SPYFLIX Festival Guest Judge, Joe Weisberg, knows a thing or two about telling tales rich with secrets. A former CIA officer and the creator of the hit FX TV series, The Americans, Joe also has a new book coming out this fall which makes the case that America’s policy towards Russia is failing – and that we’ll never fix it until we rethink our relationship. 

Here we share a few notes Joe had on the 2021 SPYFLIX Narrative Short selection, Safe Space, written and directed by Jake Robb, as well as some fascinating insight around his time at CIA. 

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On Safe Space: “I really enjoyed watching the SPYFLIX short films. Safe Space has a great twist at the end, and I enjoyed the actors’ performances. It was interesting and funny, and I appreciated its cinematography style, the film’s sound and the direction by Jake Robb. Overall very entertaining.”

On his first-hand experience with espionage and secrets: “I did spend a few years in the CIA, during which time I became really quite a liar. I had to lie all the time. I had to lie about everything I was doing. At first I thought that'd be emotionally difficult for me. And after about two weeks, it never bothered me again. It became almost second nature right away. And then after I left CIA, I had to re-examine all of that, and think about how did that happen? How did that become so easy for me to do? And I got very interested in the whole question of lying and what it's like, what it means to a person, and what it does to a person.”

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It was 1990 when Joe joined CIA - a few years after studying Russian in Leningrad and just in time to watch the Soviet Union collapse. Coming of age in America in the 1970s and 80s, Joe was a Cold Warrior, and his expertise and ideas on how America can best position itself against Russian attacks have never been more timely and relevant. Joe’s book, Russia Upside Down - An Exit Strategy for the Second Cold War, will be available this September.