Actor Joe Cole plays sardonic spy Harry Palmer, a British Army sergeant in 1960s Berlin assigned to The Ipcress File. The slick six-part series - debuting in the UK in March and the US in May - is based on Len Deighton’s thriller involving scientists, mind control, and murder. Here are 10 things you may not know about the series and its backstory.
Dr. Frank Olson’s death is one of the most enduring mysteries of the Project MKUltra mind-control experiments. The scientist fell from the window of his New York hotel room in 1953. Decades later, his family discovered the death might not be a suicide. Olson may have been part of a complex tale involving spies, biological weapons, mind control, and murder.
We believe there’s a superhero in each of us - so we’re launching our annual True Superheroes awards to celebrate people who’ve overcome adversity, made amazing contributions to society, and inspired others to do the same. We’ll nominate people in art, sport, music, tech, science and many other fields.
From Killing Eve assassin Villanelle (Jodie Comer) to Jean Courtney (Lucy Boynton) in The Ipcress File, the latest series from 2021 and 2022 are as stylish as they are sinister. So sit back, enjoy the view, and question everything.
British spy writer Len Deighton created a new breed of rebel spy - the anti-Bond, anti-establishment, working-class hero who didn’t go to a posh school or join a gentlemen’s club. Much like his iconic character Harry Palmer, Deighton - the son of a chauffeur and a cook - is an outsider on the inside with a talent for trouble.
Film icon Michael Caine debriefs SPYSCAPE on his role as Cockney Cold War spy Harry Palmer in five films that redefined the genre: The Ipcress File (1962), Funeral in Berlin (1964), Billion-dollar Brain (1966), Bullet to Beijing (1995), and Midnight in St. Petersburg (1996).
Six of Deighton’s books have been turned into films but the Brit is certainly not the only espionage writer knighted as Hollywood nobility. SPYSCAPE rounds up 15 of our all-time favorite spy authors and the movies that transformed their prose into pounding thrillers.
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