Omid Djalili
Omid Djalili is a British stand-up comedian, actor, television producer and writer. Djalili was born on 30 September 1965 in St Mary Abbots Hospital in Kensington, London, to Iranian Baháʼí parents Ahmad and Parvaneh Djalili. His parents emigrated from Tehran to London in 1958. He has a brother and sister. His mother was a dressmaker who at one point assisted Iranian singer Googoosh. His father was a liaison officer at the Iranian embassy in which he would provide medical assistance. He was also a photographer whose pictures ended up in the newspaper Kayhan. He attended Holland Park School where he failed A-level exams a record six times and faked his results to gain entry to Ulster University in Coleraine, Northern Ireland, studying English and theatre studies having been turned down by 16 drama schools. Djalili cited Jack Lemmon, Dustin Hoffman, Meryl Streep, Robert De Niro, Christopher Walken and Julia Roberts as influences. The first significant success of his stand-up comedy career was at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 1995 with "Short, Fat Kebab Shop Owner's Son", followed by "The Arab and the Jew" with Jewish comedian Ivor Dembina in 1996. Djalili has appeared in a number of films, most notably Gladiator, The Mummy, Mean Machine, The World Is Not Enough, Alien Autopsy, Spy Game, Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow, Grow Your Own, Notting Hill, Mr Nice, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, Sex and the City 2 and provides his voice in Over the Hedge. He has observed that he usually appears as a generic Middle Eastern background character in many of these films, often commenting that he appears in the James Bond film as the "Second Azerbaijani oil pipe attendant". He appeared as Nasim in 22 episodes of the U.S. sitcom Whoopi, starring Whoopi Goldberg, and picked up an international film award for Best Supporting Actor in Casanova, starring alongside Heath Ledger and Jeremy Irons. Djalili has won awards for his comedy. These include the EMMA Award, Time Out Award, and LWT Comedy Award for Best Stand-up Comedian, Spirit of the Fringe Award as well as the One World Media Award for his Channel 4 documentary, Bloody Foreigners. He has also been nominated for awards, such as the Perrier Award for Best Comedian, the Gemini Award for Best Comedy Performance of 2003, the South Bank Award for Best Comedy of 2003, the Royal Television Society Award for Best Stand-up, and the European TV Award for his Bloody Foreigners.
116 acting credits
Acting · 116
Midsomer Murders
1997
The Graham Norton Show
2007
Top Gear
2002
The Mummy
1999
Have I Got News for You
1990
The One Show
2006
Late Night with Conan O'Brien
1993
Relic Hunter
1999
Never Mind the Buzzcocks
1996
Gladiator
2000
His Dark Materials
2019
Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End
2007
Would I Lie to You?
2007
The Bad Guys 2
2025
Have I Got a Bit More News for You
—
Question Time
1979
GMTV
1993
The Ruth Rendell Mysteries
1987
Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law
2000
Dispatches
1987
Room 101
1994
Friday Night with Jonathan Ross
2001
Michael McIntyre's The Wheel
2020
Over the Hedge
2006
Celebrity Mastermind
2003
Black Books
2000
Alan Davies: As Yet Untitled
2014
Notting Hill
1999
In Your Dreams
2025
Sex and the City 2
2010
Whoopi
2003
The World Is Not Enough
1999
Blankety Blank
2021
Kate Garraway's Life Stories
2009
Jason and the Argonauts
2000
Dickensian
2015
Deep Cover
2025
Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again
2018
The Nutcracker and the Four Realms
2018
Love Again
2023
One Night Stand
1989
Shaun the Sheep Movie
2015
The Michael Ball Show
2010
Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow
2004
Lock, Stock...
2000
Spy Game
2001
Insert Name Here
2016
Live at the Apollo
2004
Mean Machine
2001
The Great Sport Relief Bake Off
2012
Beat the Chasers
2020
The Change
2023
The Paul Reiser Show
2011
Casanova
2005
Rob Brydon's Annually Retentive
2006
The Love Guru
2008
Let's Dance for Sport Relief
2010
The Omid Djalili Show
2007
Comedy World Cup
2012
Molly Moon and the Incredible Book of Hypnotism
2015
Headcases
2008
The Secret Policeman's Ball: The Ball in the Hall
2006
A Grand Night In: The Story of Aardman
2015
Mr. Nice
2010
All the Queen's Horses with Alan Titchmarsh
2009
The Calcium Kid
2004
Modigliani
2004
TV Heaven, Telly Hell
2006
Dinotopia 2: The Temptation
2002
The Infidel
2010
Alien Autopsy
2006
Alexei Sayle's Merry-Go-Round
1998
Journey to Bethlehem
2023
Anita and Me
2002
Winning Combination
2020
Grow Your Own
2007
Britney
2021
Les Dawson Lost Tapes
2021
My Family and Other Animals
2005
Paul O'Grady's Saturday Night Line Up
2021
Dead Man Running
2009
The Siege
2026
Coming Soon
1999
Mad Cows
1999
Big Fat Gypsy Gangster
2011
Going Forward
2016
We Are Most Amused
2008
Dinotopia 6: The Exit
2003
Comic Aid
2005
Cinema Iran
2005
Dinotopia 3: The Election
2002
Dying Laughing
2017
We Are Most Amused and Amazed
2018
Deadlines
2005
Cold War Steve Meets the Outside World
2020
Dinotopia 4: New Horizons
2003
New Town
2009
Tomorrow Morning
2022
Just Like Us
2011
World's Greatest Stand Up: Volume One
2006
Retrospective
2014
Dinotopia 5: The Virus
2003
Omid Djalili: Tour of Duty
2012
The Egyptian Job
2011
Coming Soon
1999
Chandshanbeh Ba Sina
—
Chopratown
2005
Dinotopia
2002
Christmas Comedy Club with Lost Voice Guy
2021
The Comedian's Guide to Survival
2016
Omid Djalili: No Agenda
2007
Omid Djalili: Live in London
2009
About A Bell
—
The Way Out
2020
Performance Live: The Way Out
—
One-Night Stand: Omid Djalili
2005