Omid Djalili

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Omid Djalili is breaking barriers . . . seriously
The British-born Iranian actor didn't anticipate the fuss over his playing the Jewish character Fagin, in 'Oliver!'
By David Gritten
July 18, 2009
latimes.com

Over the last 15 years, Omid Djalili, a British-born Iranian comedian and actor, who wryly refers to himself as "a Middle Eastern person," has become gradually famous by breaking down cultural differences and ethnic barriers. His appealing stand-up routines hinge on making audiences laugh at their own prejudices, exploring British attitudes to "otherness" and observing that what various ethnic and religious groups have in common is as important as what divides them.

Still, even for a performer familiar with this territory, his latest venture represents a huge leap. On Monday, Djalili, 43, takes over from Rowan Atkinson as Fagin in Cameron Mackintosh's West End production of the musical "Oliver!" So here's a man with parents from an Islamic republic, one whose current president makes his feelings about the state of Israel starkly clear, playing one of the best-known Jewish characters in literature -- even if in "Oliver Twist" Charles Dickens portrayed Fagin, who runs a gang of child pickpockets and petty criminals, unsympathetically.

Djalili refutes the idea that he deliberately courted controversy in accepting the role; he insists he never anticipated any kind of furor. 'Are you mad? When I first learned I'd landed the role in February," he recalls, "I didn't think there'd be any problem from 'my side.' But then recently I did a short stand-up tour of the Middle East for the first time -- Dubai, Bahrain, Beirut. I did some press, and the magazines and papers there wrote supportive things about me. But they raised the topic of me playing Fagin, and they all had three questions: 'Why?' 'What's all that about?' and 'Are you mad?' "

To Djalili, Fagin was simply a great part: "Any actor in musicals would probably want to play Fagin, or maybe Tevye in 'Fiddler on the Roof.' Then there's Shylock, Othello -- these are the big roles you want to play if you're slightly dark in complexion. I didn't realize that even to play around with the idea that here's an Iranian playing Fagin might be controversial."

Impresario Mackintosh had no need to stir up cash-generating publicity. This production of "Oliver!," which opened in January, was already a huge hit; its advance bookings of $24.6 million made it the fastest-selling West End show ever. Instead, he chose Djalili as a complete contrast with Atkinson. "The only way to follow such a unique performance is with a talent just as unique yet entirely different," says Mackintosh. "No one could fulfill these criteria better than Omid. It's his ability to inhabit his characters with such comic energy and wily cunning that will make his Fagin his own."

Djalili already has his own ideas about the role. "Rowan's performance is one of real subtlety and gravitas," he says. "But what they want from me is to play it big, play it turbo-charged. Fagin is a character of light and shade. He can be all charm and fun, but also intimidating. And both those sides of him need to be played big." Still, he was thrown into the rehearsal process literally the day after finishing work on a feature film: "It's tough, it's a whole new discipline, so unlike film," he says. "I have this team of people telling me I'm the kingpin in a well-oiled machine. And when the 'go' button gets pressed, and I'm on stage, I can't mess it up. I can't go over it again." He grimaces: "No pressure, then."

But he is determined to give the role 100% effort: "I have to," he says, scowling, "because there'll be Iranians in the audience. If you don't give it your best, that's one thing Iranians will not tolerate. It's about anything that brings Iran's name down. If I'm not up to scratch, they'll trash the place!" Yet talking with Djalili after a long day's rehearsal in a south London hall, it's clear he might be inspired casting. A squat man with a shaved skull, he cuts an unforgettable figure, with his large head and generous girth. Urbane and amusing in conversation, he can also flash or roll his strikingly dark eyes to illustrate a point, and suddenly look menacing.

He grew up in west London. While some in Britain still assume he is a Muslim, he was raised by his Iranian parents in the Baha'i faith. His stand-up career began in 1995 with an hour-long show at the Edinburgh Festival. Back then he employed the titles of his shows as statements of intent. That first one was called "Short, Fat, Kebab Shop Owner's Son." The next year it was "The Arab and the Jew." A regular on British TV for a decade, he has also appeared in some 20 films, including "The Gladiator" and "The Mummy." He has often been typecast as sinister foreigners -- though he had an amusing turn as Heath Ledger's manservant in "Casanova."

Djalili has successfully performed his comedy routines in several different countries. In 2005, HBO gave him his own comedy special; two years previously he played an Iranian janitor in Whoopi Goldberg's sitcom "Whoopi." He broke through in Britain in August 2005 at the Edinburgh Festival, when he sold out a 720-seat theater over a remarkable 23 nights. In the previous month, London buses and Tube stations were targeted by terrorist bombers, and 52 people died. Djalili had recently decided to drop material about ethnicity and the war on terror from his act, but those terrorist outrages changed his mind.

"Hey," he told audiences in Edinburgh, "I'm as alarmed as any of you by Arabs at airports." It was extraordinary to see largely British audiences responding so enthusiastically to this energetic, rotund, foreign-looking little man, bounding round the stage telling jokes about their worst fears. Night after night, he received rousing ovations.

As an Iranian, he feels "hugely impacted" by current events in that country, and sobered by the images of violence and death he has seen on YouTube. "I don't want to say too much," he says, "because I still have friends in Tehran." Yet his sympathies are clearly with the marchers protesting against the recent election results. Can he find any humor in that situation? "Well, I'm on Twitter now, and I recently did a tweet saying: 'I'm starting a rumor that President Ahmadinejad does line-dancing on Thursday nights.' That's been about my only contribution."

He nurses ambitions to play stand-up comedy in Iran: "I've thought about how to do it. I'd do it half in English, half in Farsi, my parents' first language. I'd love to." It may yet happen. His new status as a West End star can only enhance his career, which now has real international momentum. He claims he has seen all this coming, though from an unlikely source.

"When I was in San Francisco in 1988, I met someone who read Tarot cards. He was this really geeky man who wore a wizard outfit. He said: 'Wow, looks like you're going to be world famous. But you're going to start real small and build real gradually, and you'll achieve worldwide fame in your mid-40s.' I thought, hmmm, yeah, right. But in fact it's happened just like that. I'm still a couple of years off my mid-40s, but I've been building blocks and foundations. It's been slow but true."

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On today's Paul O'Grady show

[Ash]

He tries to be too funny... thus i find him not so funny!

[luke]

http://infidelmovie.com/

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Omid Djalili admits going too far in his early career
Omid Djalili's incisive observations on sensitive topics are tempered with personal anecdotes that lend him an endearing vulnerability.
Saeed Saeed
May 5, 2011
thenational.ae

Omid Djalili has made a career out of highlighting cultural absurdities, but during his previous UAE tour, in 2009, Djalili found the indoor slopes of Ski Dubai more than a match even for his rapier wit. “I remember seeing these women in niqab flying down the slopes like Olympic skiers and thinking this so great,” he chuckles. “The slopes were so good that I couldn’t get enough of it. People were telling me that we had to go, but I had to do at least 12 or 13 runs.”

The UK-born Iranian comic returns to Dubai to headline the Comedy ­Social at Madinat Jumeirah Amphitheatre tomorrow. The tour builds on Djalili’s growing fame in the Middle East with performances in Qatar, Lebanon and Jordan. He explains that the success of these shows is not simply due to his growing fan base, but also comes from tapping into the rich ­comedy tradition the region has always had.

He points to his previous UAE tour, when he ran workshops for fledgling local comedians, as proof that people from the Middle East have always had a funny bone. “Stand-up comedy seems to have been claimed by the West when in fact it is pretty much rooted in Middle Eastern traditions,” he says. The workshops were “about encouraging Middle Eastern people to do stand-up comedy and to bring something new to the table, where in the West it has become quite dark and very much laced with looking at man’s animal side”.

Although he never planned to be a comic, Djalili knew his career would involve the stage. Born in Chelsea, London, to Iranian Baha’i parents, Djalili, who is a Baha’i himself, graduated in English and Theatre Studies at the University of Ulster in Northern Ireland, but he traces his artistic flair more to his heritage than to his studies. “I always thought I was born with it,” he says. “My ancestors were a band of poets and troubadours who travelled around Iran at the turn of the 20th century. They would pitch up and there would be poetry which had a comedic bent.”

Ironically, it was the dearth of comic talent in London’s Iranian community that prompted Djalili to take up comedy in the early 1990s. “I was raised by people in my community who were doing comedy that was really awful,” he says. “And that sense of embarrassment and shame for them is what made me get up and say ‘I could certainly do this’.”

Djalili’s first comedy show, Short, Fat Kebab Shop Owner’s Son, at the 1995 Edinburgh Comedy Festival, was a critically acclaimed success. His star rose higher with each show and a decade later he had become one of the festival’s biggest draws, selling out a 720-seat theatre over 23 nights. He also performed in international comedy festivals in America, Canada and Australia, and in recent years has been reaching an even wider audience with small roles in high-profile films such as The Mummy, Gladiator and, most recently, in the interfaith comedy The Infidel. In 2009, he took over the role of Fagin from Rowan ­Atkinson in the West End production of the musical ­Oliver!.

Djalili has been praised by critics for refreshing the UK comedy circuit by fearlessly tackling touchy subjects, such as multiculturalism, terrorism and the Middle East. But it was really the irrepressible optimism of his gigs that made him a crowd favourite. His sharp observations are always tempered with sweet recollections from childhood and married life, allowing audiences everywhere to identify with him.

Djalili, who thinks of himself as a performer rather than as a comedian, say many of his fellow UK comics are wary of being perceived as crowd favourites, afraid of being judged by what he calls “the comedy police”, people who are “very critical of you no matter what, even if the audience are full of laughter and enjoying themselves”. He adds: “This is something that actually disempowers a lot of comedians because they start playing less to the crowd and more to the critic. That is something you don’t have when you come to the Middle East because there is joy and people just want to come together.”

However, Djalili admits it was harder to fend off critics from his own community, recalling the backlash during his early career when fellow British Iranians accused him of denigrating their culture. While not getting into specifics, Djalili accepts that some of his early material went too far. “I have looked back at some of my tapes from 12 years ago and been utterly horrified. I sat there tutting loudly at a young 29-year-old Omid trying stuff and thinking I became much better when I became bald,” he says. “A lot of what I was doing and saying came out as confused, damaged and possibly offensive. But I think I got away with it because people always saw my intentions were good and they thought ‘he was quite joyful’ and they turned a blind eye to it.”

It was two separate events in 2001 that pushed Djalili to become more “conscious” of his comedy. The first was winning the Time Out Comedy Award in February, a prestigious accolade voted by London’s comedy club owners. The other was the September 11 attacks in the US.

In an attempt to stem the backlash against America’s Middle Eastern communities, Djalili was asked by the United Nations to travel to New York for a series of shows in 2003. He described stepping on stage in-front of New Yorkers still seething and traumatised by the attacks as one of the most nerve-wracking moments of his career. “Thankfully, when the reviews came back so good it gave me a purpose to what I was doing,” he says. “They thought, ‘Hey, not every Middle Easterner wants to blow us up.’ I know it’s a basic, old-hat thing to say but back then in 2003 that was a healing thing.”

Healing and redemption are the motives behind Djalili’s latest world tour, branded The Tour of Duty. Djalili says the content is a mixture of new material and old favourites – and that he is attempting to redress some of the mistakes of his early career. “I feel it is my duty to perform, give a proper message and do it properly,” he says. “And by doing it I am healing the wounds of my past, of all the past gigs, all the wounds of my childhood and anything I did wrong.”

While Djalili can see his audience swelling with each Middle Eastern tour, he remains in the dark regarding his popularity in his native Iran. “All I know is I get a lot of support on my website and my Twitter and they also seem to be aware of me on YouTube,” he says. “But somebody told me I am very well known. But then again, Charlie Sheen is very well known, so that doesn’t mean anything.”

The Comedy Social featuring Omid Djalili will take place at Madinat Jumeirah Amphitheatre tomorrow at 7.30pm. Tickets available at www.itp.net