard of Elliott.<

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Categories A Spy Among Friends Print Media Review

REVIEW: Guy Pearce and Damian Lewis In a Poised Tale of Betrayal

A Spy Among Friends ITV Review: Four Stars

by Dan Einav | Financial Times  | December 5, 2022

★★★★☆

In the second world war, Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) had among their ranks one of the most successful spies in history. Trouble was, Harold “Kim” Philby was so adept at espionage that not only did he deceive his enemies, but also his allies at MI6.

An original series made for ITV’s shiny new streaming service, ITVX, A Spy Among Friends is an carefully crafted intelligence thriller about Philby — the Englishman who was outed as a double agent for the Soviet Union in the early 1960s. Like the recent BBC hit SAS Rogue Heroes, the show is a dramatisation based on an immersive history by the author Ben Macintyre. But where the former was a hot-headed affair, this six-parter is poised, patient and, fittingly for a story largely set during the cold war, touched by a certain froideur.

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Categories A Spy Among Friends Print Media Video

Damian Lewis Opens Up On ‘Hard Decision’ To Cut ‘Masterclass’ A Spy Among Friends Scene

BAFTA Worthy Performances

by Sabrina Barr | Metro  | December 5, 2022

Damian Lewis has opened up on a ‘beautifully written’ scene from his new show A Spy Among Friends that had to be cut in the final edit, which has been dubbed an ‘acting masterclass’.

The upcoming thriller series, which is set to premiere on ITVX this week, is based on a book of the same name, telling the true story of an MI6 agent called Kim Philby who was revealed to be a double agent for the Soviet Union’s KGB at the height of the Cold War.

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Categories A Spy Among Friends Print Media Review

A Spy Among Friends: An Extremely Good Espionage Thriller

“Damian Lewis and Guy Pearce Act Their Socks Off”

by Joel Golby | The Guardian  | December 3, 2022

Double agents are everywhere. Damian Lewis and Guy Pearce act their socks off. But nobody knows what ITVX is – no matter what the secret service say. The thing with A Spy Among Friends is that it’s very good – intricate, deft and thrilling with just the right sort of TV set pieces to keep things rollicking around – but also a lot of it is just “two people having a conversation in a room, both of them smoking in a very 60s way”, and you do have to actively watch it to know what’s going on.

There’s fun old-school espionage and big old-fashioned tape recorders and men in their shirtsleeves sweating in rooms while listening to a bug, and everyone keeps offering each other tea in a way that seems too deliberately innocuous to be anything other than a ruse. Guy Pearce is playing opposite Damian Lewis and they are both acting their absolute heads off, which is always fun. And there is no way this whole thing doesn’t end with a clever twist.

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Categories A Spy Among Friends Audio Podcast

Damian Lewis and Nick Murphy Discuss A Spy Among Friends and More on Empire Film Podcast

“Spies, Breakfasts and Buttocks”

by Chris Hewitt | Empire Online | December 2, 2022

This week’s episode of the Empire Podcast is joined by the brilliant Damian Lewis and Nick Murphy, star and director respectively of the ITVX drama, A Spy Among Friends . Lewis and Murphy occupy the third and fourth chairs with remarkable grace, fielding questions about spies, breakfasts and buttocks, while tackling this week’s listener question, about the best time jumps in movies and TV. Listen to episode #543 via PlanetRadio player here or any pod app of your choice.

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Categories A Spy Among Friends Print Media Review

Saga Magazine Review: A Spy Among Friends

“A Grown Up, Intelligent, Riveting Espionage Tale”

by Benjie Goodhart | Saga Magazine  | December 2, 2022

A Spy Among Friends – Episode 1/6 – Thursday 8th December – ITVX

On the basis of the first episode, A Spy Among Friends is well worth a look. The six-part drama series is based on Ben Macintyre’s bestselling factual account of secret service agent Kim Philby’s 30-year career spying for the Soviet Union, and his defection to the USSR in 1963.

Guy Pearce stars as Philby, and the story primarily centers around his friendship with fellow Secret Intelligence Service spook Nicholas Elliott, played with characteristic aplomb by Damian Lewis. The story jumps backwards and forwards in time (sit up straight and pay attention, this is not one to watch while doing a Su Doku on your phone) but the gist of it is that Elliott feels profoundly betrayed by his erstwhile friend and colleague.

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Categories A Spy Among Friends Poll Print Media

The Seven Best Shows to Stream This Week

A Spy Among Friends

by Phil Harrison | The Guardian  | December 2, 2022

Guy Pearce and Damian Lewis star in a hugely stylish spy drama. A Spy Among Friends about the doomed friendship between spies Nicholas Elliott (Damian Lewis) and Kim Philby (Guy Pearce) is an immersive treat. It’s told via the regretful Elliott’s debriefing by MI5 agent Lily Thomas (Anna Maxwell Martin) after Philby’s treason has been revealed. These jolly good public school chaps are already steeped in British reserve and the art of never quite saying what you mean, which proves to be the perfect preparation for the life of a spy. It was this distance and ambiguity that enabled Philby to infiltrate and nearly destroy their world. A very English betrayal, stylishly rendered.

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