Posted by BeautyandtheEast on 05-11-2012 | Comments | Share | Filed under: Entertainment, Film/TV
(CNN by Dean Obeidallah)—Sacha Baron Cohen’s new movie, “The Dictator,” is a modern-day minstrel show judging from the trailer and Cohen’s comments promoting the film while dressed as the film’s star, “Gen. Shabazz Aladeen,” the leader of a fictitious Arab country.
Cohen, who is not of Arab heritage, plays this Arab character while sporting a long fake beard and speaking in a strong Arabic accent, which would be fine, except the character is showcasing the worst stereotypes of Arabs.
For example, at a news conference in New York City this week promoting his film, Cohen exclaimed: “Welcome devils of the Zionist media and death to the West.” He then joked about liking TV shows that showed Arab terrorists killing Americans and admiring fashion designer John Galliano for hating the Jews.
To me, this is essentially the same as white performers in blackface portraying black people in buffoonish negative stereotypes for the enjoyment of white America.
But I am not advocating a ban on offensive comments or the telling of culturally insensitive jokes. I certainly am not calling for more PC comedy. I’m not calling for a boycott of anyone nor asking for one more insincere “I’m sorry to all those who were offended by me” from a celebrity.
I’m in no way arguing that Arab culture is off-limits or cannot be mocked. I’m a comedian of Arab heritage and have performed comedy shows not only for Arab-American groups across the United States, but also in the Middle East, from Egypt to Qatar to Saudi Arabia. I find the biggest laughs are elicited when performers hold up a comic mirror to Arab culture.
But for some reason, the entertainment industry appears to truly enjoy ridiculing “brown” people, Arabs and Indians, and has no qualms about casting people not of our heritage to portray us. Indeed, just last week Popchips snack company found itself embroiled in a controversy because an ad showed Ashton Kutcher playing an Indian character in brownface, similar to what Cohen is doing in “The Dictator.”
Here is my simple request to the entertainment industry: If you are going to mock and ridicule us for profit, can you at least cast Arabs and Indians to play us? And while we’re at it, why not include us in the creative process as co-writers and directors?
If you look at the names of the writers, co-stars and director of “The Dictator,” none is of Arab heritage. Ben Kingsley, who is of Indian heritage, co-stars, but if you don’t know the difference between Arabs and Indians, go to Google.
And let’s be honest, these types of buffoonish “brownface” stereotypes would not be permitted if it were any other minority group. What would the reaction be if a white actor in blackface mocked African-American culture? Or if an actor of Arab heritage pitched a movie about the leader of a fictitious Jewish state in which he would portray the Jewish leader and showcase the worst stereotypes of Jews? Is there any chance that film would get the green light from a Hollywood studio?
I understand that the entertainment industry is about making money, not correcting negative stereotypes—even those they helped perpetuate. But why not cast a person who is actually Arab as the sidekick to the star who is pretending to be Arab?
Arabs and South Asians have long been ghettoized in Hollywood, playing almost exclusively cab drivers, deli workers, terrorists and the occasional “good” guy who works with law enforcement, and who is usually killed later in the movie by a bad “brown” guy.
But here’s the thing Hollywood: Adding people of our heritage to the movie is actually good business. It would help the film rise above the superficial and cliched material we have seen for years when it comes to Arabs and Indians on the screen. For example, the jokes in “The Dictator” trailer sound like a less clever version of the material you would hear from comedian Jeff Dunham’s ventriloquist dummy “Achmed the Dead Terrorist.”
Hollywood learned this very lesson years ago when it made mafia movies with no Italian-Americans involved in the creative process or as stars. Those films failed because they lacked any true understanding of Italian culture, which would have enhanced the film. That changed when Paramount Studios hired Francis Ford Coppola, then a little-known director, to helm “The Godfather.” In turn, Coppola hired talented but unknown Italian-American actors such as Al Pacino and John Cazale (“Fredo Corleone”) to be co-stars. The rest is cinematic history.
In time, there will likely be an Arab and Indian-American Denzel Washington and Spike Lee. And that will come from a combination of the artists in those communities creating their own projects—which is increasingly happening—but also being cast in the bigger budget Hollywood movies. The big studio movies have the greatest reach and are the ones which create stars who then have the ability to get movies made that would present their culture in a more nuanced and entertaining manner.
“The Dictator” may turn out to be a blockbuster hit or a big budget miss. But I can assure you that the film would have been better if it included some input from the very community being ridiculed by the film.
Tags: the dictator, sasha baron cohen, dean obeidallah
Posted by BeautyandtheEast on 05-07-2012 | Comments | Share | Filed under: Entertainment, Leaders/Stories
(Reuters) - A Kansas City woman who converted from Christianity to Islam has been awarded $5 million in punitive damages by a jury who found the telecommunications giant AT&T created a “hostile work environment” after her conversion, according to a judge’s order issued Friday.
Susann Bashir, a 41-year-old married mother, sued AT&T unit Southwestern Bell for what she said was a pattern of offensive and discriminatory conduct by her supervisors that began when she converted to Islam in 2005, six years after she started working for the company as a network technician.
After Bashir started wearing a religious head scarf known as a hijab, and attending Friday mosque services, her managers and co-workers called her names including “terrorist,” and told her she was going to hell, said her attorney Amy Coopman. A manager repeatedly told her to remove her hijab, insulted her for wearing it, and once physically grabbed Bashir and tried to rip the hijab off her head, according to the suit. Bashir complained to human resources and then filed a formal complaint alleging discrimination with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and was subsequently fired in 2010.
Though Bashir’s complaint alleged she was fired in a retaliatory action by AT&T, the jury did not agree, and no damages were awarded on that charge. After several days of hearing testimony and deliberation, a jury in Jackson County Circuit Court on Thursday ordered AT&T to pay $5 million in punitive damages on top of $120,000 in actual damages. AT&T spokesman Marty Richter said the company would appeal.
“AT&T is a nationally recognized leader in workforce diversity and inclusion, something in which we take great pride. We disagree with the verdict and plan to appeal,” Richter said. Bashir’s lawyer said the jury award was “monumental” to Bashir, but said it had little impact on AT&T, a multi-billion-dollar global corporation.
“The company has an excellent written policy,” said Coopman.
“If they had just followed the policy none of this would have happened.”
Tags: at&t, muslim woman, verdict
Posted by BeautyandtheEast on 05-02-2012 | Comments | Share | Filed under: Entertainment, Film/TV
By Tim Kenneally
Ashton Kutcher’s new ad for a potato chip company could find him eating crow soon. The “Two and a Half Men” star’s ad for Popchips has raised the hackles of some in the Twitterverse, who are criticizing the ad as racist because Kutcher wears “brownface” in it. The commercial parodies dating-service ads, with Kutcher playing Raj, a 39-year-old “Bollywood producer” who’s looking for love. But the ad itself isn’t getting much love from Internet detractors, who are criticizing the brown makeup and stereotypical behavior he displays in the spot.
New York writer and entrepreneur Anil Dash called for an apology from Popchips, Kutcher and others associated with the ad. “I think the people behind this Popchips ad are not racist. I think they just made a racist ad, because they’re so steeped in our culture’s racism that they didn’t even realize they were doing it,” Dash wrote.
Brooklyn-based hip-hop group Das Racist was similarly unimpressed, and urged people to contact the company in protest.
“[T]hey got to pull this s—- and apologize, that’s it,” the group tweeted. “[I]t’s 2012, come on.”
A YouTube user offered another bashing in the comments section, writing, “LOL @ Ashton thinking he could become relevant again by putting on racist brownface, acting like Indian men are all creepers (who [have] moustaches), and attempting caricatures of popular filmy? dances. How mid-twentieth century! How cute! Very impressed.”
The ad is one in a series of Kutcher portraying a number of caricatures, including a bearded redneck, a dreadlocked British hippie and a pony-tailed German fashionista. Popchips claims that the ad campaign wasn’t intended to offend.
“The new Popchips worldwide dating video and ad campaign featuring four characters was created to provoke a few laughs and was never intended to stereotype or offend anyone,” the company said in a statement provided to TheWrap. “At Popchips we embrace all types of shapes, flavors and colors, and appreciate all snackers, no matter their race or ethnicity. We hope people can enjoy this in the spirit it was intended.”
A spokeswomen for Kutcher has not yet responded to TheWrap’s request for comment, though it’s a safe bet that the actor is probably blushing right now, under all that brownface makeup.
Tags: ashton kutcher, brownface, popchips
Posted by BeautyandtheEast on 05-01-2012 | Comments | Share | Filed under: Entertainment, Music
Hollywood Reporter: Kanye West has been spotted in the Middle East nation state of Qatar, reportedly shooting a music video alongside fellow rapper Kid Cudi.
Rumors first emerged in February that West was considering the region for his next video project, with members of his team having spent some time scouting possible locations and production partners in Qatar, alongside Abu Dhabi and Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.
But it seems Qatar emerged as the victor, and Kanye and his crew were seen late last week filming at the spacious ceremonial court in Education City, a vast complex on the outskirts of Doha, the country’s capital. Students living in the area reported seeing camels and horses on the set while Twitter was awash with Kanye sightings around town. One source suggested that the Doha Film Institute, the government-backed cultural organisation behind such events as the Doha Tribeca Film Festival, was involved.
While the entire operation has remained extremely secretive, many assume the video will be in the same vein as 2010’s “Runaway,” which served as a lengthy art-house teaser video for the My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy album.
“It’s going to be approximately 30 minutes long, in between a long form music video and short film,” a source told The Hollywood Reporter. “Kanye conceived the story, which is set in the Gulf. It’s supposed to showcase the beauty of the region, a piece that’s culturally sensitive and embraces the customs and traditions of the region.”
Speaking to local media, a student who had worked on the set said that models from a local agency had been used as extras, and that they had been dressed in a manner that was “culturally sensitive”.
Tags: kanye west, middle east
Posted by BeautyandtheEast on 04-18-2012 | Comments | Share | Filed under: Entertainment, Film/TV, Leaders/Stories
Huffington Post by Jim Luce: Interpreting Indian culture to an American audience is a challenge, but Shah Rukh Khan is so important to global art and social activism, I will attempt to do just that. The largest Bollywood actor and producer, he is a major, global entertainment figure who cares deeply about creativity and humanity. For this reason, Yale University presented him this week with its Chubb Fellow Award, its most prestigious award for leadership, given previously to Walter Cronkite, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton. In 2011, The Los Angeles Times noted, “He is the biggest movie star you’ve never heard of. And perhaps the world’s biggest movie star, period.” He is all of that and more.
American entertainment figures who might come close to him include Madonna and Lady Gaga, although neither of our stars can touch the output or contributions that Shah Rukh has made to India and the world. Paul Newman with his foundation also comes to mind. Shah Rukh has an estimated fan following in literally the billions. With a “B.” It is estimated that one-third of the world’s population knows of him. In New Haven’s Schubert Theater, the frenzy around him—almost religious—reminded me of past concerts with Elvis or the Beatles. Yet the majority of 1,700 fans were South Asian. Newsweek named him one of the fifty most powerful people in the world four years ago; in 2004, Time had featured him in their list of “Asian Heroes” under the age of 40. Today, Bollywood itself has surpassed Hollywood around the world and is now headed to the U.S.
Shah Rukh Khan, informally referred to as “SRK,” Shah Rukh has acted in over seventy Hindi films. One billion U.S. dollars have been made by just eleven of his films. After graduating with a Bachelor’s degree in economics, he started his career appearing in theatre and several television serials in the late 1980s. Deeply absorbed with goodness, ironically he is best known for his unconventional choice of negative roles in films such as Darr (1993), Baazigar (1993), and Anjaam (1994). Shah Rukh also owns a cricket team in India.
SRK was born in 1965. Although India has a Hindu majority, he is a Muslim—married to a Hindu woman, Gauri Chibber, in a traditional Hindu wedding ceremony. At home, his children follow both religions, with the Qur’an placed next to the Hindu deities. He spoke of his children frequently. Activism is in his genes, as his father was an Indian independence activist prior to Indian independence from the British in 1947. His distant roots are in Afghanistan. America still struggles with Islam: last year Shah Rukh was outrageously detained by our own immigration when he arrived through Newark. His press-conference and presentation was delayed for hours as, although he flew on a private jet from Mumbai to New Haven, U.S. immigration detained him in customs once again. He joked, “Whenever I begin to feel arrogant about myself, I take a trip to America!”
Shah Rukh was very attached to his parents as a child and describes their death at such a young age as a turning point in his life. His father lost his battle with cancer when Khan was 15 years old and his mother also passed away after a long illness. He says his biggest motivation for working hard is to make movies “so damn bloody big… that my parents somewhere sit down on a star and say ‘I can see his movies from here better than I can see the Wall of China or anything!’” He spoke repeatedly from the stage about his parents and the need for Yale students to honor theirs. “Love your parents. Cherish them.”
Shah Rukh works very hard, sleeping only 4-5 hours a night, but never brags about his good works. Known for not talking about his humanitarian work, he helped create the children’s ward at the Nanavati hospital in Mumbai. He contributes regularly to organizations and individuals, especially in the case of AIDS and cancer patients. He has also lent his name to various government campaigns throughout the years, notably those of Pulse Polio immunization campaign. He is a member of the board of directors of Make-A-Wish Foundation in India. He told the audience, “I want to increase education for women, provide toilets—simple things.” He dislikes gossip columnists. “The gossip and nonsense is so strange and make you feel weird—I just want to do good stuff.” “I don’t like relaxing at all,” he said, “and I am a disbeliever of holidays and taking times off.”
“I wish to give the creative part of me away, it’s not about how many Rupees I give.” But he gives generously. A few years ago, Shah Rukh adopted five entire villages outside Delhi, providing solar electricity through a program known as ‘Light A Billion Lives.’ The following year he adopted eight more villages—and then again eleven more. That’s a lot of light.
Recently this Bollywood legend visited two Kashmiri orphan children who suffered severe burns during a terrorist grenade attack in India and agreed to bear their medical expenses. In 2011 he was honored with the UNESCO’s Pyramide con Marni award for his charity engagements and social commitment towards providing education for children, becoming the first Indian to win the accolade. He told us how much he hated racial profiling, bigotry and sexism. As a Muslim performer, he has united not only India with its hundred languages and faiths, but people of all languages and faiths across the globe.
Back to his film career: in 1998, he won critical praise for his performance in Indian director Mani Ratnam’s critically acclaimed Dil Se… I interviewed Mani on film two years ago (video). In 2001 he played the role of Emperor Asoka in Santosh Sivan’s historical epic, Asoka, a partly fictionalized account of the life of Ashoka the Great whom I chronicled during my pilgrimage to Buddhist holy sites in India this January. Asoka was released coincidentally on 9/11 and played across the U.K. and in North America. Continuously challenged while “traveling while Muslim,” Shah Rukh was stuck in New York while promoting this film right after the September 11th attacks.
In 2009, while in Los Angeles, he took a break from filming to attend the 66th Golden Globe Awards in L.A. where he was introduced as the ‘King of Bollywood.’ Shah Rukh was then introduced with Freida Pinto of Slumdog Millionaire, a movie he had previously turned down.
My Name Is Khan is one of my personal favorites. Released in 2010 in cooperation with Fox, My Name is based on a true story, dealing with post 9/11 Islamaphobia. His film became the highest-grossing Bollywood film of all-time in the overseas market up until then. I love his line, “My name is Khan—and I am not a terrorist.” Being harassed by U.S. immigration seems to be SRK’s lietmotif. He told the Yale audience that our immigration service wears him down with silly questions. He imagined being asked his race so that he could reply, “white.”
I cannot commend my father’s alma mater, Yale University, for being the first American university to honor this man. Shah Rukh Khan is a thought leader and global citizen of the highest magnitude.
Tags: shah rukh khan, yale, chubb fellow award, jim luce
Posted by BeautyandtheEast on 04-17-2012 | Comments | Share | Filed under: Entertainment, Film/TV
Knights of the Mid-East Film Festival
New Film Makers Film Festival
Wednesday, April 25th, 2012
7-11 pm
32nd 2nd Ave (at 2 St.)
$6/film
Don’t miss the showing of Moniere’s new film XeNation at the festival! Born in Kandahar, Afghanistan. Moniere moved to Brooklyn, New York when he was nine. By age ten, Moniere embraced his acting and film career. He graduated from the State University of New York at New Paltz, double majoring in Psychology and Theater Arts. He also studied graduate level Film and Media at The City University of New York’s Hunter College and was accepted to The New School University’s graduate MFA program. Moniere has been awarded Best Director at several film festivals. His film, “Dissonance”, has been awarded numerous nominations and accolades including Best Feature Film. He is wrapping up a documentary trilogy: “XeNation?: Abundance”, “XeNation?: Consciousness”, and “XeNation?: MPO”; dedicated to the mind, body and spirit. Currently, Spring 2012, he is preparing for several narrative feature films which include, “Laila or Not” and “Scarlet Poppy”.
Tags: knights of mid east, new film makers festival, xe nation, moniere
Posted by BeautyandtheEast on 04-12-2012 | Comments | Share | Filed under: Entertainment, Leaders/Stories
By Kamal Kobeissi
Al Arabiya LONDON
One hundred years have passed since the sinking of the Titanic, considered the worst disaster the seas have ever witnessed in the twentieth century. In the middle of the extensive coverage this shocking event has received, hardly anything has been mentioned about the Arab passengers that perished on the ship.
In addition to the list of victims which reveals all the Arabs who died in the tragedy were Lebanese except one Egyptian, the proof of Arab presence on the ship was evident in the 1997 blockbuster movie directed by James Cameron.
In the film “Titanic,” an Arabic speaking mother is heard urging her daughter to hurry when she ship starts to sink. The Lebanese accent with which she says “Come! Come!” in Arabic shows her roots.
Her husband replies, also with a Lebanese accent, “Wait! Let me see what we can do,” while panicking in one of the third class corridors. Behind the Lebanese family appears the film’s protagonist Leonardo Di Caprio, also an inmate of the third class, running with Kate Winslet in tow.
The Lebanese husband is seen flipping through the pages of a book that contains a layout of the ship in order to look for a way out. Other than this scene, which lasted for only six seconds, nothing was heard of Arabs who died in this tragedy even though the world keeps remembering the victims on every anniversary.
This clip from the movie is shown on Al Arabiya followed by real footage from the only video recorded inside the ship since it sailed on its way to New York. The video was discovered 27 years ago.
Titanic tragedy felt in Lebanon
The village of Kafr Mishki in the Rashaya District southeast of the Lebanese capital Beirut suffered the most in the Titanic tragedy. The village, whose population does not exceed 500, lost 13 of its residents.
“The church of Kafr Mishki will hold Sunday a Mass for the victims and the congregation will observe a minute of silence to mourn their death,” village mayor Khalil al-Sikli told Al Arabiya in a phone interview.
Sikli added that more than 11,000 natives of Kafr Mishki have immigrated to several parts of the world and are currently scattered over five continents.
“More than 6,000 from Kafr Mishki are in Ottawa, Canada alone.”
The village of Hardine in the Batroun District in northern Lebanon comes second as far as lives lost in Titanic are concerned.
“Hardine lost 11 of its residents in the Titanic [disaster],” the village mayor Bakhous Sarkis Assaf told Al Arabiya.
“When the ship started sinking in the first hours of dawn, those 11 passengers gathered in one corner and started reciting verses one of them improvised in the style of Lebanese vernacular poetry.”
According to Assaf, who says the story has been narrated down generations, the verses Hardine residents recited right before their death were: “O Hardine, weep and lament the death of 11 of your youths who did not exceed 25 years old. Five of them are single and the others are married. None of them is old. They’re all 25.”
Like Kafr Mishki, Hardine will hold a Mass in its church to remember its victims in Titanic, Assaf added.
“I just wish that the Lebanese government would also remember those forgotten victims especially at the 100th anniversary of the tragedy.”
Assaf from Pennsylvania told the story of a 19-year-old boy called Daher Shadid Abi Shadid from the village of Abrine in northern Lebanon. Abi Shadid accidentally killed a girl from his village while experimenting with his gun.
“Fearing the retaliation of the girl’s family, Abi Shadid left the village not knowing where to go until his uncle, who lived in Pennsylvania, sent him some money and told him to travel to the U.S.,” Assaf told Al Arabiya.
Shadid first went to Marseille in France and from there boarded the Titanic which stopped at the UK to pick up more passengers before sailing to New York.
“Shadid escaped a fate in Lebanon only for his uncle to receive his corpse from the Titanic,” he said, again recounting a story as told throughout generations.
One of the most striking details revealed to Al Arabiya during the search for details about Arab victims on the Titanic was provided by Syrian-American writer Laila Salloum Elias who wrote a book titled “The Dream and then the Nightmare.”
Elias relied on Arab newspapers published in New York at the time of the ship’s sinking as information for her book. One such story came from the then famous al-Hoda newspaper.
According to Elias, who also listened to testimonies from victims’ families, several of the Lebanese victims were shot dead for refusing to obey the orders of the ship’s security personnel.
One was killed for trying to get on a life boat reserved for first class passengers.
Tags: arabs, lebanese, titanic, ship, sinking
Posted by BeautyandtheEast on 03-13-2012 | Comments | Share | Filed under: Entertainment, Music, Leaders/Stories
From X-Factor Australia, Iraqi-born Emmanuel Kelly tells the beautiful story of his rescue and adoption. When he and his brother were found as infants in Iraq, they had no birth certificates and had been severely injured. Both were eventually adopted by their Australian mother, whom Kelly speaks of during his audition:
“I was born in the middle of a war zone. My brother and I were found by nuns in a box in a park, in a shoebox … It was like looking at an angel when my mum walked through the orphanage door. She brought us both to Australia for surgery originally, and then, sort of, mum fell in love with both of us. My hero would have to be my mother.”
Watch him perform “Imagine” by John Lennon.
Tags:
Posted by BeautyandtheEast on 03-07-2012 | Comments | Share | Filed under: Entertainment, Film/TV
Hurriyet Daily News: “Fetih (Conquest) 1453,” a Turkish film that details the Ottoman conquest of Istanbul, was viewed by close to 2.5 million viewers in its first week, according to Anatolia news agency. The movie, which debuted Feb. 16, garnered an estimated record-breaking 12 million Turkish Liras at the box office in its first week, daily Milliyet reported.
The film is being shown in 850 cinemas around Turkey and has reportedly drawn 2.47 million people. The movie, directed by Faruk Aksoy, tells the story of Istanbul’s capture by the Ottomans during the reign of Sultan Mehmed II.
It has angered Christians in the German city of Cologne, with the Christian association Via Dolorosa boycotting the film. The association said Turks should be ashamed of what they did to Christians in the past instead of celebrating Istanbul’s conquest. Germany has prohibited the presentation of the film to viewers under the age of 16, Milliyet reported.
Turkish immigrants in Germany, more than 104,000 of whom went to see the film during the first three days of its release, have complained that they were unable to bring their children along.
The movie has also angered Greek viewers after it was released there in January. Greek weekly To Proto Thema described the film as “conquest propaganda by the Turks” in a story published on its website.
“The Turkish invaders present themselves as rulers of the world” and “[fail] to show the mass killings of Greeks and the plunder of the land by the Turks,” the piece said.
According to Wikipedia, The Fall of Constantinople (Greek: Άλωση της Κωνσταντινούπολης, Alōsē tēs Kōnstantinoupolēs; Turkish: İstanbul’un fethi) was the capture of the capital of the Byzantine Empire, which occurred after a siege by the Ottoman Empire, under the command of 21-year-old Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II, against the defending army commanded by Byzantine Emperor Constantine XI Palaiologos. The siege lasted from Friday, 6 April 1453 until Tuesday, 29 May 1453 (according to the Julian calendar), when the city was conquered by the Ottomans.
The capture of Constantinople (and two other Byzantine splinter territories soon thereafter) marked the end of the Roman Empire, a state which had lasted for nearly 1,500 years; it was also a massive blow to Christendom. After the conquest Mehmed made Constantinople the Ottoman Empire’s new capital. Several Greek and non-Greek intellectuals fled the city before and after the siege, migrating particularly to Italy. It is argued that they helped fuel the Renaissance. Some mark the end of the Middle Ages by the fall of the city and empire.
Tags: fetih 1453, conquest 1453, turkey, faruk aksoy
Posted by BeautyandtheEast on 03-05-2012 | Comments | Share | Filed under: Entertainment, Film/TV
Daily Mail: A new reality show is set to do to a group of Iranian immigrants what Keeping up With The Kardashians did to a wealthy LA family.
It also appears to be very similar, on first appearances, to other aspects of the Kardashian franchise - from the long, dark locks to the lavish lifestyles, Shahs of Sunset follows the antics of six 30-something ‘Persian socialites’ living around Sunset Boulevard. The brainchild of Ryan Seacrest - he of Kardashians and Sasha Baron-Cohen’s Oscars ashes stunt fame - the successful producer is keen to focus on their good values, rather than the flashiness and bling that have come to characterise many well-heeled Iranians in California.
‘The great thing about a show like this,’ he told The Daily Beast, ‘is that it promotes something I believe in, which is friendship and family. We like shows about that.’
Cast members from the area of LA known as Tehrangeles, agree, saying that the show is about friendship and are excited, as one put it, about ‘the impact it’s going to have on people to see us Persians and learn something new.’ They might be on to something - many of the cultural stereotypes of Iranians seen in the U.S. media hinge upon ‘the terrorist Arab archetype or Persian archetype,’ Thaddeus Russell, author of a renegade history of the United States, told The Daily Beast. Drawing upon the strong ties LA has to Iran - it became a new home to many exiled families after the 1979 revolution - the show is also being compared to Jersey Shore. But its proponents say the cast is about much more than than heels, lap dogs and hair extensions.
A dapper-looking moustachioed man by the name of Reza Farahan believes that he is an ‘anomaly’ in that he is a gay Persian. ‘We are much more sophisticated [than Jersey Shore’s cast],’ he told Daily Beast. ‘We come from different backgrounds of lawyers and doctors. Those people on Jersey Shore are hooking up every night. They have a ‘smoosh’ room. They drink pickle juice. They have nothing. They are incredibly trashy. We are not like that.’ He says he wouldn’t change a thing about his background and professes to be a great sports fan. The clique has close ties - all went to Beverley Hills High School together in the Eighties and Nineties.
29-year-old Golnesa ‘GG’ Gharachedaghi is a daddy’s girl - beautiful, hunting for a husband and fully financially dependent on her father. She is unabashed about the show’s potential. ‘Do I think people will see us in a different light? Yes, I do’ she said to the site. ‘We are not terrorists. Our money isn’t from oil. We’re not related to Saddam Hussein or Osama bin Laden.’ Asa Soltan Rahmati left Iran aged just 8 and made her way to the U.S. via Hamburg, Germany. On a show preview, the musician says she has been called the Persian MIA, the Persian Lady Gaga, the Persian Kesha and the Persian Grace Jones - and made a song named for her homeland pomegranate stew dish, FessenJoon.
‘My videos get around’ she tells the Daily Beast. ‘I get pulled over by Persian girls who want to take pictures of me. We don’t have any people that are out in the public, that are living outside the box.’ Mercedes ‘MJ’ Javid has a reputation as a party girl and spoils her two pet chihuahuas rotten. According to the bravo site, there is no love lost between her and her mother: ‘Coming from different sides of the spectrum MJ and her overbearing and unconventional Persian mother, Vida, fight over everything including the way MJ dresses.’ Sammy Younai and Mike Shouhed are both in the real-estate business. Mike, 33, says he is part of the city’s ‘Persian Real Estate Mafia’ while muscle-bound Sammy, 35, is a ‘ladies man’. He admits - for all the women out there - that while he is currently dating someone, the relationship is ‘not serious’.
Shahs of Sunset premieres on March 11 on Bravo at 10pm.
Tags: shahs of sunset, iran, ryan seacrest, bravo tv
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