Barkhad abdi

He has broken into Hollywood like a pirate who makes a huge racket on a ship that in principle is not his. Barkhad Abdi has a story worthy of a fairy tale, or a movie about the American dream directed by Frank Capra. 

Barkhad Abdi was born in Mogadishu on April 10, 1985. But his family fled Somalia after the outbreak of civil war, so he spent his childhood in Yemen. When he was 14 years old, the clan moved to Minneapolis, Minnesota, home to the largest Somali immigrant community in the United States.

After exercising various trades in this town -waiter, DJ-, Abdi found a stable job as a limousine driver. One day, he heard an announcement on the news that a film director was going to do a casting in the city for an important character in a movie. He decided to show up without high expectations.

Not even Abdi himself believed it when he was told that he would participate in Captain Phillips – about the hijacking of a cargo ship at the hands of Somali pirates – and that he was going to appear on the screen alongside Tom Hanks himself . It took him a while to meet his illustrious co-star, because in search of maximum realism, the director Paul Greengrass decided that they were not going to meet until the scene in which the kidnapping takes place was filmed.

Despite his inexperience, Abdi did a first-rate job, humanizing his character, Abduwuali Muse, with apparent ease, despite the fact that he is the ringleader of the pirates. “To play him I drew on my personal experiences, as I witnessed the war in Somalia and was able to find personal ties to my character,” says the actor. Not surprisingly, despite being a newcomer, he has picked up the BAFTA for Best Supporting Role, and an Oscar nomination in the same category.

The future? It remains to be seen. But Abdi has already moved to Los Angeles. “I just want to keep acting and see where my career goes,” he has stated.