Sayed Badreya talks award-winning short film ‘Jellyfish and Lobster’
Much lauded short film “Jellyfish and Lobster” is making waves at international film festivals and is garnering buzz as a potential candidate for next year's Academy Awards after it scooped up the Best Live Action Short Film BAFTA prize in February. Here, lead actor Sayed Badreya reflects on the challenges posed by the role and his own path to success. The US Egyptian actor plays Mido, a man dying of dementia, in the story of two elderly strangers in a nursing home who, while trying to live their final days to the fullest, find an enchanted swimming pool.
Director Yasmin Afifi was studying at the National Film and Television School in
Buckinghamshire in the UK when she wrote and directed the awardwinning film.
Badreya reflected on the challenges of portraying Mido, emphasizing the difficulty of not having a defined history for the character.
“You walk in and you don't have history,” he said. “You have dementia, and everything is going away. Yes, Grace is dying of breast cancer, but she's dying physically. I'm dying mentally,” he added, referring to the story's co-protagonist played by actress Flo Wilson. Sayed dedicated the win to children in working class areas throughout the Middle East and North Africa region.
“This is the story of Sayed Badreya who grew up in the ghetto and poor, but had a dream,” he said. “And to come to Hollywood and to stand with a BAFTA in his hand in England in front of the cream of the cream of filmmakers, that's for them to say: ‘if he can do it, I can do it.'”
For her part, Afifi told the
BBC that the film was inspired by losing her father and aunt to cancer.
"They both truly never allowed themselves to be defined by their illnesses; they were the ones who were going through it, yet they were the ones that were constantly comforting us," she said.