Rami Malek
Malek in 2014, photo by Prphotos.com
Birth Name: Rami Said Malek
Place of Birth: Torrance, Los Angeles, California, United States
Date of Birth: May 12, 1981
Ethnicity: Egyptian Coptic, as well as one eighth Greek
Rami Malek is an American actor and producer. He won the Academy Award for Best Actor for Bohemian Rhapsody (2018). He played musician Freddie Mercury in the film. He has also starred, as Pharaoh Ahkmenrah, in the Night at the Museum films, and in the thriller The Little Things and the show Mr. Robot.
Rami’s parents, Nelly Abdel-Malek and Said Malek, are Egyptian immigrants, who came to the U.S. in 1978. He has said that he is also of one eighth Greek ancestry. His family is Coptic Christian. He has stated that he speaks Arabic “like a 10 year old” and that he grew up watching Egyptian movies with his parents.
Rami is the second male born in 1980 or after to have won an acting Oscar (Eddie Redmayne, for The Theory of Everything, 2014, was the first).
Rami has a family background in the town Samalut, Egypt. He has said:
There’s no first-generation, or second-generation removed. I am Egyptian. I grew up listening to Egyptian music. I loved Umm Kulthum. I loved Omar Sharif… These are my people. I feel so gorgeously tied to the culture and the human beings that exist there. I acknowledge that I have a different experience, but I am so enamoured and intertwined with Egyptian culture. It is the fabric of who I am.
Rami’s paternal grandfather was named Makhali Abdelmalek/Abdel Malek.
Rami’s paternal grandmother was named Juliette S. Guirguis.
Source: http://www.theglobeandmail.com
I thought he was white at first, but his name sounds Egyptian or Muslim
you can be white,egyptian and muslim at the same time…
he’s not Muslim, I bet
Only in terms of nationality, not in terms of ethnicity. Whites can’t be ethnic Egyptian because we are not Middle Eastern genetically.
Likewise a black person can be a Norwegian in terms of nationality if they were born in Norway, but they can never be Norwegian in terms of ethnicity because they will already be of an African ethnicity, like Zulu or Yoruba or whatever.
@Aksiram
So what if their half Norwegian by blood, you saying they still can’t ever be Norwegian other than by nationality? So what about a person like me who is African American, however having blood ties to a lot of different places, am I still just African?
then they’re half and half you absolute snowflake
He’s Middle Eastern. They can have blue eyes etc.
Egypt is part of north africa not the middle east and ofcourse they can have blue eyes it’s just less common than for example norway
Most North Africans/Berbers look Middle Eastern to me and most Egyptians are mixed with Middle Easterners.
No, they can not have blue eyes unless they are mixed with white Europeans. It’s not just “less common” than in Norway; it’s basically nearly non-existent.
Seriously you people on here… Have you ever traveled to non-white countries? I have been to Egypt eleven times and I have never seen an Egyptian Arab with blue eyes. NEVER.
@Aksiram
No offense, you not seeing something, doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. It’s already been proven,two years ago that African have their own version of the light eye gene. I don’t know about the Arabs, but other Africans are very superstitious, and tend to kill any that’s abnormal. From twins ,child being born left handed instead of right, bottom teeth coming out before top etc. As nina up above stated it less common. We have the same genes, you think a mutation would only happen once. the Light eye gene was around about 4000 yrs before the pale skin mutation, so what color were the people who had those blue eye?
@aksiram
In fact he is not an “Egyptian Arab”. His family is Coptic Christian. When he said that he is 1/8 Greek, he probably refers to the Melkite Greek Catholic Church, not that he has roots in Greece.
No, they cannot, unless they are mixed and part European white. Seriously, how many pure Middle Eastern people with blue eyes have you seen lol? One in 30 million?
You make that claim as if one in ten Middle Eastern person has blue eyes, which is asinine.
Thought he was white? He looks partially white at best. You can definitely tell that he is Middle Eastern with some white European admixture.
He reminds me of Bruno Mars…..
I just know his surname is similar to Lebanese Christian surname “Malick”
there are high chances his family isnt Muslim
His middle name “Said” is usually given to people believed to be descendants of Muhammad. I don’t think he would have it if he wasn’t Muslim.
its actually very common in the middle east wether you are muslim or christian.
The writer Edward Said was Christian (Egyptian/Greek Orthodox, I think).
Rami’s family is Coptic Christian.
I never really expected him to be Egyptian while watching Night at the Museum :D
This is kinda random but he seems like a happy person that I feel happy looking at him lol
White Egyptian!
He is not fully white, only partially.