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[0:09] Robert Bannon: Welcome to The Roundtable. My name is Robert Bannon. You're listening to us on Broadway World over here on the Broadway Podcast Network, iHeart, and Spotify. Wherever you listen to artists talking about art, we have two incredible actors that I have had the pleasure of having here. You've seen them too. They've been in big giant hits that you love from Star Wars to streaming television shows to a brand new film that they're in together. I'm excited to have you both here. Welcome to The Roundtable.

[0:36] Fares Fares: Thank you so much. Great to be here.

[0:38] Cherien Dabis: Pleasure to be with you.

[0:39] Robert Bannon: So you are here to talk about a movie called Eagles of the Republic. Fares Fares, which is the greatest name of all time. How do you describe this movie?

[0:52] Fares Fares: Oh, how do I describe this movie? It's an intense political thriller. That's how I would describe it.

[1:06] Robert Bannon: It sounds like my kind of movie. I love a thriller. Am I gonna be scared? Is it scary?

[1:12] Fares Fares: Well, in some sense, it's scary, but not, you know, it's not like someone's gonna jump out of a coffin or something, and then there is one pretty scary character.

[1:25] Robert Bannon: Yeah, there is. That sounds like my kind of show. So I want to make sure that everyone knows that this lovely lady over here, you've been watching and has been in some incredible work. You have jobs, you're working on television. Why say yes? Why did you jump at the opportunity to do this movie?

[1:48] Cherien Dabis: I really wanted to work with Tarek. I was a huge fan of his films. I'd watched The Nile Hilton Incident, Cairo Conspiracy. I was really genuinely a fan. So when I heard that he was thinking about me for this film, I jumped on it. I was like, yes, I want to meet with him. And, you know, of course, the moment you talk to Tarek, you're just kind of blown away by the depths of his intelligence. We talked about the script, and I loved the way he talked about the script, everything he said about the character. He really goes deep. There are so many layers of meaning to what he's looking to create. He has such a distinct vision and really knows what he wants. You can see it in his work that he really knows what he wants. So he was definitely a director that I wanted to work with and was thrilled to get the opportunity.

[2:40] Robert Bannon: Well, what I know about you is that when I talk about television, if you watch Only Murders in the Building, then you know that you've directed episodes of the show. If you watched The L Word early in your career, you were on that show, and you've done a lot of other film work, like important film work about immigrants, about shows, movies that have been at Sundance. You've talked about your past history being Arabic in America and what it's like to have been in Ohio and your family's from Jordan. So this story about Egyptian storytelling and filmmaking must hit pretty close to home for you.

[3:14] Cherien Dabis: It definitely did. I mean, this is a portrait of corruption in many ways. I was really attracted to essentially what the movie has to say about our part of the world. And it's not just our part of the world, by the way. These days, the authoritarian regime, the level of corruption, I think will be familiar to all people everywhere. And that's actually what makes the movie super relevant. It was another thing that I read that I thought, like, this hits close to home, not just for Egypt, not just for the Arab world, but for everywhere right now. I think that's one of the things that people will really love about this film.

[3:53] Robert Bannon: Yeah, we're living in crazy times around the world here in the United States and everywhere. So we need to definitely watch a film like this. It's not just happening in Egypt or in the Middle East; it's in the United States. So, Fares, look, you've worked with, I don't know, Denzel and Tom Hardy and Chris Pine, and we love Westworld and we love Chernobyl. You are an actor, like holy cannoli. So when this script came to you, what about it said, I'm gonna take a couple months of my life and I'm gonna commit to doing this project?

[4:25] Fares Fares: Well, first of all, put aside that I really loved the script and the character and everything. Just working with Tarek was amazing. This is our third major feature. We've done other stuff together. I've done a few music videos with him, and I was in a small part in one of his animated films. But these three films that I've done with him, it's just he's the best to work with. The way that we do it is like he's got an idea, and he starts talking to me about it, and I listen and I listen and I listen, and then maybe I'll say something and take it in. He will do something much better out of what I say, and then I read, and we talk so much about the script, and he kind of brings so much to my world, like things that I didn't know about that he teaches me about life. Besides all that, he's my best friend. So I don't know if I had any choice really.

[5:32] Robert Bannon: See, look at that. If he asks me to do something...

[5:37] Fares Fares: The nepotism of it all.

[5:39] Robert Bannon: No, I'm kidding. You know what's funny about that, Fares, is when I went to acting school, one of my friends said, when you go to school together and you make friends who are artists, you better stay close friends because one of them's gonna make a movie and they're gonna call you and need you to jump in, and it may just be a gigantic thing for sure.

[5:58] Cherien Dabis: Exactly for both of you. So tell me about your character. Go ahead, Cherien. Starting up, who is your character? What do you play? How did you find her? How did you do the background to find who she was?

[6:13] Cherien Dabis: Well, my character is the co-star of George. So, you know, we're both Egyptian movie stars. My character in some ways represents the stakes of the movie, like the emotional stakes of the film. She's this person within a corrupt world who really holds on to her integrity, and you see the consequences of what happens to people who do that within this world of corruption. It was one of the things I was super attracted to in this character was that she really is like one of the few people with integrity in this kind of dark world where there are consequences when you have integrity, when you speak truth. I really loved that about her, and you don't actually see a lot of what happens to her on screen.

She has kind of few moments on screen, but you really feel the weight of what's happening to her when you do see her. One of the things I think that was really fun for me was just really kind of digging into those scenes, even physically, like what does this character look like now because she's just been through all of this stuff that happened off screen? How can we communicate that in what she looks like? It was really fun to help design that kind of physical arc of the clothing, the hair, the gray hair growing out, the kind of busted lip, all of it.

[7:07] Robert Bannon: I have to be completely honest, I can't keep saying this incredible actress because I'm so intimidated to mess up your name. So can you say it properly so I don't slaughter it?

[7:07] Cherien Dabis: It's no problem. It's Cherien.

[7:07] Robert Bannon: I kept wanting to say Shirian, and I was like, I'm not trying to mess up this. Okay, she's a director; she could look at my face and I could be in Only Murders in the Building tomorrow, Fares, you know what I mean?

[7:07] Fares Fares: I know what you mean.

[7:07] Robert Bannon: So for you, Cherien, so Fares, for you, you get to play this movie star, B-list movie star, Egyptian star.

[7:07] Fares Fares: A-list.

[7:07] Robert Bannon: A-list, he's pretty A-list in Egypt.

[7:07] Fares Fares: Yeah, he's A-list in Egypt.

[7:07] Robert Bannon: I'm gonna take that. You see, that's why you can't use AI-generated things because they'll tell you the wrong thing, Fares.

[7:07] Fares Fares: Yeah, they would tell you.

[7:07] Robert Bannon: How did you find yourself? How did you find the character? What was it like to try to discover him and put him on screen?

[7:07] Fares Fares: I mean, it's lots of fun. The character that I'm playing, George Farming, he's the number one actor in Egypt. There's like no one bigger than that. It's not a B-list; that's an A-list. It was important to make him actually a good actor, not just someone that was famous. At the same time, those types of actors are like an old-school type of movie star. I wanted to base him a little bit on someone like Marcello Mastroianni or Alain Delon or Humphrey Bogart, if you'd like. They were more of a persona than the actors playing characters because you would imagine that they were the same person in front of the camera as behind the camera. I thought George Farming was more like he was a bit lighter, so I lost a lot of weight because of that.

I felt like he was gliding through life because he thought that nothing, no one could touch him, that he was just larger than life, that no one could get to him. The interesting part about this character is piece by piece he starts realizing after a while because in the beginning, he doesn't want to get the president to play him, right? It would be something equivalent to like if Trump made George Clooney play him, and George Clooney had to say yes, and it was a proper propaganda film. In the beginning, he was like, I don't want to do it, and then they kind of forced him to do it. The thing that he realizes after a while is that he is selling his soul to the devil because when he becomes friends with these guys, he's kind of enjoying it in the beginning.

They start asking him for favors, and then they start kind of eating his soul in a way, and he becomes part of this whole corruption. Too late, he realizes that there's no way out, and no matter who you are, they're gonna get to you.

[10:55] Robert Bannon: Sounds heavy, fascinating, harrowing.

[11:01] Fares Fares: Harrowing.

[11:11] Robert Bannon: Sounds a little bit like renaming the Kennedy Center after yourself or something like that.

[11:11] Fares Fares: Exactly.

[11:17] Robert Bannon: So you should take a listen and watch this film so you can see what has gone on and what could go on somewhere else. Cherien, for you now that it's gonna have this release, New York, LA is gonna get ready literally for the 17th. It's been nominated and awarded at film festivals, the biggest film festival in the world. Now it's coming to theaters around the United States; people can see it. What does it mean for people to get a bucket of popcorn and show up at the theater and check this out?

[11:41] Cherien Dabis: You know, I just think there's no experience like going to the movie theater. It's the most communal experience we can have. It's like going to see a show on Broadway; you just can't replace that experience. It's one of the few times in our lives that we go into a dark room and we do something together. We watch together; we go on a journey together, and we're impacted by the reactions of people around us. It's just a completely different experience than watching it at home. Even if we have a big screen, we hit pause a million times, we get up to go to the bathroom, we get a phone call, you know, so many distractions. There's just something so satisfying about going to a dark room, never looking at your phone, really focusing on the intent of all of the creative people who put this piece of art together, and really just letting yourself go on a ride.

I think that that's an irreplaceable experience. I truly hope that people will go out to the cinema to see this film because it's also just so incredibly cinematic. It's so beautiful. There's really so much that Tarek and his production designer and cinematographer worked hard to put in that frame so that you could have an experience. So yeah, I hope that people will go on that ride.

[13:01] Robert Bannon: Fares, how do you describe what it's gonna be like for people who should check this out? Who should come to the theater this weekend?

[13:08] Fares Fares: Everybody. Everybody in the US should go watch it. It should become the most seen film this year in the US. That's what I want.

[13:20] Robert Bannon: I think it's gonna, I mean, I will have to agree with Cherien because it's a beautiful movie. It's filmed on 65, which is like, you just can't experience it at home the same way. It's just incredible. I love going to the movies; I just love doing it. I recommend anybody to just go watch anything, really. Go to the theater and watch anything. But this film in particular, I really hope a lot of people will find the local theaters and go watch it.

[14:02] Robert Bannon: Look, it has won awards; it has been getting rave reviews from everywhere, from the Beverly Springs Film Festival all the way to Cannes, and it is gonna come into your neighborhood. It's gonna come to a local cinema near you. Get that number two combo, those two Diet Cokes, and that big bucket of popcorn. Take someone you love and go to the movies this weekend and go check them out. Thank you both so much for the incredible work you've done. I am a fan of the art that you both do and what you stand for. It's an honor to be able to have you here, and I hope you come back anytime. Thanks for being here.

[14:31] Fares Fares: Thank you.

[14:31] Cherien Dabis: Thank you for having us.