Omid Djalili: Finding humanity through comedy, from 9/11 to the Middle East wars
Ways to Change the World with Krishnan Guru-Murthy
Channel 4 News
4.6 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 11 December 2024
⏱️ 38 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Comedian Omid Djalili talks to Krishnan Guru-Murthy about Syria, Israel, Gaza and the Iranian regime, and why the West should care about the Middle East.
In this episode of Ways to Change the World, Djalili says a combination of his Baha’i faith, his heritage and the encouragement of friends is what has kept him resilient in the face of setbacks, including being “cancelled” after the 9/11 attacks.
Produced by Silvia Maresca
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello and welcome to Ways to Change the World. I'm Christian Guru Murphy and this is the podcast |
| 0:05.8 | in which we talk to extraordinary people about the big ideas in their lives and the events |
| 0:10.7 | that have helped shape them. My guest this week is the comedian and actor Ahmed Jalili, who is on |
| 0:19.2 | tour at the moment with a show called Namaste, which we'll get into, |
| 0:23.1 | but has starred in all sorts of amazing comedy films over the years. |
| 0:28.2 | And I really feel like you're in the eye of the storm right now, because as we speak, |
| 0:33.6 | Syria has fallen, Iran has been in the news non-stop this year. And you, of course, |
| 0:38.9 | are Persian or Iranian. But we've been trying to get you on this podcast for a long time. |
| 0:44.2 | And I don't want to come on. You didn't want to come on? No. Because you thought this was a |
| 0:48.6 | dangerous place. I think this is the most dangerous podcast out there, because thoughts and ideas are really powerful. |
| 0:56.4 | And as everyone knows, there's a small ruling minority that are very happy with the way |
| 1:01.1 | things are. And if you talk about changing the worlds in a positive way, well, they don't |
| 1:05.3 | want those changes. So if you do think of something that is great, and overnight, you change |
| 1:10.4 | world hunger. Overnight, you bring the globe great. And overnight, you change world hunger. Over night, you bring |
| 1:12.0 | the globe together. The next day, you may not even wake up, because traditionally, whenever there's |
| 1:17.7 | been a great invention or great idea, those people have been snuffed out. And I'm worried because |
| 1:22.4 | I've got lots of ideas. If I share that on here, it could be that you and I both wake up in a coffin. |
| 1:29.4 | And I want to know, will you be wearing that? Because I don't want to be in eternity with the |
| 1:33.4 | guy next to me like this. Yeah, no, I know. I'm a little scruffy stay. But I try to keep it sort of |
| 1:38.5 | informal on the podcast. I mean, it's sort of, so you were a man with lots of ideas. Yeah. And unusually for a comic, you do want to change the world rather than just poke fun and scorn at it. |
| 1:51.4 | I do believe in the transformative power of comedy. |
| 1:55.1 | I think that's something that I wholeheartedly believe in, only because I know that laughter is such an important thing in life, |
... |
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