Ahmad Maksoud is an Egyptian-American actor. He’s worked in shows such as “Law and Order: SVU,” “The Blacklist,” and “The Good Fight.” In theater, he most recently performed in “On That Day in Amsterdam” at Primary Stages, “The Visitor” at the Public, and “The Band’s Visit” on Broadway.
Hayat Life Editor-in-Chief Fira Gasimova interviewed Maksoud about his acting journey.
Maksoud in “On That Day in Amsterdam”
Maksoud didn’t start out as a Lucille Lortel Awards nominee.
Gasimova: Looking into your educational history, you were always into acting and theater. How did everything start for you?
Maksoud: Since I was a child, I have been interested in performing. When I was a kid, I would put together lots of little plays with my friend in after school programs. However, I originally went to school for biology. I had this idea that I was going to be a doctor like a lot of Muslim kids do. After double majoring in theater and psychology, I got a job at a software company. I was just crying in my office everyday. I was miserable.
After quitting, I spent a couple of years trying to break into the industry and ultimately decided to return to school. I think a lot of Muslim households are a little bit afraid of letting their children pursue the arts, but I was relentless. I went and got my graduate degree, and I’ve been performing professionally ever since.
Gasimova: I relate to that a lot. I did ballet professionally for a long time, but I was taken out against my will. To this day, it was one of the things I loved the most.
Maksoud: Wow, yeah.
Maksoud in “On That Day in Amsterdam”
Maksoud talked about all the rewards and challenges of being an actor and offered advice for those who are in pursuit of the same career.
Gasimova: You do modeling and acting; what would you say are the most rewarding parts of each? What are the most difficult parts?
Maksoud: Part of why I pursued acting so much is because I’m a really curious person. It’s a job that’s always changing and exposing you to different ideas, environments, and stories. Getting to work with other people from different backgrounds and getting to examine different ideas and histories is probably the most rewarding part.
What’s most difficult is, this applies to modeling as well, particularly as an Arab, is the business has a lot of expectations of what it’s trying to sell, and I think Arabs aren’t as present in a commercial, creative space. Particularly in Western markets. Sometimes I feel like, independent of prejudice and discrimination, being Arab specifically, we sometimes get lost in the business because people don’t know where to put us, what to do with us, or what we represent. Staying connected to my ancestry and history and not being taken advantage of in that way and advocating for it as well. Those are probably the hardest things.
Gasimova: Yeah, I mean, it reminds you that you’re still a minority, even in this time and day when there’s so much more representation. There’s still not a lot of movies or shows that have people like you. Acting and modeling is a difficult field to get into. What would your advice be to people trying to pursue a career in these fields?
Maksoud: I would suggest for people to stop looking up and start looking to the sides. What I mean by this is find a community of people who you trust creatively and who you have similar aesthetics or perspectives with. Work with them, make things with them. Then when they succeed, you increase your chances of them providing you with an opportunity and vice versa. Personally, all of my successes have come from people on my level advocating for me when they manage to get through the door. If you start expanding your circle this way, you’ll find help going up the ladder as opposed to climbing it yourself.
Gasimova: Yeah, I feel like a lot of young actors and models feel like it’s such a competitive field that they’re too scared to get close with other actors and models. It’s refreshing that you would suggest inspiring and helping each other.
Maksoud: Yeah, build your community. That’s what matters.
Maksoud in “The Visitor”
Maksoud talks about reconnecting with Muslim heritage and culture.
Gasimova: How are you able to connect with your Muslim heritage? How do you reclaim it and experience it in New York City?
Maksoud: For so much of my upbringing, I was so nervous about losing a lot of my Muslim identity because of the way I didn’t fit into the ‘dogma’ of what it meant to be Muslim. So I stepped away from it for a long time. But what I love about being in a city like New York is I have a network of other Muslim-creatives and Arab-creatives, and we mutually taught each other how to navigate that space and how to hold onto our identity.
What I do respect and what I do hold onto is that Islam, at its heart, has a really direct and personal relationship with God. That’s something that I think is unique to Islam. You don’t have to work your faith through any kind of clergy or intermediary, you can make sense of it on your own. At the end of the day, we’re all just finding ways to be better to each other. That’s the goal of faith. Getting to see other people in my community, other artists, who are also doing the same thing is really validating.
Gasimova: That’s really interesting! For me, living in Baku, I couldn’t really identify with being a Muslim. Even though it’s a really secular city, the ideas floating around of what it meant to be Muslim never sat right with me. But after coming to a different country, people showed me how they were reclaiming their identity and made me proud of being Muslim.
Maksoud: Right, exactly.
Gasimova: As we conclude, what are you working on now? Do you have any future projects coming up?
Maksoud: A couple of friends of mine and I have been developing a TV series for a few years now, but in the interest of supporting our union strike, I’ll withhold those details for now. For theater, I’ll be performing in a concert presentation of a new musical titled “The Game Boy” at 54 Below in October. Otherwise, just auditioning and working on my own independent projects.
