Biography X
Navid Akhavan (Persian: نوید اخوان; born on June 9th, 1980 in Tehran) is an award winning Iranian-German actor and director. He is also known as Navid Navid.Navid was born in Teheran, Iran. Due to the Iran–Iraq War the four-year Navid had to escape with his family from his native country. After living in the United States, they immigrated in 1985 to Germany.
Navid grew up speaking English, German, and Farsi. Due to his fathers profession, an event manager, he was introduced to the stage and audience from an early age. He performed on stage for the first time when he was eight years old. Until the age of 16 he was the opening act of dozens of concerts.
After he graduated from a school for performing arts in Cologne, Germany "Schauspiel Zentrum" in 2001, he started working as an actor in film, TV and theatre.
He played the role of Lady Macbeth in William Shakespeares Macbeth and Romeo in Romeo and Juliet at the Altonaer Theater in Hamburg, Germany.
In 2003, his first leading role in Elmar Fischers "Fremder Freund", gained him a nomination at the Munich Filmfestival in the category "Best Actor in a Leading Role". In the same year the film won the acclaimed "First Steps Award", the "Digital Visions Award" as well as the Audience Award at the "Filmz Mainz" film festival.
His other leading roles include Mohsen in "Salami Aleikum" and Jamal in "45 Minutes to Ramallah" (both comedies directed by Ali Samadi Ahadi) as well as the drama "For a Moment Freedom" (written and directed by Arash T. Riahi), which won 30 awards at international film festivals and was the Austrian entry for the Academy Awards in 2009.
In the Hollywood production "Septembers of Shiraz", which can be seen on Netflix, he plays the part of Morteza next to Adrien Brody and Salma Hayek.
From 2005 until 2010 Navid and his brother Omid produced Persian pop music as "Navid & Omid". They released two studio albums (Faryad & Kolli Sefaresh) as well as several music videos during that time, which all Navid wrote and directed.
Navid is also a guest teacher and gives workshops on how to direct actors and produce music videos at the SAE Berlin.
In 2020 he narrated Dalia Sofer's novel Man of My Time for Audible.
Navid has also been working as a director for other artists. He has won awards at international filmfestivals with the music videos "November's Fall" and "Habs", which he made for the Iranian legendary singer Ebi.
The acclaimed music video "Behesht", which Navid wrote and directed for the Iranian superstar Googoosh, gathered international attention since it was the first time a homosexual love story had been portrayed in an Iranian music video. You'll find links to a selection of the international news articels that covered this on the "News/Press" section of the website.
CLICK HERE TO WATCH A COLLECTION OF NAVID's DIRECTORIAL WORK
News X
"MAN OF MY TIME"
Listen to "Man of My Time" by Dalia Sofer on Audible, narrated by Navid."HABS (Imprisoned)"
Starring the legendary Iranian singer Ebi, for whom Navid wrote, produced and directed the music video, won the Audience Award at the UMFF and was nominated at 7 more film festivals.
"SEPTEMBERS OF SHIRAZ"
IS OUT NOW!Starring: Adrien Brody, Salma Hayek, Shohreh Aghdashloo and Navid Navid
Producers: Gerard Butler, Alan Siegel, Avi Lerner
Director: Wayne Blair
You can watch the complete film on:
Netflix | iTunes | Amazon | Google Play
Press
THE NEW YORK TIMES:
"...The film's innovation is its reading of extremist zeal as a perversion of youthful energy. Aided by Mr. Akhavan's quicksilver performance..."(by Dana Stevens)
THE NEW YORK POST:
"Akhavan plays each change brilliantly in a film that is so tightly controlled that the mere glimpse of a new beard or a prayer mat being unrolled becomes a moment of horror."(by Kyle Smith)
VARIETY
"Akhavan, a fine actor, portrays the terrible emotional cost of this farce even as he goes ahead with it. (...) Casting of the four attractive young leads, who seem to have stepped out of a romantic teen comedy, pays off as the story spins into a dark nightmare and the carefree setup turns dark. Both leads offer riveting interpretations of their characters: Wannek as the culturally curious German liberal ready to fight for his friend and follow his code of ethics to the end; Akhavan as a poetic youth whose life goes disastrously off track (...)Akhavan is appealing on screen."
(by Deborah Young)
BZ BERLIN:
"Navid Navid: Von Hollywood zu Hannelore Elsner"(by Carina Parke)
CINEMA:
"Das Feelgood-Movie der Saison: Wer nach dieser fantasievollen Kulturclash-Komödie noch schlechte Laune hat, dem ist nicht mehr zu helfen."WELT:
"Auch wenn es sich vom Titel nicht so anhören mag, ist der Kinofilm "Salami Aleikum" eine wirklch gute Komödie."(by Cosima Lutz)
KINO ZEIT:
"Salami Alekum, Ein bestrickender Clash der Kulturen"(by Paul Collmar)
EPD FILM:
"Karim Saleh als gockelhafter Womanizer und Navid Akavan als Einfaltspinsel verkörpern zwei liebenswürdige Charaktere, die man in diesem Roadmovie (...) gerne begleitet."(by Manfred Riepe)
PROGRAMMKINO:
"Animierte Sequenzen unterbrechen den Lauf der turbulenten Geschichte. Und auch das Timing stimmt, um die Spannung zu halten. Das verdankt er nicht zuletzt seinem spielfreudigen Hauptdarsteller Navid Akhavan, der bereits in „Salami Aleikum“ als strickender Metzgerssohn glänzte. Meisterhaft beherrscht auch der in Teheran geborene Schauspieler und Sänger den Spagat zwischen souveräner Missachtung der Realität und Normalität des Grotesken."(by Luitgard Koch)
PRESS regarding the music video "Behesht" ("Paradise"),
which Navid wrote and directed for the legendary persian singer Googoosh:
Contact X
AGENT | |
|---|---|
| Name: | Agentur Hoestermann |
| Telephone: | +49.30.6950.1881 |
| Email: | mail@hoestermann.de |
MANAGER | |
|---|---|
| Name: | Paul Becker |
| US #: | +1.310.8611.433 |
| Email: | paul@paulbecker-talent.com |
All pictures by YASMINE ASHA
