A French television channel held internationally well-known Egyptian actor Omar Sherif as guest alongside with the Italian actress Monica Bellutchi, star of the movie passion of the Christ, on one of its programs to talk about his career and personal life.
Sherif was speaking in fluent French that made viewers forget that his mother tongue was Arabic. He did not get any embarrassing question from the host of the program; Omar was very open and natural. He revealed that he doesn’t like to go to the movies and if he does he makes sure that the movie is worth it so he doesn’t get disappointed.
Sherif added that he thinks TV is leading over the cinema, and that it has become more effective in people's lives. He also commented on the Cesar prize granted to him in France, he added that this prize triggered many questions by journalists asking him if he had become a better actor. He elucidated that a good movie makes the actor immortal and that is why he does not fear aging.
Omar, who was the first Arab actor to win Oscar prize back in 1963, said that he quit smoking twelve years ago and he does not drink while he is acting in front of cameras.
Watching horse races and buying horses are Omar’s favorite hobbies. He adds that he cuts a handsome share of his wage from each film to buy two to three horses, but due to the fact large number of horses he owns, he has limited himself to buying only one horse after each film.
The latest activity for the international star is participating in a movie called [Gilgamesh] based on an ancient Iraqi myth. The movie is going to be filmed in the region of Warzazat in Morocco. Sheriff concluded that he doesn’t regret any silly movies he had done throughout his career, as well as any foolish acts in his real life.
Omar has won the Best Actor Award at the Cesars Pre-eminent Film Awards, in France for his role as a Muslim shopkeeper in the drama film “Monsieur Ibrahim et les Fluers du Koran” (Monsieur Ibrahim). Omar had expressed his deep gratitude at winning such an award stressing that he always loved the French and believes they share the same sentiments towards him by granting such an honor.
The film is directed by director François Dupeyron and concerns the friendship between Momo, a young Jewish boy (Pierre Boulanger), and Ibrahim (Omar), a Muslim shopkeeper who becomes his surrogate father and spiritual guide.
Set in Paris in the 1960's, the movie has a scruffy, New Wave look and a soundtrack full of period-appropriate French and American pop songs. The film is basically a lesson in tolerance, but the atmosphere of unassuming realism and the tenderness of the two central performances make it less cloying then it might be, and Sherif's sly charisma almost rescues his character, who is basically the personification of exotic, enigmatic wisdom, from being a dubious Orientalist cliché. –Albawab.com
© 2004 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
