Michael Fassbender cannot lie — the polygraph scene in Black Bag was a bear for him to shoot. Not because he had to pass the test (in fact, his character, George, is the one administering it). But on the page,

“ Black Bag ,” an elegant, quick-witted new thriller that finds Cate Blanchett and Michael Fassbender playing married spies, isn’t the pair’s first time together on screen. That honor goes to 2017’s “Song to Song,” one of Terrence Malick’s most intangible and head-scratching offerings — though the two stars can barely recall that experience.

In honor of the new spy thriller, 'Black Bag,' Parade sat down with the film's leads including Cate Blanchett, Michael Fassbender, Marisa Abela, Regé-Jean Page, Tom Burke and Naomi Harris to discuss their dinner party dos and don'ts.

Given that many of these have managed to push the genre forward by exploring current political and social issues, the prospect of Steven Soderbergh making an old-fashioned spy thriller about identifying a mole within a powerful institution may have seemed rather antiquated.