Egyptian actor Mohamed Alaa started his professional career in 2005 in the television series Al Rimal (Sands). His debut role in a film was in Al Shayateen: Al Awda (The Devils: The Return) with Sherif Mounir. He followed that with roles in several films and series, including Hammam Attia in the recent popular Ramadan series El Ekhteyar 2 (The Choice 2). eniGma’s Youssef Elkarabigy spoke to Alaa about playing a terrorist and what it took to prepare for this latest role.
How do you prepare for a role, especially when it is based on someone real?
Preparing for a fictional character is harder than one based on a real person; you must create everything with the director using your imagination! But for a character based on an actual person, you just put effort into studying the person himself. In Hammam Attia’s case, I couldn’t meet any of his family members as they were not close to him, because he was born in Switzerland and lived in France. We found out more about Hammam from the police investigation with his wife, which uncovered so many important details. After listening to these investigations and what other people said about him, we realised that Hammam had very destructive thoughts and he was very good at convincing others to kill people and become terrorists.
What attracted you to take on the role of Hammam Attia?
To be different! Between all the terrorist roles that have been done in the industry, I wanted to play a different role that would leave a mark. It would be a shame not to play an important role in Ramadan. I want everyone to remember me! Even if the role was not big, I still wanted to leave a mark, especially that my main role this year in the series EL Mulouk (The Kings) was postponed. This was my challenge and I won it!
What would you say is your favourite scene in El Ekhteyar 2?
My favourite scene is when I went to convince a man to kill cops after the death of his father, even though I didn’t even know anything about the guy.
If you could play any other role in El Ekhteyar 2, who would it be?
I wanted to play the role of a cop. Actually, that was the plan at the start. I was first called to play a cop, then the director Peter Mimi suggested switching my role from a cop to a terrorist.
Out of the many roles that you have performed as an actor, which one is your favourite and why?
I don’t have a favourite role or one that is similar to my personality, but I wanted the series Ekhtefa’a (Disappearance) to last longer. Also, I wish that my role in El Ekhteyar 2 lasted longer, I even called director Peter Mimi and told him that I’m upset that my role ended so quickly. Whenever I’m given a role, I make sure I do it in the best way possible, and I take so many people’s opinion before I agree on taking the role.
Do you have any work coming up soon?
I’ll carry on shooting Al Ameel Sefr (Client Zero) for now and I’m also reading two new projects but I can’t talk about them since I haven’t signed yet.
