State of Love and Trust

Steven Soderbergh blurs the lines between personal and professional in spy thriller Black Bag, its stars tell Newsweek

- JANEÉ BOLDEN

IN BLACK BAG, ESPIONAGE ISN'T JUST A JOB—it's a way of life. Steven Soderbergh's latest thriller blurs the lines between professional duty and personal entanglement, delivering a sleek, high-stakes narrative where loyalty is tested as much between the sheets as it is in the field.

At the center of the film are Michael Fassbender and Cate Blanchett as George Woodhouse and Kathryn St. Jean, a married pair of elite spies whose chemistry is as explosive as their assignments. In the first moments of the film, Woodhouse is assigned to find a traitor among his ranks after a lethal weapon known as "Severus" is stolen from the intelligence agency. His list of suspects includes just five names and one of them is his wife's. What follows is a frantic search to discover which of the parties closest to him is the guilty one, while being torn between protecting his wife and honoring his duties.

During a conversation with Newsweek, Fassbender described his and Blanchett's electric on-screen connection as something they didn't overthink.

"We didn't really talk at all about the characters," he admitted. "The exciting thing about working with somebody like Cate is not discussing too much about the relationship—just seeing what she's going to bring once we start doing the scenes and then to be sort of really awake and respond to that and bring whatever I think my biography is.

"It's always a joy when you're working with somebody who's so good and has that wealth of experience. So there wasn't much discussion about anything—we just got into it."