A radio play of John le Carré's novel "The Looking Glass War" was produced and broadcast by Radio 4 in 2009, with Simon Russell Beale as George Smiley, Piotr Baumann as Leiser, Patrick Kennedy as Avery, and Ian McDiarmid as LeClerc. This radio play featured the George Smiley character, who had been dropped for this movie.
Sir Anthony Hopkins later said of this movie, in which he appeared: "It was a very strange film, not helped for me, because it was a deeply unhappy period of my life with everything at home really going to pieces. I enjoyed working with Sir Ralph Richardson, though, and he made me laugh a great deal."
The popular and famous John le Carré character of George Smiley, who appears in the novel, was dropped from this adaptation.
Debut theatrical movie of writer, producer, and director Frank Pierson, who was billed as "Frank R. Pierson."