Los Angeles - The city of dreams...

It has been exactly nine months since I moved to Los Angeles from New York City. In those nine months, I have worked at Paramount Pictures, been fired from six jobs, had a short film screen at the Cannes Film Festival (Broadway Bound), finished writing a feature length screenplay, and have been accepted into the prestigious MFA Directing program at the American Film Institute.

Looking back now, it has been an incredibly long journey to get to where I am today. Before moving out to Los Angeles, I was a professional actor in New York City. I auditioned for stereotypical Middle Eastern roles on a weekly basis, all the while playing a terrorist off-Broadway at the Flea Theater. It was definitely an exciting time in my life.


I decided to make the move out west in the summer of 2007. I had just finished directing my first short film (Broadway Bound), about an Arab-American actor struggling to survive in post-9/11 New York City. I wrote and directed Broadway Bound because I was fed up with all of the stereotypical roles I was being offered, and decided that change needed to be evoked. The film was based on my personal experiences as an Arab-American actor while living in New York City shortly after the 9/11 attacks. I was able to get Emmy-Award Nominee / National Board of Review winner Louise Lasser (Happiness, Requiem for a Dream, Take the Money and Run, Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman) to play the role of my talent agent in the film.






Shortly after finishing post-production on Broadway Bound, I packed my bags and made the move out west to Los Angeles. After a few weeks of living there, I decided to apply to the American Film Institute's prestigious Directing program. I wrote my personal statement in a few days while working a horrible desk job, and sent in my short film Broadway Bound as a creative sample of my work.

I received an interview from AFI a few months later, and on April 14th, I received a phone call from Peter Markham informing me I was admitted into the Directing program. Those were by far some of the best words I ever heard in my life. It has always been a dream of mine to one day walk the same halls as some of my favorite filmmakers. I was one of only 28 Directing fellows from all over the world who were admitted into the competetive program. I will now be joining the ranks of filmmakers such as Darren Aronofsky, David Lynch, Todd Field, Edward Zwick, and many others, who all graduated from AFI's Directing program.

This brings me to where I am today. I invite everyone to come on board with me as my journey to becomming a filmmaker beings.