FishbowlLA has a Q&A with Joseph Weisberg, the author of An Ordinary Spy, an espionage novel that was recently optioned by Oscar-winning screenwriter/producer Paul Haggis and Oscar-nominated producer Michael Nozik for the movies. In the interview, Weisberg, a former CIA agent, discusses how redacting several passages in his novel on his own, even before the agency conducted its own security review of his manuscript, didn’t let him entirely off the hook:
“What constitutes classified material is in itself a complicated question, and I think the best answer is, nobody really knows. Classified does not mean secret. In fact, most of what the CIA had me take out of my book was information that is widely known. It’s classified not because it’s secret, but because they don’t want the information confirmed by an ex-Agency employee.”
As for how Haggis, the writer/director of Crash, got interested in An Ordinary Spy, Weisberg admits, “Believe it or not, I don’t know. Nobody ever told me, and I never asked.”