One of your first acting jobs in the 1950s was the series “Deliran Tungstan”, which was aired several times after the revolution. Tell me about participating in this series?
Of course, the series has been broadcast with a lot of censorship. At that time (18 years old) I was working in theater and my friend introduced me to Homayun Shahnawaz and he chose me and I was involved in acting in this series for three months which was filmed in different places such as Bushehr and Qazvin and the central deserts of Iran.
Did you play one of the minor but attractive and important roles in the series?
I played the role of an English spy, who is a mystery at the beginning, and because of his good services for the British, he reaches the position of Bushehr Police Department. For this reason, a part of my game was removed in the broadcast after the revolution.
Do you remember “Diliran Tungstan”?
The main role of the series was played by Mahmoud Johari, who was a good actor and I have many pleasant memories of him. He remembers that after finishing filming, he and his fiancee had an accident with a tanker truck on Bushehr road.
How did your work in the theater take place?
I started acting in the theater in the late forties in Qazvin.
In the 40s and 50s, cities like Shiraz and Mashhad became cities that were often important players in the following decades. But in cities like Qazvin, this process of cultivating actors and introducing them to the body of cinema and television was less developed. What was the reason for this?
Qazvin was a small city in those years and was not known as a province, and its population was around 300 thousand people. But the case of Shiraz and Mashhad was different from cities like Qazvin in terms of population and facilities. Even now, Qazvin’s theater facilities are at zero. In those years, there were two or three of us who had artistic and theatrical activities. A few people later left the theater and went to work in the market.
After a few years, you entered the cinema with Taghi Mukhtar in Sobh Khakaster. How did this acquaintance take place?
In those years, we used to gather somewhere with some friends like Mehdi Fakhimzadeh, Masoud Asadollahi and Reza Karam Rezaei and write scripts.
How did you meet Mehdi Fakhimzadeh?
Fakhimzadeh was studying at the Faculty of Fine Arts, and I was active in fine arts and theater. Hamid Saarigian was going to perform a play in the university and I used to go there before I was accepted to the university and because I had a post-graduate diploma in electricity, I could not study in the field of art. With my follow-up, this barrier was broken and people like Kamkar brothers and Parviz Meshkatian became friends with me because of my work. To get permission to do this, I threw myself on the car of Minister of Education Farrokh Parsai and told the story that I have been coming to Tehran for two years to study at the university and I am facing this challenge. He wrote a letter and my work was prepared to take the exam at the university the following year. I stayed away from the discussion and as I said, Hamid Saarigian was performing “Rhino” at the theater school and was looking for someone to stand at the door and check the tickets, and I accepted this job and introduced myself as a conscientious agent. I did Mehdi Fakhimzadeh played in this show and I got to know him, Parviz Sayad and Izatollah Tazami behind the scenes.
Didn’t you ask Mehdi Fakhimzadeh to introduce you to movies?
No, I am not familiar with these things and in my fifty years of working career, I have never worked with anyone’s relationship or introduction.
What was the process of Taqi Mukhtar’s discussion and your appearance in “Sobah Ash Kastar”?
I met Taghi Mokhtar behind the scenes of the cinema and during that time I wrote a screenplay for Behrouz Voshoghi, which was not finalized for production. Taghi Mukhtar was in the pre-production of the movie “Morning of Ashes” and he first asked me to be his assistant. I accepted and the work started. There was a supporting role in the script, which was a professional billiards player, and Mukhtar asked me to play this role. The role had humorous features and several times when I saw the movie in the cinema with people, people had connected with this character.
To make your first film in the cinema, you went to the subject of the black life of Lashkars. What was the role of Gholamreza Sophace as a producer in the making of the movie “Serkhpoutoha”?
The film production group came from Tehran to Qazvin to make the film “Qasas” directed by Nizam Fatemi. Nasser Malek Matiei and Gholamreza Sopha were among the actors of the film. Fatemi was selected for one of the supporting roles, who was an apprentice in the shop of a businessman, played by Gholamreza Sopha. I was rehearsing the “Golden Serpent” theater in Qazvin when Fatemi and Malik Matiei saw the work and invited me to play the role, and in this way I got to know repression. He was a good, kind and popular man and he was a master of playing negative roles. I was in contact with him, who worked with him in the office of Abbas Shabaviz.
Did you produce “Indians” with great difficulty?
Ain Amir Naderi, who faced many challenges to make his first film, similar things happened to me. We didn’t have money to start filming and I had a friend in university who was in love with Behrouz Voshoughi and gave 100 thousand tomans for the film to be released.
Suppression did not inject money into the film as a producer?
No, suppression in the discussion of dubbing the film through his dubbing wife helped us to use first-class dubbers like Naser Tahmasab. In order to get a screening license, someone’s name must have been mentioned as a producer in the credits of the film, and for this reason, the name of Suppression was mentioned in the credits as the producer. Of course, he didn’t take anything from me and my friend as investors for this film.
Parviz Fenizadeh considering that you were a young director. How did you agree to play in the movie?
Parviz Fenizadeh was paid 50,000 tomans for playing in “Redheads”. In the mornings, I used to go to their house with my girlfriend and bring them to the stage and many other things that are not correct to say.
Considering the simultaneity of the screening of “Redheads” with the revolution, the film could not be seen as much as it deserves?
The movie was released at a bad time, in the summer and fall of 1957, which was the height of the conflicts. Anyway, the movie had an interesting subject and theme. I had a hard time making this film, and the burden of producing the film was on me and the cinematographer, and we did not have assistants or designers in the film.
After the revolution, you were able to be seen in the children’s series “Mahle Baru Bia” along with Reza Ruigiri, Akar Abdi, Pesiani, Jabali and many others. How was the process of this work?
The main director of this series was Dariush Maudebian and I was his assistant. The idea of modeling several actors was my idea and later these actors became famous.
One of the most important works of your career, which was popular and quiet street, was the family melodrama series “Aineh”. This series was formed based on what process?
I had a complete understanding of the family living conditions of the sixties among the middle-class families that were the characters of this series. Since my school days, I was always present in the park, alley, and market with my small voice recorder and I used to record people’s voices. At that time, due to the cooperation with the production of several teletheaters with the real name of Mrs. Pari Saberi, I was on television and in film and series groups, and I had also translated several foreign plays. At that time, the head of the television education department invited me to make some interludes for them, and I was given two ten-minute texts, and after reading them, I felt that it had the capacity to become a long script for making a series. We started working with the writer and he wrote the script based on my ideas and this script was formed and born. This script writing process took three months and I was in contact with the writer every day and we worked together. After the approval and estimation of the budget in the organization, the filming of the series started.
The interesting point of “Aine” series, apart from the values of its well-written script, was the choice of actors, which consisted of a real father and daughter (Asha and Ismail Mehrabi) in the cast of the series, or the successful presence of Javad Khodadadi, Mahiman, etc. did you use
All these actors were selected under my supervision, and the gem of Khairandish who doesn’t know me now! He had just come from Shiraz and was looking for a job with his young child, and I chose him. Even his two or three year old son was used. “Aine” was the live introduction of Yad Jamshid Ismailkhani and Gohar Khairandish to acting in movies and series. This story also exists for Marjane Golchin, and playing in this series made her famous.
One of the challenges of your career was not appearing in the series of wives?
I worked hard for this job for three or four months and I was supposed to act in that game and also direct it, but it didn’t happen and it’s better not to do it again.
In terms of acting, you appeared well in the form of intelligent, somewhat sweet and opportunistic characters with gray features in series such as “Khane Be Doosh”. How did you form these types of characters?
By stating some facts, friends get upset. I have acted in about 34 movies. None of the directors of these films told me what to do and accepted any ideas I put forward about how to play my role.
Is this routine very important for any actor?
I am sad about it. Because every actor has problems in his work that the director must retouch and share with him. Of course, in “The Last Act”, Varozh Karim Meshii acted against this procedure to some extent and arranged everything in front of the camera. Most of the current actors only memorize the dialogue and express it in front of the camera, and the directors don’t care about good or bad acting.
Maybe these directors knew about your directing skills and the correct guidance of the actors by you, and they would have given you a hand in presenting your performance?
This is also an opinion and if I confirm it, I will look like a selfish person.
What method do you use to play your roles?
The first step is role analysis. The point is that there is no absolute bad person and absolute good person. In Melville’s words, “Man is born innocent, but it doesn’t take long for his character to become black and gray.” I have always played negative roles in such a way that the audience likes me. A friend said that it was interesting for him to see my acting during the broadcast of “Khane Be Doosh” series.
One of the charms of your performance was your good coordination with Hamid Lolaei as a quick-tempered person without politics and confronting your clever and intelligent character, which created an attractive drama in “Khane Be Doosh”?
Yes, I did these efforts alone to improve the role. I love acting and I know its nuances well. I know more about people in society and their living conditions than many people in cinema.
Apart from working with Reza Attaran, you also had this experience with Mehran Madiri, why didn’t these experiences happen again?
While working with the manager, I realized that as the series progresses, my role and some others like Mahin Shahabi’s role becomes less and less, and we become a kind of third and fourth role in the series. I pointed out the incident and the manager said that it will be fixed, and when I saw that nothing happened, I went to the producer and said that we are not the black army and said goodbye to the group, and Mrs. Shahabi did the same. Unfortunately, the manager didn’t forget this incident and didn’t even invite me to the Durham program.
Did you expect him to invite you to attend a meeting?
I did not expect it and I am happy about this non-invitation.
What happened to not cooperate with Reza Attaran again?
Attaran is a first class human being and a good director, and after “Khane Be Doosh” he didn’t make any more series and went to the cinema and acting and it was natural because it earned him more money.
In Pooya Film and in collaboration with Farah Bakhsh, you had a successful comedy called “Pak Bakhte”, which was based on a film before the revolution. How did you direct this film?
“Pakbakhteh” was a custom film…
I mean, you weren’t interested in making it?
Absolutely, Farah Bakhsh invited me to his office and offered me the plan for this work, and at that time I was interested in making a film, and based on these conditions, I accepted to make it. The script was rewritten several times and finally I made the script written by Cyrus Elvand. We made rewrites in joint meetings with the agreement of Alvand. I made some changes on the set again and Farahbakhsh believes that “Pakbakhteh” is one of the good works of his office. In the meantime, one should not simply pass over the correct editing of Kamran Ghadkechian.
Was Khamsa’s couple, Akbar Abdi, also well placed in the structure of the film?
It was the first time that these two actors played together. One of the problems of Farah Bakhsh was that these two people were angry with each other, and this made it difficult for me, and I tried to use fewer scenes of the two of them in the film.
In “Pickbags don’t go to heaven”, you presented a good and correct performance in the form of a pickpocket gang leader who has a gray and clever personality in front of Khamse and Mohib Ahri.
Abolhasan Davoudi was a successful director in those years, and at that time I was full of hair and my makeup was different. Of course, in the few things we discussed, it is not one of my best games.
In which of the movies did you give a better performance?
I played a teletheater called Malcolm X in 1961. I played the role of Malcolm X in this telefilm.
what are you doing these days
I spend time in my 50-meter apartment in Qazvin, watching movies and hanging out with people on the street.