Top Actors

The following is a list of the actors who have appeared in three or more of the films on my catalogues. The actors are ranked according to number of appearances, large or small, leading or cameo, and not according to any favouritism on my part. I might at some point add actors who give stand-out performances in just the one film and who I haven’t seen in anything else, but for the time being I set three films as a basic hurdle for blog recognition. Since the project started out with me watching primarily Israeli and Palestinian films, with some other Arab input, the list was initially dominated by actors from those domains, but of course since I added a ton of Turkish and Iranian films that’s changed substantially. A lot of Iranian films very deliberately use amateur actors, which means that the number of professionals that I’ve got here appearing in three or more movies remains limited compared to the very large number of Turkish actors that you see.

It’s in the nature of things, as discussed in this early post, that Palestinian actors constitute a relatively small pool, and that is the reason why the top end of the list is dominated by them. The same actors tend to turn up again and again, sometimes as the Arab characters (in major or “token” roles) in Israeli films, as well as in the relatively small number of Palestinian films which manage to get made in the face of all the obvious difficulties. Quite remarkably, one of the Palestinian actors, Yussuf Abu Warda (the father of Layla in Habibi) plays a Haredi rabbi in Amos Gitai’s Kadosh. That’s some kind of range!

For the first year or so, Saleh Bakri had the honour of being classified as the most prolific Arab/Palestinian actor and most prolific overall. That’s him on the left of the picture, appearing in The Band’s Visit, alongside two others on this list, Ronit Elkabetz and Sasson Gabai. Over time, however, Ali Suliman (also Palestinian) crept up on Bakri, and finally overtook Bakri for overall leader of this list, for what little that title is worth. Still, if you add Saleh Bakri to his father Mohammad - also on the list - plus his two brothers, who are also actors and one of whom appears in at least one film on this list, the Bakri family wins the rather meaningless competition hands down.

Lior Ashkenazi is the most prolific Israeli-Jewish actor on the list. I’m clarifying that distinction, because like all the other Palestinian actors on the list (I think), Bakri and Suliman are also Israeli citizens. The last I checked, anyway - times are crazy, and things can change, I suppose.

There are currently 81 actors listed here - 13 Palestinians, 5 actors from elsewhere in the Arab World (mostly Lebanon), 17 Israelis, 17 Iranians, and 27 (!!!) Turks (some of whom, I suppose, might be more Kurdish than Turkish, which is COMPLICATED). At present the number of actors that I've got recorded as unambiguously Kurdish comes to precisely..... 1, but of course there will be many more people who would identify. All those numbers will keep going up. Expect more faces in due course!