More Shohreh Aghdashloo Bios & Profiles
The most recent Shohreh Aghdashloo biography is published on the main page.
Biography #2 (for The Lake House)
Shohreh Aghdashloo earned critical acclaim with an Academy Award nomination and Best Supporting Actress honors from the Los Angeles Film Critics, the New York Film Critics and the Online Film Critics associations as well as the Independent Spirit Award, for her role as the supportive and sympathetic wife of a proud Iranian immigrant (played by Ben Kingsley) in House of Sand and Fog.Aghdashloo, a noted film and theatre actress in her native Iran, began her career on the stage with the Drama Workshop of Tehran at the age of nineteen. She debuted on the motion picture screen a few years later in the 1977 feature Gozaresh (The Report) for renowned director Abbass Kiarostami, which won the Critics Award at the Moscow Film Festival.
She followed this triumph with a role in Shatranje Bad (Chess with the Wind), also a film festival favorite. While her initial projects were banned in her home country, she scored a huge success with Sooteh-Delan (Broken Hearts), directed by the late Iranian filmmaker Ali Hatami, which established her as one of Iran's leading actresses.
Just as her movie career began to crest, the Shah of Iran's regime crumbled, forcing the Tehran-born talent to flee her home country during the 1978 Islamic Revolution. Aghdashloo settled in England, where she completed her education in International Relations at the International University Europe in Waterford while putting her acting career on hold.
She resumed her career onstage in 1984 in a Farsi-language play that was also staged in several U.S. cities, including Los Angeles, where the actress married longtime acquaintance, Iranian playwright Houshang Touzie. She has since performed in several of his works while forming Drama Workshop '79, a theatre company created in memory of the Revolution and dedicated to producing plays in her native language.
In addition to her stage work, Aghdashloo has appeared in several independent films, including Guests of Hotel Astoria, Twenty Bucks, Surviving Paradise, Maryam, America So Beautiful, Possessed and Pulse (the latter two are part of socially passionate filmmaker Shirin Neshat's trilogy). She co-starred in last fall's box office hit, The Exorcism of Emily Rose and will next be seen in X-Men: The Last Stand.
Aghdashloo was also critically acclaimed for her role in season four of the Emmy-winning series 24, playing Dina Araz, a Muslim wife and mother involved in terrorist activities in Los Angeles.
Bio courtesy Warner Bros. for "The Lake House" (09-Jul-2006)
Biography #3
Shohreh Aghdashloo is a Los Angeles-based, Iranian actress and self-proclaimed activist. She is outspoken against her native Iran's current regime.Aghdashloo was born to a wealthy family in 1953. She entered acting school at a young age, and reached stardom at the age of 20 in her native Iran after starring in a prominent role in the movie The Report, which was directed by the famous director Abbass Kiarostami, and her performance won critics' awards at the Moscow Film Festival. She won even further acclaim and established her position as one of Iran's most prominent leading ladies in 1978 after starring in the movie Sooteh Delan (Broken Hearts), directed by Ali Hatami.
After the 1979 Revoluton, she left Iran for England, where she finished her education. Her interest in politics and social justice drove her to earn a Bachelors' degree in International Relations, however her political activity has made her an exile in her own country.
She was one of the nominees for the Oscar in 2004 for the category of Best Actress in a Supporting Role. The award was won by Renée Zellweger, though many say that Aghdashloo deserved the award.
During the fourth season of 24, Aghdashloo had a recurring role as a Muslim terrorist, in a storyline that raised controversy among Arab-American communities. In an interview with TIME magazine, she stated that although she had previously resisted reinforcing the stereotype of Muslims as terrorists, the strength and complexity of the role convinced her to accept the part.
Despite the different views on the storyline, her role of Dina Araz, and her performance, was an instant hit with viewers and her character's offscreen death — although confirmed by the producers — has many fans hoping, and coming up with conspiracy theories, for her to come back.
She is married to Iranian theatre actor and director Hooshang Tozi.
Article text released under CC-BY-SA. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Shohreh Aghdashloo" (21-Apr-2005)