FX ‘The Americans’ have to have every script approved by the CIA before anyone starts acting out a scene.
In case you missed it, the CIA is keeping a close eye on what happens on FX’s The Americans. It isn’t because of the cast and crew or anything like that, but because the creator Joe Weisberg is a former CIA officer and he knows things.
From :
Joe Weisberg worked for the CIA in the early ‘90s, just as the Cold War was ending. He came from a very liberal family, so joining the CIA was a bit of a rebellion. But after some time inside the organization, he started to doubt it. “It was all kind of BS,” he tells Kurt Andersen. “The intelligence they were providing wasn’t worth anything to the U.S. government. But what you did to collect that intelligence was ask people to really risk their lives — for a lot of nothing…
One advantage of making a spy show in the 1980s: no cell phones. “Philip can’t pick up a phone and call Elizabeth and say, get out of there!” Weisberg says. He’s also proud to show off what agents could do in the analog era, when they had to rely more on brains, guile, and sometimes their bodies. But the CIA keeps a close eye on Weisberg’s scripts to make sure that he doesn’t give away tradecraft he learned with the Agency.
Some of the “tradecraft” details are currently reviewed by the CIA becuase they are still in use today. As it is not uncommon for government agencies to provide assistance to TV shows and movies in order to aid in the naturalism and facts. The FBI even provides a guide on how to go about seeking their help and the CIA has their own department to check out scripts.
Discuss this story with fellow Project Casting fans on Facebook. On Twitter, follow us at @projectcasting.
