Status: Development
English, German, French
10 X 60 Minute Episodes
Co-Production Countries:
UK, Ireland, France, Portugal, Spain
Created By:
Tom Edgerton
Writers:
Juan Pujol, Tom Edgerton
Genre
Drama, Kitchen Sink, Espionage, Thriller
Comparables
The Night Manager, True Detective, The Crown
The astonishing true story of an eccentric Spaniard, a pair of princesses, some inflatables, and the 27 imaginary spies who changed the world.
Set amongst the opulence of Madrid, espionage of Lisbon, and destruction of London during the 1930’s and 40’s, we explore the capacity of every individual to effect change beyond a preordained destiny.
Eccentric failure Juan, and brazen social climber Araceli, marry on the eve of war. Foreseeing the scourge of Fascism they set out to do what they could, and reposition themselves more favourably in whatever follows.
Rejected by allied embassies they find opportunity with the Nazi intelligentsia, gaining trust by reporting from behind enemy lines. Crafting a network of informants, each with convincing backstory, they share tantalizing observations and insights that shape real military action.
Their ideological enemy would never realize all two thousand of Juan’s trusted wartime reports were fictitious; his observations of Britain in fact made from a Portuguese beach, fuelled entirely by imagination and guile.
Picked up by MI5, the Pujol’s are relayed to London where they gain the prominence and success they craved, manipulating their enemy and saving lives in the process. But it comes at a grave cost. Their wartime life stokes conflict, escalates to violence, and culminates in extortion and a suicide attempt that reverberates all the way to Churchill.
But with a final set piece stripped from the pages of Hollywood, Juan tips the scales of the war, and holds his marriage together – just long enough for a magician’s escape into thin air. Not that Araceli lets him off in death as she did life, getting everything she’d ever wanted in the process… until an unlikely and unwelcome article in a Spanish newspaper some forty years on.
Using an unreliable narrator and multiple timelines to trick and thrill the audience, just as it subjects did to the world around them, Living with Garbo is crafty, unpredictable and rooted in real world events. A marriage of wit, ingenuity, and high stakes drama, unfolding just a few miles away from total war.
Author
Juan Pujol Garcia, MBE
“Garbo” was the British codename of Juan Pujol Garcia, perhaps the most influential spy of the Second World War. Despite his tumultuous relationship with his wife Araceli, Garbo’s cover was never broken and he remains the only person to have been awarded honours from both sides, receiving the British MBE and the German Iron Cross.
After the war Garbo faked his own death and fled to Venezuela with a mistress, where he later opened a book store. Ironically, his family in Spain only found out he was still alive when his own book was published in 1985 – Garbo having failed to realise it would also be translated into Spanish. He died three years later.
Source Material Info
- War records declassified 1970s
- Memoir Published in 1985
- Goya Winning Documentary Released in 2009
- Multiple stalled film projects – Most recent with Oscar Isaac attached.
Further Reading
Lightwood Green 