“ I love peoplewatching and feel that each person is so unique that they are a drama case study in themselves.”
At one point I was doing a model shoot for Nina Ricci, and the director of my first film saw me in the ad and called me to do a screen test. It worked out and I moved into acting.
But you have also moved towards directing. How has that been different from acting? When I was a designer I worked very closely with the rest of the staff and particularly the directors. Through this experience I began to design sets and costumes according to camera angles and not simply what I thought looked good naturally. Eventually directors started to rely upon me to handle editing, coloring, and take on more responsibilities on the production side. One day, I was working on a set and the director didn’ t appear so I took his place for a day, and this is how I moved into directing.
Personally, I feel much more comfortable behind the scenes. Production, whether it is a film or a television series, is an extremely stressful venture for everyone involved. I like being the director because you are on top of the entire process and the stress is actually a bit less. You get to deal with everybody and obviously have the most direct impact on the final product. Every aspect of production has its beautiful sides and its challenges, but I love the challenges of being a director the most.
You are currently working on a series for Ramadan. Can you tell us a bit about it? It is a social drama that is unique in that it is not pretentious. The characters are much more normal, and the things that you will see in the series are exactly what you would see in real life, which is what gives us an edge. There is so much in our society that happens behind closed doors, and the goal of this series is to open those doors and show what is really happening.
In this series I am working with Rania Farid, Gamal Soliman, Iman Hegazy, Tarek Ebbiary, Farial, Samia Youssef, and a whole list of other great names, from actors all the way to the behind the scenes group. This is a really great team, which makes the whole process easier.
How has the production process been with the team? Firstly the producers( the Sabbah brothers from Lebanon) are great, because in an environment where everybody is waiting until the last minute or afraid to put something together because of the political and security situation, they decided to immediately move forward and get to work. On set, we all know each other very well and therefore whatever problems arise in the process we are able to handle them internally very quickly and get on with our work.
CAIROWESTMAG. COM.