Ziad Jallad plays a Syrian refugee trying to survive on the streets of Beirut by selling scrap metal in Wissam Charaf’s deadpan comedy Dirty Difficult Dangerous, winner of this year’s Europa Cinemas Prize in Venice.
The role of the displaced Ahmed, who has been wounded by war but finds a chance of happiness with a fellow refugee, has been winning plaudits for the 33-year-old Jallad. Despite being something of a late starter, the actor’s chameleon-like qualities and ability to play a manner of different characters from various backgrounds is likely to see him become a cinematic fixture.
Jallad’s ability to master accents and embody various personas, from Caucasian heartthrobs to disabled refugees, makes it difficult to guess that his roots are Lebanese-Egyptian. Living in Lebanon from the age of three, he moved to Egypt, his motherland, aged nine, where he would watch black-and-white Egyptian films and TV series with his mother. In 2014, he moved to Paris, where he is now settled.
Jallad had been working in the marketing department of a chemical distributor for four years when, inspired by a childhood desire to become an actor, he made the decision to take drama lessons. “I woke up and told myself, ‘I’m not going to work today, I’m going to pursue acting full-time’,” he recalls.
His first screen role was as David Parsky in French TV soap Les Mystères De L’amour, a part he auditioned for and landed after seeing a casting call on Facebook. After securing an agent, he has, he says, been taking ‘baby steps’ ever since, with small roles in Amazon’s Hanna TV series and Chloe Mazlo’s Skies Of Lebanon (2020).
It was Jallad’s agent who suggested that he might be perfect for the part of Ahmed in Dirty, Difficult, Dangerous, directed by Wissam Charaf (It’s All In Lebanon, Tombe Du Ciel). Having secured the role, Jallad’s main challenge was to find a way of playing a disabled character whose arm becomes increasingly hard to use as time goes on.
”I couldn’t overdo it,” notes the actor. ”Getting this right was my main concern because otherwise it would be too comical and a bit like Charlie Chaplin, as Wissam [the director] once jokingly remarked during one of the scenes. So I had to tone it down a bit and find the right balance.”
Jallad will next be seen in My Donkey, My Lover & I director Caroline Vignal’s Iris Et Les Hommes opposite Laure Calamy as well as the third season of Netflix hit series Emily In Paris.
Contact: Kristin Tarry, TCG Artist management Ltd
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