jens stoltenberg was speaking as leaders of nato countries prepare to meet at a summit in madrid on tuesday. now on bbc news, it s hardtalk. welcome to hardtalk, i m stephen sackur. what i find funny, you might find offensive. comedy challenges taste and convention and it can rouse strong reaction, as we saw at this year s 0scars when a joke earned comedian chris rock a slap in the face from the actor will smith. my guest today has spent more than 25 years finding laughs in sometimes unlikely places. 0mid djalili was born in london to iranian parents. he has thrived as a cross culture comedic chameleon, but is it possible to be funny without being mean? 0mid djalili, welcome to hardtalk. stephen sackur, my friend, my fellow presenter in the business of show, man who is so unbelievably good looking and thin that he walks into snooker hall, they start chalking his head. i am so happy to be here, this is one of my favourite shows. well, if you carry on like that, this won t be a
in sometimes unlikely places, omid djalili was born in london to iranian parents. he has thrived as a cross culture comedic chameleon, but is it possible to be funny without being mean? omid djalili, welcome to hardtalk. stephen sackur, my friend, my fellow presenter in the business of show, man who is so unbelievably good looking and thin that he walks into snooker hall, they start chalking his head. i am so happy to be here, this is one of my favourite shows. well, if you carry on like that, this won t be an interview, it will be a monologue! let me ask you this, you have been doing comedy for almost 30 years, do you find the same stuff funny today as you did back then? what a tricky question! what a way to start. that is such a tricky question. look, at the end of the day, it is a big subject now because we saw the oscars and we saw will smith smack chris rock. can i just tell you, just to speak personally, i saw the video the day after, and i bleary eyed woke up on monday
Was chico and i was from palermo in sicily. the iranian revolution had happened so it had had an massive impact on me as a child the way people thought i was from a very weird culture. so, i think humour became a comfort. a weird culture, you say, and of course that is the way some in england at the time would have seen it but i wondered the degree to which you would have then sort of played into that notion of being a bit weird, a bit of an outsider in your early profession? in the memoir, there is this fascinating letter that you recount you wrote to a talent agency, and it goes like this. you said to the agency, i think the way forward is to go down the ethnic bit part route, i am quite adept at accents, you said rather immodestly, iranian, afghani, turkish, pakistani, i could even play a russian commandant or a bulgarian gymnast trainer, a slovak border guard. i can play french, german, american mafia boss, i m pretty good at regional british accents, too.
Immodestly, iranian, afghani, turkish, pakistani, i could even play a russian commandant or a bulgarian gymnast trainer, a slovak border guard. i can play french, german, american mafia boss, i m pretty good at regional british accents, too. so, you were pushing this idea that you could be put into a pigeonhole, i think you have later said the ethnic scumbag. yes, that was one of my firstjokes. i am an arab scumbag specialist but in the bond film, i did play the second azerbaijani oil pipe attendant, which is a major departure for me in my career! but here you are, walking yourself into a pigeonhole. i love that, i love it when you get challenging! it wasn t that, it was back in the 90s when i started off, i felt it was the only way to get work because, you know, you see films where in another country, you ve got all these actors with high cheekbones and they were good looking, i realised i was a short,
Happened so it had had an massive impact on me as a child the way people thought i was from a very weird culture. so, i think humour became a comfort. a weird culture, you say, and of course that is the way some in england at the time would have seen it but i wondered the degree to which you would have then sort of played into that notion of being a bit weird, a bit of an outsider in your early profession? in the memoir, there is this fascinating letter that you recount you wrote to a talent agency, and it goes like this. you said to the agency, i think the way forward is to go down the ethnic bit part route, i am quite adept at accents, you said rather immodestly, iranian, afghani, turkish, pakistani, i could even play a russian commandant or a bulgarian gymnast trainer, a slovak border guard. i can play french, german, american mafia boss, i m pretty good at regional british accents, too. so, you were pushing this idea that you could be put into a pigeonhole, i think you have later