Brotherhood won\'t affect art

Egyptian actor Ahmed Fahmy Despite growing tension between the artists and the ruling Muslim Brotherhood, Egyptian actor Ahmed Fahmy believes there will be no consequences for artists.. At least in the short term. Egyptian artist Ahmed Fahmy explained: “The relation of the Brotherhood with art will not have an effect in the current period because it is a group that fought for years to reach power. It’s not likely that it’s first step after reaching power would be fighting arts,” In the star's interview with Arabstoday he shares his ideas for the progression of the country: “Egypt needs to progress in the coming period depending on its strength, not the collapse of others.” He talked about drama, cinema and music in the exclusive interview.
At the beginning, Ahmed Fahmy expressed his happiness about “participating in works during Ramadan this year,” where he co-starred in “Serr Alany” (Public Secret) with Ghada Adel,  “Khotot Hamraa” (Red lines) with Ahmed el-Sakka and “Aldahr wa al-Atshana” (The Sea and The Thirsty) with Rola Saad and expressed his happiness to work with Ghada Adel in “Serr Alany”, which he believes  to be the most important one he was a part of.
Fahmy pointed out: “Scriptwriter Mohamed Nayer was very careful when writing for the series to the extent that while reading he makes you have great feelings and emotions about the characters as they are written in detail as if you are enjoying reading a novel.”
About the difficult scenes he faced while shooting, the WAMA singer said: “All scenes were difficult, especially those I had with Ghada Adel and Iyad Nassar because of the considerable amount of conflicting feelings and emotions in these situations.”
Fahmy said that the director of the series “Serr Alany” Ghada Selim helped him a lot to get into the character of Ahmed Abu Elela, and that he always found with her the diversity and the emotions that he could go through, explaining that he tried many times to come in and out of the character so it doesn’t affect his personal life or the other characters he was playing during Ramadan.
When speaking in relation to the quantity of drama produced this year and its impact on the chances of viewing his works, he said: “the good series imposes itself so it may even be seen more than once.”
Fahmy added: “attacking the huge drama production for the significant funds this year is not constructive criticism at all from my point of view because this production is proportional with the number of advertisers and the several satellite channels which naturally will accept any quantity of drama. There is also a big amount of this money spent on drama, which means that many families depend on this money for spending at home. This means a lot of work opportunities in these dramas for technician, workers, cameramen, photographers and assistant directors who have been affected last year by the lack of drama production.”
Fahmy said he will soon start working in a new cinema movie with Ghada Adel, stressing that: “The cinema crisis we are going through now has may positives. The most important of them is working according to professional and fair standards to all those who work in this sector so that it returns to being a major industry and not only a haphazard trade." The actor and singer is back to work on more cinema work during the year.
Fahmy warned: “The problem of cinema in the last period lies in the lack of good scripts that we suffer a lot from, there are many outstanding talents in cinema writing in Egypt but it needs to be discovered, not exploited.”
Arabstoday spoke to Fahmzy over the Muslim Brotherhood and their relationship with arts, and whether he had any fear of freedom or arts restrictions, Fahmy said: “The Brotherhood has been planning to reach power for the last 70 years, so it is impossible that the first thing they do after reaching power is to tighten things around arts,” pointing out: “At the beginning they need to gain popularity and have a large base. This will depend on their interest in the infrastructure and the general reforms. As an artist when I feel all my needs are satisfied as a normal citizen on which they are working, it is possible then to let myself discuss with them the form of art, but with respect to public freedoms.”
“No one is allowed to forbid or control anyone in religious issues or his relationship with God, because God himself gave the humans the freedom of belief which was applied by the Prophet Mohammad peace be upon him when applying the verse of the Holy Koran (Let him who will believe, and let him who will, reject).”
At the end, Ahmed wished that Egypt would: “Advance among all the forces and not to progress on the collapse of others,” noting: “When Egypt for exapmle progressed in the FIFA order, it was because of the decrease in the level of the other teams, not because of the increase of our team’s level.”