Something most people don't know about me is that I never grew up.

There's enough of a willingness in the West to do sympathetic movies about Arab roles.

I wish everybody was just ethnically ambiguous. It would make life a lot easier.

The future of Arab films is absolutely up to Arabs and no one else. They've got the equipment, they've got the will, they've got the talent, now they just need a little bit of history behind them and a bit of cultural relaxation.

I'm one of the luckiest Arab actors on the planet, because I've done, I think, two of the finest Arab roles that have been out in mainstream cinema for a very long time.

There are parts that you can do them all your life, and no one knows you're even acting, and there are other parts which somehow - I think they say they 'pop' - people notice that you're in and you become an actor from the movies and people take you in a whole different way. Whether or not I can keep that ball rolling is another matter.

I think if you're good and you can persuade people you're going to be able to do that role and ultimately the audience buys it, then it doesn't matter whether you were really a chimpanzee in disguise! You've done it.