Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Gosford Park. Moonrise Kingdom. The original cast of You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown. These might seem like wildly different projects, but they have one man in common: actor Bob Balaban.

Balaban is one of the consummate “hey, it’s that guy!” actors. His name might not immediately ring a bell (unless you, like me, love to keep track of all the great character actors), but the second you see his face or just hear his voice, you’ll instantly know who he is. He’s been working steadily on stage and screen for 50 years, and he’s also written and directed his own projects. (Heck, Gosford Park emerged from an idea he had.) If you love good movies and television, you’ve become well acquainted with Bob Balaban.

His newest project is Condor, a spy thriller on the DirecTV Audience Network. Balaban is exactly the sort of person you wouldn’t expect to pop up in a series so high-octane. It's all the more delightful that he’s there, seeming like the quiet, sensible one amid all the foot chases and action sequences. He joins Todd to talk about his long, illustrious career, and just why it was time to finally play a spy.

Show notes:

The actor Balaban is talking about in The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp is Anton Wolbrook.