Actress Kim Cattrall, best known for her “Sex in the City” role, will lead the cast of a new BBC podcast that also stars actors Ed Harris and Johnny Flyn. The ten-part audio drama titled Central Intelligence tells the true insider story of the CIA’s early days from the perspective of Eloise Page (Kim Cattrall), who joined on the agency’s first day in 1947 and became one of its most powerful women. Narrating in hindsight, Eloise takes the listener on a journey spanning the staggering world events that shaped her career, as well as portraying her relationships with early CIA leaders, Allen Dulles (Ed Harris) and Richard Helms (Johnny Flynn).
Cattrall calls the podcast a “very well-written, factual and entertaining history” of the CIA. “I was engrossed learning the true story of how this vital agency grew and prospered before and during the Cold War,” she says. “A human story full of false starts, gaffs, blunders, and thankfully triumphs on the world stage.”
The creators say the limited series offers listeners a chance to be a fly-on-the-wall to the heated debates and decisions that shaped world history and continue to have ramifications in the present day.
“I’m always looking for stories about powerful women. Eloise was definitely a woman of that time, that era, but she made her own decisions. I was very attracted to that in her personality,” Cattrall says. “The thing I loved about reading Eloise Page is that it’s behind the scenes, the fly on the wall. She's witnessing human beings under a tremendous amount of pressure. They’re also being human, which means being flawed, and they all have their peccadilloes which she knows all about. I think it was probably terrifying.” In the end, Cattrall says her power grew the more time she was with the CIA. “She knew where the money was, where the guilty parties were – she had her finger on democracy and if it was going to survive,” Cattrall says, adding, “I have tremendous respect for her.”
Central Intelligence is produced by Emma Hearn at Goldhawk Productions Ltd, for the BBC. Goldhawk Productions founder John Scott Dryden says producing dramas based on real-life, world-changing events such as the collapse of Lehman Brothers bank, the Greek Debt Crisis is what they built their reputation on.
“This is bigger,” Dryden says. “The story of the CIA told from insiders’ accounts and declassified documents, feels huge and important and casts a light on the world we live in today.”
Central Intelligence is part of the BBC Radio 4’s popular Limelight collection of drama serials, which regularly rank in the top ten most-listened-to programs on BBC Sounds.
“With Central Intelligence, Radio 4 and Limelight listeners are in for a treat – it’s so exciting to have world-class casting of this caliber to complement the bold ambition of this powerful drama serial.” says Alison Hindell, Radio 4’s Commissioning Editor for Drama and Fiction.”Audio drama is unique in the way it transports us to different places and times, and this ambitious series will give an intimate insider’s view of some of the most remarkable events of the last century.”
Central Intelligence is being released weekly in the Limelight feed.
Other drama announcements from the BBC include a new adaptation of King Lear, starring Richard Wilson and produced by Brill Productions, with more Shakespeare commissions to follow. The BBC says 2024 will also see new dramatizations of three Charles Dickens stories and a season of original dramas on the theme of rule breaking.
Comments