Rising actor Kaj Adnan, whose journey to Hollywood began in Bahrain, has appeared as the lead actor in a short film centred on a soldier in an oppressive regime asked to make an impossible decision.
The 25-year-old actor, who is originally Lebanese but was born and raised in Saudi Arabia before moving to Bahrain when he was 11, is starring in Obligatory – a 12-minute short film set during the oppressive military rule in Greece in the early 1970s.
Mr Adnan plays the role of Elias, a young prison guard who is tasked with executing his former college professor, in a story about “fighting evil with our greatest tools – unrelenting perseverance and unwavering optimism”, according to director Eli Staub.
The poster of Obligatory
“The film is set during a real historical moment that happened in Greece, starting in 1967 and leading to a seven-year coup, during which the ruling party killed or tortured anyone who would oppose them,” the actor told the GDN.
“The writer (Angelo Pitsillis) took this moment in history and created a fictional story set during that time, where my character is tasked with executing someone, who he discovers, is his former college professor.”
Obligatory was recently screened at the Eileen Norris Cinema Theatre in Los Angeles and will be submitted to international film festivals throughout 2024.
Mr Adnan studied at Modern Knowledge Schools in Juffair, before studying business marketing at Bahrain University.
Mr Adnan
While completing his undergraduate studies in the kingdom, he started doing commercials and participating in acting workshops, while also building a following on his YouTube channel, which currently has more than 1.75 million subscribers.
Despite his popularity on the social media channel, when Mr Adnan moved to Los Angeles a year and a half ago, he decided not to highlight this as he started to audition for movies and short films.
“I didn’t want people to see me as a YouTuber and so, in terms of acting, everything I have built here has been from zero – so now I have two lives here – one on YouTube, which is in Arabic, and one as an actor, focused on auditioning.”
Since the beginning of this year, Mr Adnan has auditioned for more than 100 roles, as he continues to hone his craft.
He has also been working on his American accent in private classes, although in films like Obligatory, he has found that having an accent to his English could prove to be an advantage.
Mr Adnan playing Elias in Obligatory
Amongst the student and bigger films, he has started to see more nuance when telling stories centred on people of colour, especially those from the Middle East.
Another role that he just finished filming for is that of Hamza in Fitna (Arabic for trial or test), where he plays an Iraqi extremist being interrogated by the US military. The short film delves deeper into Hamza’s backstory, where the audience learns that his wife and son were killed during the US invasion of Iraq.
“I also recently acted in an Arabic film, where they were looking for someone who could speak in the Egyptian dialect, so it’s been an advantage being able to speak in a Lebanese, Egyptian and Khaleeji vernacular,” he added.
Amongst his many struggles as he continues his journey, hopefully to Hollywood stardom, is making sure that his roles still reflect his religious values, while adding nuance and depth to stories from and about the region.
Owing to the impact of social media, Mr Adnan has seen the industry evolve and is happy to see Muslim-Americans, like Fitna director Musaid Abdullah, pitch and get a green light for films centred on the Middle East.
When asked about his lessons from his time in Hollywood thus far, Mr Adnan highlighted the importance of being able to handle rejection and focus on enjoying the craft of acting, while also persevering through the hardships.
naman@gdnmedia.bh
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