A new book explores the symbiosis of espionage and entertainment

Oct 23rd 2021

Stars and Spies. By Christopher Andrew and Julius Inexperienced. Bodley Head 512 pages £20

AT THE Top of his powers in the late 18th century, there was no far more feted dramatist in Europe than Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais, the author of “Le Barbier de Seville” and “Le Mariage de Figaro”. He was also an extraordinarily thriving spy, an agent of the French king’s private intelligence agency, the Secret du roi. Sent to London in 1775 to negotiate a deal with a rogue French agent—a flamboyant transvestite chevalier called d’Eon de Beaumont—Beaumarchais noted to Louis XVI’s foreign minister, the Comte de Vergennes, that pessimism was in the air around the war to preserve the American colonies.

To hasten Britain’s defeat, Vergennes authorised Beaumarchais to set up a front corporation to offer arms to the American rebels. By early 1777, even though he was rehearsing a output in Le Havre, Beaumarchais managed to deliver 9 shiploads of weapons to George Washington’s military. Remarkably, his fame was not an impediment to his clandestine activities, and may perhaps even have aided him keep away from suspicion. The CIA’s Centre for the Review of Intelligence concluded that his endeavours had assisted deliver “the toddler United States as a result of the most critical interval of its birth”.

The interplay among demonstrate small business and espionage was previously very well-set up before the exploits of Beaumarchais. Since stars seek the limelight and spies lurk in the shadows, the symbiosis is not at initial clear, acknowledge Christopher Andrew (the formal historian of Britain’s Safety Provider, MI5) and Julius Inexperienced (a theatre historian and producer). But, they argue, the two professions need similar abilities: deception, purpose-playing and the capacity to create and stick to scripts. Both equally entice people at relieve with the transitory way of living popular to itinerant entertainers and undercover agents.

Dubbed the second-oldest profession, spying has generally observed leisure a beneficial cover. King Alfred penetrated a Danish camp pretending to be a harpist legend experienced it that the troubadour Blondel utilised his licence to wander throughout Europe to discover the location of Richard I’s imprisonment. But this delightful history starts with the extraordinary intelligence network established by Elizabeth I’s spymaster, Sir Francis Walsingham. Catholic sympathisers, such as the lutenist John Dowland and the exiled adventurer Anthony Standen, were being “turned” to perform for the Protestant condition. Standen was an accomplished actor and, posing as “Pompeo Pellegrini”, offered crucial information about Spain’s invasion programs Dowland infiltrated the Danish court docket. Christopher Marlowe, a playwright and poet, also spied for Walsingham.

In the 17th century the dramatist Aphra Behn grew to become the very first British female to generate her residing as a writer—and to be formally recruited as a spy by the British governing administration. In 1666, immediately after the outbreak of the next Anglo-Dutch war, she was sent to Antwerp to persuade a former lover and Dutch agent to change sides in a basic honeytrap operation. The book then speeds through the age of revolution and counter-revolution with quick-fireplace anecdotes and a huge forged of greater-than-daily life people. They incorporate the libertine and memoirist Giacomo Casanova, who was probably the 1st specialist spy to describe himself as a “secret agent”.

Espionage in the 20th century is the book’s main emphasis. Before the very first earth war, the authors relate, spy dramas had been all the rage in equally novels and on the London phase. The to start with head of MI5, an engagingly theatrical naval officer identified as Mansfield Cumming (regarded as “C”), utilized a West End costumier, Willy Clarkson, to supply him with a succession of disguises. All through the war, the most celebrated brokers ended up ladies. The most famed of all, the upmarket Dutch stripper Mata Hari, spied, not really successfully, for the Germans—until her seize and execution.

Stage fright

A considerably a lot more productive spy was Mistinguett, a singer, dancer and movie star who extracted from a Prussian prince, her a person-time lover, the area of the closing German offensive in 1918—in Champagne, not on the Somme as experienced been envisioned. Her successor in the next world war was the terrific African-American entertainer Josephine Baker (pictured), who, following shifting to France, carried out many missions for her adopted country’s Deuxieme Bureau, winning Charles de Gaulle’s gratitude.

Through the second planet war, SIGINT, or indicators intelligence, was mostly more important than HUMINT, the human variety. But theatre intruded even at Britain’s code-breaking centre at Bletchley Park. Before the war its deputy director, Frank Birch, had a stellar profession as a pantomime dame, specifically as an acclaimed Widow Twankey in “Aladdin”. Initially Britain’s primary HUMINT mission was to aid persuade The usa to enter the combat. The head of the MI6 (overseas-intelligence) station in New York, William Stephenson, recruited a galaxy of stars as impact agents, like Roald Dahl and Noel Coward.

An additional of Stephenson’s recruits was Eric Maschwitz, a Hollywood screenwriter and lyricist. He generated a cast map purporting to expose a Nazi learn system for getting above South America. President Franklin Roosevelt was absolutely fooled. Maschwitz went on to come to be head of mild amusement at BBC television.

The ebook has its faults. Shockingly, for occasion, it omits the spies and adventurers who performed the “Great Game” amongst Britain and Russia in the 19th century. At moments, the stylistic joins involving the two authors are a small as well visible. But anyone who enjoys a great spy story will come across and delight in hundreds of them listed here. ■

This report appeared in the Textbooks & arts part of the print version underneath the headline “Smoke and mirrors”