Release

SHOWTIME TO PRODUCE NEW DOCUMENTARY THE SPYMASTERS AIRING NOVEMBER 28TH AT 9 PM ET/PT

Documentary Pulls Back The Curtain On The World’s Most Powerful And Secretive Spy Agency

And Features Interviews With All Twelve Living Directors Of The CIA

Narrated by HOMELAND’s Mandy Patinkin

LOS ANGELES, CA, August 11, 2015 – Shrouded in controversy and secrecy, the Central Intelligence Agency is the world’s most powerful and clandestine spy agency.  On November 28th at 9 p.m. ET/PT, under the SHO: CLOSE UP banner, SHOWTIME will present THE SPYMASTERS, a gripping documentary looking inside the workings of the CIA and talking candidly to the men who ran it.  For the first time ever, all twelve living directors of the CIA, and the agency’s top operatives, have given remarkable, introspective interviews and unprecedented access to America’s spy network.  THE SPYMASTERS is written by multi-Emmy® Award and Peabody winner Chris Whipple  (The President’s Gatekeepers) and directed by Gédéon Naudet and Jules Naudet  (the Emmy and Peabody Award-winning film 9/11).  Gédéon Naudet, Jules Naudet, Chris Whipple, Pulitzer Prize winner David Hume Kennerly and multi-Emmy and Peabody Award-winning journalist Susan Zirinsky (9/11, Three Days In September, 48 Hours)  will executive produce in a co-production with CBS News. Emmy and Tony® winner Mandy Patinkin (HOMELAND) will narrate.

The film focuses on the organization during one of the most controversial periods in its history – marked by the use of torture, secret prisons, undeclared war, lethal drone warfare and even an alleged assassination.  It asks the burning questions of our time:  how far should America go to keep us safe from another terrorist attack?  What is considered fair game?  Has the world’s elite spying organization focused on paramilitary operations at the expense of gathering intelligence?  Killing enemy combatants from the air by remotely- piloted aircrafts? Targeting American citizens?  And as the CIA’s deadly drones wage a remote-controlled aerial war, are we losing moral high ground and creating more enemies than we kill? The film will examine the internal debate among the directors about what is ethical and how America should fight to protect its own citizens.

THE SPYMASTERS will reveal never-before-seen footage of directors talking about their failures and previously classified successes.  The memorable and frightening terrorist attacks that each director lived through will be captured in vivid “real-time” as they developed and unfolded.  We will see moments as never before – through the eyes of the very men charged with preventing them.  And we will hear from key critics of the CIA with claims of ineffectiveness, overreaching authority and poor image. 

The main focus of THE SPYMASTERS will be the over 100 hours of intimate and candid conversations and the unprecedented access with the men from the CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia. 

The participants who talk about the human struggles of balancing duty and conscience and the harsh reality of fighting terror are:

 

DIRECTORS:

George H. W. Bush          

Stansfield Turner

William Webster

Robert  Gates

James Woolsey

John Deutch

George Tenet

Porter Goss

Michael Hayden

Leon Panetta

David Petraeus

John Brennan

 

Michael Morell (Acting Director twice)

John McLaughlin (Acting Director once)

 

OPERATIVES:

Cofer Black - Chief of the Counter Terrorism Center 

Jose Rodriguez - Chief of the Counter Terrorism Center

Gina Bennett - Analyst tracking Osama Bin Laden

Bob Baer - Case officer

 

Showtime Networks Inc. (SNI), a wholly-owned subsidiary of CBS Corporation, owns and operates the premium television networks SHOWTIME®, THE MOVIE CHANNEL™ and FLIX®, and also offers SHOWTIME ON DEMAND®, THE MOVIE CHANNEL™ ON DEMAND and FLIX ON DEMAND®, and the network's authentication service SHOWTIME ANYTIME®. Showtime Digital Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of SNI, operates the stand-alone streaming service SHOWTIME®. SNI also manages Smithsonian Networks™, a joint venture between SNI and the Smithsonian Institution, which offers Smithsonian Channel™. SNI markets and distributes sports and entertainment events for exhibition to subscribers on a pay-per-view basis through SHOWTIME PPV. For more information, go to www.SHO.com.

 

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CONTACT:

Jackie Ioachim

212/708-1220

jackie.ioachim@showtime.net

 

 

 

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