State of Play is a 2009 political thriller. It is a film adaptation of the critically acclaimed six-part British television serial of the same name, which first aired on BBC One in 2003. The plot of the six-hour serial was condensed to fit a two-hour movie format, with the location changed to Washington, D.C. The film was directed by Kevin Macdonald from a screenplay written by Matthew Michael Carnahan, Tony Gilroy, Peter Morgan, and Billy Ray.