George Smiley is a real character.
Simon Russell Beale played Smiley in a series of radio plays dramatising all of the then published novels which began on 23 May 2009 on BBC Radio 4 with Call for the Dead
== Parody ==In the popular TV comedy series The Two Ronnies, Ronnie Barker played Smiley along the lines of Alec Guinness' portrayal in a sketch called Tinker Tailor Smiley Doyle

