IN last year's Hollywood version of the Iran hostage crisis, director and star Ben Affleck paid painstaking detail to recreating the events from 1979.
The effort paid off as he scooped an Oscar and a batch of other awards for his film Argo, in which he starred as CIA agent Tony Mendez.
Now another star of the movie has been highlighted: the Harris Tweed jacket worn by Mr Mendez during the crisis and which he sent to Affleck to wear in the hit film. The jacket is giving the tweed its biggest exposure in decades.
Argo, which was adapted from the book The Master of Disguise by Mr Mendez, tells how six American diplomats were smuggled out of Iran at the height of the 1979 Islamic revolution, posing as film makers searching for locations for a science fantasy film.
They were given shelter at the Canadian Embassy after the US embassy compound was invaded by militants who took 52 other American staff hostage, sparking an international crisis that was to last for 14 months.
Mr Mendez was happy to do his bit for Scottish trade. He confirmed Harris Tweed had been "part of what every agent wore" during his time in the service. "I wore it all the time," he said.
"That was our uniform. The jackets were representative of our group. If you were in the field during the Blitz, you wore a trench coat. If you were tracking Ivan [the Soviet Union and its allies], you had Harris Tweed."
When Affleck asked him how he dressed during the Argo mission, Mr Mendez couriered to Hollywood the jacket he wore during the rescue drama in Iran more than 30 years ago, and with which he had refused to part.
Mr Mendez was guest of honour at the launch of a new social media site, Need for Tweed, a collaboration between Harris Tweed Hebrides and Leo Burnett advertising agency which will celebrate the heritage of Harris Tweed as well as current, cutting-edge use.
Brian Wilson, the former Labour MP and trade and energy minister, who chairs Harris Tweed Hebrides, said: "By telling the story and honouring Tony, we hope everyone who sees Argo will be more likely to say – that's a great Harris Tweed jacket Ben Affleck is wearing. I want one of them."
Mr Mendez also recalled that another Scottish product played a key role in the real-life story. "When I was forging the passport documents needed to get them out of there, using a special ink, the pad ran dry and I used the ambassador's finest bottle of Scotch whisky to revive it," he said.
This scene is now being captured in a portrait of Mr Mendez commissioned by the CIA to commemorate his role in the Argo drama.
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