Actor Zeeko Zaki Is Ready to Change the Narrative of Arab Men on the Small Screen
SOURCE: TOWN & COUNTRY
BY: LIZ CANTRELL
Zeeko Zaki is ready for the big time. And maybe a nap, because he’s usually up at three or four in the morning, training and shooting for his breakout role as special agent Omar Adom Zidan, known as O.A., in the new series FBI, from Law & Order producer Dick Wolf.
Born in Alexandria, Egypt, Zaki immigrated to the United States as an infant, but visited his birth country often and speaks fluent Arabic. He appeared on shows such as NCIS: Los Angeles, 24: Legacy, and Six before landing the role of O.A. In FBI, co-stars with Missy Peregrym (Stick It, Rookie Blue) who plays special agent Maggie Bell.
Here, Zaki talks with T&C about his first big role, growing up Arab-American, and what viewers can expect from FBI.
How did you get involved in the series?
I got an audition in my email from my manager for a 40-year-old Latino detective, and I thought I had absolutely no chance. Dick Wolf’s name was attached to the audition so I was excited about the possible opportunity. So I put it on tape and sent it in, and then found out I was actually never invited to tape and my manager kind of just cheated the system. There was no if, ands, or buts—I was over the moon.
There are a lot of law enforcement shows. What makes this one stand out?
What clicked for me is that we deal with federal cases. When you think of federal cases, you think of mafia and terrorists, and that kind of stuff only has really existed in films. To take Dick Wolf’s equation and apply it to the larger scope of crime really, really got me. The traditional SVU and other cop shows— their jurisdiction stops where the FBI begins, so it’s a realm that hasn’t been fully exploited or represented in this sense.
What’s been your biggest challenge? How did you prepare to take on the role?
The hardest part is just the physical demand and the shoot schedule. Me and Missy are in about 90 to 95 percent of the scenes in an episode so we’re first in, last out five to six days a week, and it’s intense. Fitness and physical health has been a big focus of mine for the past seven years. I lost over a hundred pounds, so being able to keep a workout routine while filming has been a big challenge, too. We’re existing in these worlds with sex traffickers or snipers or terrorists, and the hours and not being able to leave it for a day is the biggest challenge.
O.A. asks Maggie to confront some of the feelings and difficulties of the job, while she seems tough and doesn’t want to talk. It’s an interesting flip.
Our relationship is definitely beginning, and we do balance each other out. Personally, we get along great, we just kinda hit it off right when we met. It was great to have her [Missy’s] experience, and then that also be kind of like the characters— she [Maggie] is more experienced than O.A.
My family has a lot of women in it. Traditionally in Arab cultures, the men are much older, so they die off soon. So I have the grandmas around with no grandpas [laughs]. For me to be this six foot five inch big Arab man, the last thing I wanna do is come across as some controlling brute. It’s showing a different side and supporting this woman that I admire in the workplace and who is helping me. That’s just who I am naturally, that’s what I’m trying to bring to the character.
O.A. used to work undercover. How does that mystery unfold and inform his character throughout the season?
When you’re undercover you don’t have to answer to anybody, to a degree. You have a thought, you move on it. And the FBI, it’ll take them a year to bust down a door because they have to go through all the right channels. What I’m excited about is, when you think of undercover cops, you think of the drug world and the cartels and the 70s and the 80s. Getting to bring that to 2018 where—eventually we’ll get into that he was undercover with terrorists— and realizing that that whole world exists, and there’s so much that isn’t represented on television. I think there’s so much that can change the narrative of Arab Americans in this country.
There’s a scene in the pilot with a racist character and O.A. has to navigate that. You’re Egyptian-American, so how does your own background inform that part of the role?
I was so excited that they were willing to go with an Arab American playing an Arab American. From the beginning of my acting career, I knew someone was gonna have to take a chance and make a bold move to use me for something, because I’m six foot five inch and I’m Arab and doesn’t just fit into every breakdown.
Growing up in a primarily White town, after 9/11 in middle and high school, “Osama” jokes got tossed a lot and I would brush them under the carpet. All I know is I am an Arab American who is passionate and patriotic and loves this country, and they exist in ten fold.
Is the show trying to ground us in the present? How does it grapple with today’s political realities?
It’s definitely a delicate dance, but Dick is not gonna go right or left of the line, because the second he goes Republican or the second he goes Democrat, you lose 50% of your viewers. We’re going to keep it right in a place of a very tactical, hands on puzzle, of detective work, without getting into the politics. People might want that, but that’s not for me to have a voice in. I just want to represent a storyline or a voice that hasn’t really been represented in TV.