This week, an Egyptian court convicted the country’s most renowned comic actor, Adel Imam, of offending Islam. A few of his movies, they argued—including The Terrorist, in which he plays a homicidal Islamist zealot who comes to see the error of his ways—were disrespectful of the religion. Imam was sentenced to three months in jail and 1,000 Egyptian Pounds, or $165, in fines. Imam’s defense—that by portraying a bungling terrorist, he was mocking not Islam but those who thwart the religion by equating it with murder and destruction—was in vain. Seeing the sentencing as a blow to free speech and a troubling omen of things to come in Egypt, Imam’s fellow artists issued strong condemnations, and the international press widely reported the case.
Seeing Imam’s face threw me back to my childhood. Growing up, I watched his movies religiously and spent hours trying to imitate his outlandish facial expressions. I would take great pleasure in mimicking him and shouting out surprised utterances in Arabic, which may seem a tad odd considering that I grew up in Israel.