Tradecraft: Agent Zigzag Reports to Muppets Director

Variety reports that Agent Zigzag is in new hands. Last we heard, Mike Newell was attached to direct the Tom Hanks-produced film adaptation of Ben Macintyre's book Agent Zigzag: A True Story of Nazi Espionage, Love, and Betrayal, which has been in development since New Line won an intense bidding war back in 2007. Now, though, the trade reports that Muppets director James Bobbin is helming the project. Mark Bomback and Rowan Joffe previously worked on the script under Newell; it's unclear whether Bobbin will oversee a new pass. The true story of Edward Arnold Chapman—a charming criminal who was trained by the Germans to spy on the British, but instead offered his services as a double agent to the British—previously inspired the 1966 spy movie Triple Cross, directed by James Bond auteur Terrence Young and starring Christopher Plummer, Gert Frobe, Claudine Auger and Romy Schneider. This new version has a Bond connection of its own: Ben Macintyre also wrote the book For Your Eyes Only: Ian Fleming + James Bond.