December 23, 2024
Review

‘The Company,’ 8 p.m. Sunday TNT

How about a little history noir?

This six-hour series, broadcast on three consecutive Sundays, takes a look inside the dark world of the Central Intelligence Agency through the years.

Based on the historical novel by Robert Littell, “The Company,” directed by Emmy winner Mikael Salomon (“Band of Brothers”), follows the paths taken by three young men who became friends at Yale.

Jack McAuliffe (played by Chris O’Donnell) is a true believer who gets recruited as a field agent. He’s trained by veteran agent Harvey “The Sorcerer” Torriti (Alfred Molina), the colorful Berlin station chief.

Leo Kritzky (Alessandro Nivola), Jack’s best friend, ends up working inside CIA headquarters, in part because his wife, Adelle (Kristin Booth), is the daughter of a close adviser to President Truman.

The third member of “The Troika,” Yevgeny Tipsin (Rory Cochrane), returns to Russia, where he gets recruited by KGB chief Starik (Ulrich Thomsen) and returns to the States as a sleeper agent.

Overseeing the CIA’s counterintelligence division is James Jesus Angleton (Michael Keaton), a global chess master who develops an obsession that eventually proves his undoing.

The first night of “The Company” examines the early days of the Cold War, with McAuliffe protecting an attractive asset and Torriti trying to ferret out a mole with British intelligence.

The second night follows McAuliffe through two of the agency’s failures, the aborted uprising in Hungary in 1956 and the Bay of Pigs invasion in 1961.

Night three focuses on the search for a KGB mole within the CIA.

“The Company,” produced by Ridley and Tony Scott, is a taut thriller that brings history dramatically to life and which will enable viewers to go behind the scenes during some dark moments in CIA history.


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