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Egyptian comedy has a very, very old tradition. Our theater and our movies are just, like, amazing. And Egypt is kind of like the Hollywood of the Middle East. I mean, we had cinema maybe decades before the other Arab countries ever got independence.

The future of Arab films is absolutely up to Arabs and no one else. They've got the equipment, they've got the will, they've got the talent, now they just need a little bit of history behind them and a bit of cultural relaxation.

Egypt is the most populous Arab nation, the seat of Sunni Islamic doctrine, and has tremendous political, religious and social influence on the rest of the region. For better or worse, it will lead the rest of the Middle East by example. So goes Egypt, so goes the region.

Egypt is a large, complex, very important country.

What I hope to do in the States is to break up this stereotyping of Muslims and Arabs. I mean, we are basically the only sub-culture that is not represented in Hollywood. And it's funny because everybody is talking about the Muslim world and the Arab world, and we are not represented.

There's enough of a willingness in the West to do sympathetic movies about Arab roles.

Egypt is the oldest, largest and most important Arab country in the region. What happens there affects them all.

I think in Israel there is so much talent in the TV world because there's less movies done.

There is a positive and personal relationship between the Egyptian people and the Syrian people.

If you want to move people, you look for a point of sensitivity, and in Egypt nothing moves people as much as religion.