Simon Ings

All successful spies need to be good actors

The ability to adopt a fictional persona, learn a script or improvise are as important in espionage as in the theatre, say Christopher Andrew and Julius Green

Greta Garbo as Mata Hari in the 1931 film directed by George Fitzmaurice. [Alamy]

  • Stars and Spies: Intelligence Operations and the Entertainment Business

    Christopher Andrew and Julius Green

    The Bodley Head, pp. 512, £20

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