The Agency’s Jeffrey Wright Goes Deep on His New Spy Drama, Hints That The Last of Us Season 2 Will Deliver Isaac’s Backstory: ‘It Might Not Be Pretty’
Conventional spy-drama wisdom has us believe that fictional covert operatives are malleable masters of improvisation who are tough to corral. Correspondingly, their most effective handlers exhibit sympathy and understanding mixed with a no-nonsense willingness to make tough calls. In Paramount+ With Showtime’s upcoming The Agency, that blend of warmth and gravitas comes in the form of the CIA’s London Station deputy station chief Henry Ogletree, played by Jeffrey Wright.
The Agency is based on the French series The Bureau and follows an operative known as Martian (Alien: Covenant‘s Michael Fassbender) as he struggles to re-enter his normal life after a years-long undercover operation. In addition to Oscar-nominee Wright, the show has big names in front of the camera; the cast also includes Bad Monkey‘s Jodie Turner-Smith, Pretty Woman‘s Richard Gere and Perry Mason‘s Katherine Waterston. The behind-the-scenes players are just as starry. George Clooney and Grant Heslov executive-produce, Edge of Tomorrow‘s Jez Butterworth and John-Henry Butterworth wrote the scripts, and Showtime/MTV Entertainment Studios president/CEO Chris McCarthy and Yellowstone EP/101 Studios CEO David Glasser are big backers.
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While characters like Martian see the agency’s rulebook as mere guidelines to be bent when the situation calls for it, Wright says, Henry follows protocol. “He’s good at what he does, and he does what he does on behalf of the agency and of the United States government and for his country,” he tells TVLine during a visit to our New York studios, “but he does it by the book.”
The character stands in stark relief to another of Wright’s upcoming projects: reprising militia-group leader Isaac, whom he voiced in The Last of Us Part II video game, in Season 2 of HBO’s series adaptation. “People have asked… whether we’ll get a little bit of a backstory about Isaac?” Wright says in the video at the top of this post. “We might.” His face takes on a “I know something you’d really like to know” look. “It might not be pretty.”
The Agency begins streaming on Friday with two episodes on Paramount+ for those with the Paramount+ with Showtime plan, followed by the linear network premiere Sunday at 9/8c. Press PLAY on the video above to hear Wright offer Agency insight, tease a Last of Us Season 2 scene that sounds insane and update us on the latest Westworld-continuation buzz.
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