Amr Waked

The fact that Amr Waked is one of a rare set of actors that has found success in both Arab cinema and Hollywood, speaks wonders.

A late bloomer, it wasn’t until the Esquire cover star was 30 that he landed his first major role in 2002’s Ashab wallah Business (‘Are we friends or just a business’), for which reviewers offered that he portrayed the role of “Gehad “ so well that many viewers left the cinema believing he was actually Palestinian, rather than Egyptian.

That led to his first lead role in Deil el Samaka (‘The Fish’s Tail’) and a year later he made his Hollywood bow alongside stars George Clooney and Matt Damon in Stephen Gaghan’s Syriana.

While he continues to balance in his fair share of work across the cinematic worlds, his performances in the HBO TV show House of Saddam (2008), the film adaptation of Salmon Fishing in the Yemen (when he also made our cover in September) and then playing the French detective Pierre Del Rio in the Scarlett Johansson vehicle, Lucy, has made him a bastion for Arab actors on the big screen.