Former spy creates immersive espionage stage show

A former MI6 intelligence officer is behind a new stage show, lifting the lid on what goes on at the UK's Secret Intelligence Service.

Matthew Dunn spent years working in the intelligence community, which he said was not all tuxedos, exotic locations, and evil billionaires trying to destroy civilisation.

Operation MI6 starts a 70-date UK tour in Wolverhampton on Thursday, and depicts two officers overseeing a live operation in eastern Europe.

Dunn, from Stratford-upon-Avon, said: "The audience will be taken into the heart of a modern MI6 control centre and via huge screen, they will see how MI6 handles a rolling, overseas operation."

MI6 (Military Intelligence, Section Six) was founded in 1909 and is recognised by the Guinness Book of World Records as the oldest continuously operating intelligence gathering operation in the world.

It can trace its history back to the foundation of an official espionage service in the 16th Century under Sir Francis Walsingham.

Dunn has written 14 novels about his time in the secret services.

He also had numerous different identities during his career, for undercover operations around the world.

"I operated under alias identity and those 14 aliases, it's not just like having a dodgy passport and credit card, it's the full works.

"I needed to know my entire back story, my life, my personality, where I lived, local facilities, everything.

"It was absolutely required for the work I did, getting up close and personal to very tricky targets overseas in hostile locations."

He also had to use disguises, but admitted he was not a fan.

"Things would go wrong, moustaches could slip, a wig goes askew and the problem is that it's not just comedic in the moment, but quite literally, people could pull out guns or call people with guns".

Dunn said that there were points in his career as an intelligence officer, that he almost forgot that when he was undercover, he was playing a role.

"I won't say exactly where it was but it's a beautiful overseas city in late November and sort of early-ish evening [and] I was walking down this street, suit and overcoat, looking the part, but I'd finished my work for the day as a spy.

"As I was walking back, it suddenly hit me out of nowhere that actually... that day was my 30th birthday. And it was the first moment it had occurred to me I was so deep into the other character who obviously had a different birth date.

"So I think on multiple... superficial levels you do become somebody completely different and all that comes with it, including the trappings of things like birthdays or likes, dislikes all of that kind of thing."

Dunn had joined SIS after being approached while at university in the mid-1990s and said he considered it an honour.

"The intrigue, the mystery, the exhilaration, the fact that I was joining almost the world's most secret club. The flip side of it was I was walking into the complete unknown.

"There was this nagging doubt... 'OK, this is great, I'm joining the Secret Service, but what are we doing now? You know, is this going to be almost like the glorified police job', that type of thing.

"It was actually more complex, more dangerous than ever. But entering was a complete leap of faith because James Bond is my hero."

Now retired from the service, Dunn has co-written the stage show to give audiences an idea of how a spy operates on assignment and is controlled by those in charge.

The play, called Operation MI6, tours the UK this year and opens at the Grand Theatre, Wolverhampton, on Thursday.

He said the show, which takes place in a control room monitoring an assignment in Prague, aims to give people an idea how everything works.

"There's a plan to assassinate a significant person but they don't know who it is.

"All they do know is that if the assassination takes place the repercussions will be globally severe".

Dunn said he tried to keep the play as close to the real world of spies, espionage and security operations as possible, without revealing too much.

"When I left service, I became an author, an author of spy fiction. Some of the works there had to be cleared by the service, but also the service provides excellent briefing to former officers, about what we can and can't do.

"And the key thing is not betraying details about ongoing operations, personalities, obviously that's a very important one.

"The show itself is accurate but it is dramatised, it's wrapped in a work of fiction.

"So the service is very happy that I'm not in breach of any national secrets."

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