Office of Strategic Services - in Popular Culture

In Popular Culture

Films

• The 1946 Paramount film O.S.S., starring Alan Ladd and Geraldine Fitzgerald, showed agents training and on a dangerous mission. Commander John Shaheen acted as technical advisor.
• The 1946 film 13 Rue Madeleine stars James Cagney as an OSS agent who must find a mole in French partisan operations. Peter Ortiz acted as technical advisor.
• The 1946 film Cloak and Dagger stars Gary Cooper as a scientist recruited to OSS to exfiltrate a German scientist defecting to the allies with the help of a woman guerrilla and her partisans. E. Michael Burke acted as technical advisor.
• In the 2006 film The Good Shepherd Matt Damon plays Edward Wilson, a Skull and Bones recruit who joins the OSS to help with a mission in London. He quickly gains rank as the head of the newly formed CIA's counterintelligence service.
• The 2008 biolgraphical film Flash of Genius is about famed American inventor and OSS veteran, Robert Kearns.
• In the 2008 film Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, it is indicated that Indiana Jones worked for the OSS, attaining the rank of Colonel.
• In the 2009 film Inglourious Basterds by Quentin Tarantino, the "basterds" are members of OSS, although no such OSS unit ever actually existed.
• The 2009 film Julie & Julia includes flashback scenes depicting Julia Child's wartime service with the OSS.

Television

• In the Season 6 X-Files episode "Triangle", the woman from the 1939 scenes portrayed by Gillian Anderson as Scully is a member of OSS.

Literature

• The 1976 book A Man Called Intrepid: The Secret War by William_Stevenson_(Canadian_writer) describes the operations of the OSS, particularly the role of Sir William Samuel Stephenson, head of British Security Coordination in New York, in its formation. He also authored a 1986 book entitled Intrepid's Last Case.
• The 1957 book You're Stepping on My Cloak and Dagger by Roger Wolcott Hall is a witty look at Hall's experiences with the OSS.
• The 1986 book "Camp X" by David Stafford is the most accurate account of the activities and personnel of Camp X the secret agent training camp for sabotage and guerrilla warfare at Ajax near Oshawa Ontario, Canada, that was administered by the British Special Operations Executive.
• Author W.E.B. Griffin's Honor Bound and Men At War series revolves around fictional OSS operations.
• A French pulp fiction series OSS 117, by author Jean Bruce, follows the adventure of Hubert Bonisseur de la Bath, alias OSS 117, a French operative working for the OSS. The original series (four or five books a year) lasted from 1949 to 1963, until the death of Jean Bruce, and was continued by his wife and children until 1992. Numerous films were made from it in the 1960s, and in 2006 a nostalgic comedy was made, celebrating the spy movie genre, Cairo, Nest of Spies, with Jean Dujardin playing OSS 117. A sequel followed in 2009 called OSS 117: Lost in Rio (original title in French: OSS 117: Rio Ne Répond Plus).

Comics

• The O.S.S. was a featured organization in DC Comics, introduced in G.I. Combat #192 (July 1976). Led by the mysterious Control, they operated as an espionage unit, initially in Nazi-occupied France. The organization would later become Argent.
• DC Comics superhero Wonder Woman alter ego Diana Prince works for Major Steve Trevor at the OSS. In this position, she found herself privy to intelligence on Axis operations in the United States, and many time foiled agents of Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, and Fascist Italy in their attempts to defeat the Allies and achieve world domination.

Video games

• In the Wolfenstein series of video games, the main character is a member of a fictional organisation called the OSA (Office of Secret Actions),which is inspired by the OSS.
• Most games in the Medal of Honor video game franchise feature a fictional OSS agent as the main character.