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Omar Sharif
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Omar Sharif (; born April 10, 1932) is an Academy Award-nominated and Golden Globe-winning Egyptian actor who has starred in many Hollywood films. He has acted in Egyptian, French, and English language feature films. Sharif is most famous for his roles in Doctor Zhivago, Funny Girl and Lawrence of Arabia.
if was born Michel Demitri Chalhoub , also occasionally spelled as Michel Shalhoub, in Alexandria, Egypt, the son of Claire (née Saada) and Joseph Chalhoub.
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Encyclopedia
Omar Sharif (; born April 10, 1932) is an Academy Award-nominated and Golden Globe-winning Egyptian actor who has starred in many Hollywood films. He has acted in Egyptian, French, and English language feature films. Sharif is most famous for his roles in Doctor Zhivago, Funny Girl and Lawrence of Arabia.
Biography
Early life
Sharif was born Michel Demitri Chalhoub , also occasionally spelled as Michel Shalhoub, in Alexandria, Egypt, the son of Claire (née Saada) and Joseph Chalhoub. Sharif graduated from Alexandria's Victoria College, then from Cairo University with a degree in mathematics and physics. Afterwards, he worked with his father in the lumber business.
Career
In 1953, Sharif began his acting career with a role in the Egyptian film, Sira` Fi al-Wadi, (English, The Blazing Sun or Struggle in the Valley or Fight in the Valley). Numerous Egyptian productions followed. He starred with his ex-wife, Egyptian actress Faten Hamama, in several movies as romantic leads. Others include Ayyamna el helwa (Our Best Days, 1955), La anam (I Don't Sleep, 1958), Sayedat el kasr (Lady of the Castle, 1959) and the Anna Karenina-adaptation Nahr el hub (The River of Love 1961).
Sharif's first English language film was Lawrence of Arabia in 1962 where he played the role of Sherif Ali. This performance earned him a Best Supporting Actor Oscar nomination, a Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor - Motion Picture, Most Promising Newcomer award and worldwide fame as the world's leading Arabic actor. Sharif also played the title role in the 1965 film Doctor Zhivago by David Lean. His decision to star in William Wyler's Funny Girl with Barbra Streisand reportedly angered Egypt's government due to Streisand's endorsement of Zionism. After a period in which he made headlines more for being a professional bridge player than an actor, he made a comeback in 2003 with the film adaptation of the novel Monsieur Ibrahim et les fleurs du Coran.
In November 2005, he was honored with a medal by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in recognition of his significant contributions to world film and cultural diversity. The medal—which is handed out very infrequently—is named after Russian director Sergei Eisenstein and can only be given out a total of 25 times by Russia's Mosfilm.
Sharif is to once more team with his co-star from Lawrence of Arabia, Peter O'Toole, in Gilgamesh by Stonelock Pictures. This epic, about the ancient land now called Iraq and its rulers, also stars some of Europe and Egypt's leading actors.
Personal life
Sharif converted to Islam from Christianity and married renowned Muslim Egyptian actress Faten Hamama, in 1955 and took the name Omar al-Sharif. The marriage lasted almost 20 years and ended in 1974, producing one child Tarek Sharif (b. 1957), who appeared in Doctor Zhivago as Yuri at the age of 8.
Sharif is fluent in Arabic, English, Greek, and French. He also speaks some Italian and Turkish.
In a 2002 interview with the Spanish newspaper El Mundo, Omar Sharif stated that he and his son Tarek are atheists. Tarek was married three times; first to a Jewish woman from Montreal, then to a Catholic Czech woman, and ultimately to a Muslim woman from Egypt. Sharif is often quoted saying that he brought up his children and grandchildren to believe that religion should not differentiate people.
Sharif became very close friends with Peter O'Toole during the making of Lawrence of Arabia. They have appeared in several other films together and remain close friends. He is also good friends with Egyptologist Zahi Hawass.
Sharif underwent a triple bypass surgery in 1992, and suffered a mild heart attack in 1994. Until his bypass, Sharif smoked 50 cigarettes a day; after the surgery, he quit easily.
On August 5, 2003, he received a one-month suspended prison sentence for striking a police officer in a suburban Parisian casino in July. He was also fined $1700 and ordered to pay the officer $340 in damages. (He had insulted and then head-butted the Pontoise policeman, who tried to intervene in an argument between the actor and a roulette croupier.) On February 13 2007 Sharif was "found guilty of assaulting a Beverly Hills parking lot attendant and breaking his nose".
According to The Middle East Media Research Institute, Omar Sharif said the "East" will never have a democracy because people like him "prefer to go to the neighborhood sheikh, instead of Democracy." MEMRI posted an interview of Sharif that aired on the Al-Hayat TV network on June 8, 2008. In the interview, Sharif reportedly blasted U.S. policy in Iraq and said Americans are ignorant. Sharif also claimed to have spoken with U.S President, George W. Bush before the beginning of the Iraq War and told him that Arabs are not like regular people and that Arab nations are made up of sects resistant to becoming democratized.
Actor and friend Tom Courtenay revealed, whilst being interviewed for the 19 July 2008 edition of BBC Radio's Test Match Special, that Omar supports Hull City and in the 1970s would telephone their automated scoreline from his home in Paris for score updates.
Gambling
Sharif, once among the world's best known contract bridge players, co-wrote a syndicated newspaper bridge column for the Chicago Tribune for several years. He is also both author and co-author of several books on bridge and has licensed his name to a bridge computer game; initially released in a DOS version in 1992, Omar Sharif Bridge is still sold in Windows and "mobile platform" versions. For a number of years his partner at international tournaments was American football coach Tommy Prothro.
Sharif has also been a regular in casinos in France, where he once assaulted a casino employee after losing thousands of dollars on a single roulette bet.
In 2006 Sharif declared both pastimes as ended when he was asked if he still played bridge: "I've stopped altogether. I decided I didn't want to be a slave to any passion any more except for my work. I had too many passions, bridge, horses, gambling. I want to live a different kind of life, be with my family more because I didn't give them enough time."
Filmography
Further reading
- The Eternal Male (1977)
- Omar Sharif's Life in Bridge (1983)
- Omar Sharif talks Bridge (2004)
- Bridge Deluxe II play with Omar Sharif (Instruction manual)
External links
- , Digitised BAFTA Journal, Winter 1962-3
- (in french)
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