He played the CIA chief in "No Way Out" & represented Tennessee in the U.S. Senate
In a remarkably varied career, he used these commanding talents to achieve 
success as a lawyer, a lobbyist, an actor and as a US Senator, blurring the lines 
between fact ... or as a pivotal supporting player in the real-life Watergate drama, 
... as a CIA director in the taut 1987 thriller No Way Out that starred... [DOC] [TLE] Thompson: Role of a lifetime - Chicago Tribune [PAR] Oct 23, 2007 ... Back when the part-time actor, lawyer, lobbyist, former senator and ... 1985 movie 
"Marie," starring Sissy Spacek as a whistle-blower he represented in 1977 in a 
famous cash-for-clemency scandal involving the Tennessee Parole Board.