'Gladiator II', Makeup Artist & Production Manager, Mariam Lee Abounouom

0:00Mariam Lee AbounouomWhy does the Western world come and tell our stories? We have done recently, a TV series, about the Arabian sword, and it's doing really well in Qatar, 'cause m… the Qatari, they come with the money, and we come with the…... The ex… expertise.

0:18Jawad MirOf course.

0:19Mariam Lee AbounouomBut the diff… the difference is that they control so much, like, of the script, where Hollywood, you know, they just… they want to tell the story.

0:28Jawad MirI find that the trouble with that part of the world is, you know, whether it's, Middle East or Asia, even Africa, is that there is this tendency of not showing vulnerabilities. And the reason Hollywood works, in my view, is that they would show even vulnerabilities for, you know, a character like Nixon, John F. Kennedy. Weakness is something that we tend to avoid to show in that part of the world. That's what connects to the audience.

0:57Mariam Lee AbounouomAgree.

0:57Jawad MirThose are the, those are the thing that perfections nobody cares about. Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome back to another episode of Kingdom of Dreams Podcast, the Making of Stories. I'm your host, Jawad Mir. Today, my guest is Mariam Lee Abounaom. I hope I'm pronouncing her last name correct. If not, my apologies. She started her career as a makeup artist on Kingdom of Heaven, which has almost been 20 years to date, and, then she sort of shifted her career through different other positions. And she's based out of Morocco. She manages a lot of different productions, including the most recent, Gladiator 2. We talked about a whole lot of stuff, including her career, her path, Kingdom of Heaven, Gladiator 2, and a bunch of other stuff. A wonderful conversation, a different kind of conversation, a little bit of unexpected turns it took, that I wasn't aware of, which you'll find out during the conversation. So without further ado, here's my conversation with makeup artist/production manager, Mariam Lee.

2:00Jawad MirYeah, no, I was just saying that it's good to have you, and you know, obviously you worked on some amazing projects, with Ridley Scott as well, and, I saw Kingdom of Heaven when it came out. ... It's been 20 years. I can't believe that. And then I saw it again maybe last year, thinking…

2:21Mariam Lee AbounouomOkay

2:21Jawad Mir... And when I initially saw it, I didn't like it, just being honest with you, and then I saw it last year. I still didn't like it. But then I found out there's a director's cut, the 3 hour and 13 minutes. I finished watching that this morning, and I absolutely loved it.

2:38Mariam Lee AbounouomOkay.

2:40Jawad MirSo I just wanna put that in context that, you know, I know theatrical's cuts are different than director's cut, and sometimes it's just to the story and the character development goes away, but a wonderful film, and your work obviously stands out, so I just wanted to put that out there first.

2:56Mariam Lee AbounouomThank you very much. You know that I, so I participated in K… Kingdom of Heaven as a makeup artist.

3:04Jawad MirYou did?

3:05Mariam Lee AbounouomYes. So, I'm, I'm actually curious to see, like, what do you, what do you know about me? Like, why did you have, like, the interest into contacting me for this podcast?

3:21Jawad MirSure. So from, so here's the thing. IMDb, for some reason, suggested your role as an art director, if I'm not mistaken, which is, which is fine.

3:32Mariam Lee Abounouomhuh.

3:32Jawad MirThat's okay.

3:33Mariam Lee AbounouomFine. Yeah.

3:34Jawad MirBecause this podcast is more about... I'm a film director myself.

3:38Mariam Lee AbounouomOkay.

3:38Jawad MirAnd I'm very fascinated with stories behind the scenes because that's my life too.

3:43Mariam Lee AbounouomOkay.

3:43Jawad MirSo I've barely had any makeup artist on the podcast, which makes it even…... Which makes it even more better. So my interest is because I'm just fascinated with p… films… ... And what goes behind in making them and learning more about people's journey.

4:01Mariam Lee AbounouomOkay.

4:01Jawad MirAnd that's it.

4:03Mariam Lee AbounouomOh. So my journey is very interesting. I actually am a, I would say, a child that fa… fell in the magic pot.

4:14Jawad MirOkay.

4:15Mariam Lee AbounouomAs both of my parents are in the film industry. But s… my father is the big… is biggest film producer in Morocco, so through his company, which is, I'm also a partner in, we did... Our last movie was Gladiator 2.

4:37Jawad MirOkay. So that's news to me. I did not know that.

4:40Mariam Lee AbounouomYes.

4:40Jawad MirThat's amazing.

4:40Mariam Lee AbounouomSo when I started, I started basically as, an extra on film sets, you know. My parents both used to take me there because, you know, they had to babysit me in a certain way, so it was the film set that did that. And I developed a love of film, filmmaking, from being on film set. I used to be, like, a lot of extra. My mom is also a costume designer, so I would help her out in costumes, you know, do little jobs here and there. And when I finished high school, I wanted to do something which was completely different from what my parents did. At that time, my father was between production and, art direction. And, he started kind of telling me, "Okay, maybe I should go into the art direction," because I love to work with my hands, and somehow I found, that, makeup artistry was something that, I might enjoy.

5:44Mariam Lee AbounouomSo not having, like, a very clear direction about what I want to do, I went, I went to Germany, where I studied first, the language, and then, a family friend said, "Oh, there's this school in Berlin, from a very famous makeup artist. He's the one that did, Name of the Rose with Sean Connery."

6:10Mariam Lee AbounouomSo I wrote to the school, and since he loved having international students because it allowed the, his name to travel along the world, I got a place quite easily. And then I went to Berlin to do two years of, makeup school. And then when I finished, I wanted to stay a little longer in Germany, but then, Alexander from Oliver Stone was taking place, and so my decision was very, was made very fast, and so I came back home to start. And that was, like, my first project on a film as a makeup artist.

6:48Jawad MirWhat a fascinating story. That is so cool. Thank you for sharing that.

6:52Mariam Lee AbounouomYou're welcome.

6:54Jawad MirIf you don't mind me asking, what's your dad's name? I didn't say…

6:58Mariam Lee AbounouomOh, his name is J… Jimmy Abounouom.

7:01Jawad MirJimmy Abounouom. How do you spell his last name? I'm just curious about his…

7:05Mariam Lee AbounouomA-B… ... O-U-N-O-U-O-M.

7:14Jawad MirOkay. Okay. That's interesting. That's really cool. I mean, I... You know, you hear everybody has a different journey, but the fact that you were helping out in art direction and then... I mean, they're not similar, but they are. You know?

7:28Mariam Lee AbounouomOh.

7:28Jawad MirOne is more about the set, the other is more about the person…

7:31Mariam Lee AbounouomYes

7:31Jawad Mir... Human being. But that's really cool. So, you know, for you to be able to work on f… I've seen Alexander. With... My favorite part of Alexander is the music… ... More than anything else. I listen to that soundtrack all the time. But, just, you know, talking about makeup and watching in Kingdom of Heaven, the way it was done with lighting, because back then, I mean, the styles were different as opposed to now. You know?

8:00Mariam Lee AbounouomYes.

8:01Jawad MirThere's a lot of bl… there were a lot of blue tints, there were a lot of, like, tungsten. And working on that film that long ago, how was that experience? Let's forget about the film. Who were you back then as a makeup artist, if you were h… Did you work as a makeup artist on that film, correct?

8:21Mariam Lee AbounouomYes, I did. I did.

8:23Jawad MirAnd seeing yourself now, how are you different as a professional?

8:28Mariam Lee AbounouomOkay. Well, different is because I don't do today any more makeup. I've moved on…

8:35Jawad MirOkay

8:35Mariam Lee Abounouom... To production. So I'm a…

8:37Jawad MirOkay

8:37Mariam Lee Abounouom... Young producer in the company. But I will make, I'll talk about my experience on Kingdom of Heaven.

8:47Jawad MirSure.

8:47Mariam Lee AbounouomAnd I'll compare it to my experience on Gladiator II, because I came back as to working on, Gladiator II as head of a department. I… at that time, for me it was, you know, it's, like, really fascinating, you know, because we were shooting on a film, so the dynamics of sets are, very much different, especially that you can't waste a lot of time because film is costly.

9:16Mariam Lee AbounouomSo it was, very interesting to see then just how the structure of a film works because it's, it's like an army, you know? And every department... I was young. I was 24 when I did, when I did Kingdom of Heaven, so it was like this big machine, and with all the extras and the crews and the special effects and the stuntmen and horsemen and, you know, it was like a huge village, of, there's a lot of people. So I really was, very observant of the dynamic, how people flow within the different departments, because you have to have this, a knowledge of when you, when it's your time to act, on the job, and to kind of, like, not get in trouble because you probably walked in a shot because you didn't pay attention…

10:13Jawad MirYeah

10:14Mariam Lee Abounouom... Or anything like that. So it was, it was quite im… im… impressive then. I remember one day we were, because we shot in the south of Morocco in a city called Ouarzazate. That's where he had his sets of King… of Kingdom of Heaven, we call it…

10:32Mariam Lee Abounouom... That was, shot there. And I remember we had, like, these l… really long days. We started super early in the morning, got all the extras ready, and we arrive on set. It's 7:00 AM. We... So that we can catch, like, the sunrise, and there was a lot of wind that day. It was a very windy, dusty day. And we literally spent the whole day from morning until evening, we have not shot a single shot. And that's where I understood, you know, the power of a p… producer being also the director, of, just, that, if you have that power you can actually afford to do something like that, to have, you know, maybe 300, what, well, 300 crew plus 1,000-something more extras, that could just be on standby for the whole day, But the w… the, it was the very different. There was also, like, a suspense of waiting to see whether you got the shot or not, you know, on f… on film.

11:37Mariam Lee AbounouomThey would open the gate and everybody's just, like, so excited and patient to hear, like, to hear, "Gate clean," you know, so we can move on to the next one. After coming back to doing Gladiator II, the dynamic was very much different, because, the rhythm was different. I think we were shooting eight cameras. I sometimes wondered which camera you watch to get your shot.

12:10Jawad MirI read about that. Like, I think it was a cinematographer's interview who was talking about especially the Colosseum sequence.

12:17Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah.

12:17Jawad MirThey had a really hard time making sure not the other cameras were in the shot…

12:21Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah

12:21Jawad Mir... Because they were shooting continuously.

12:23Mariam Lee AbounouomExactly. It, the, so it's, it's very p… it's pretty much very strict on set. You know, the part which I found fascinating was that he, Ridley came back to Ouarzazate to film in the same sets that he used for Kingdom of Heaven. They did redo the construction. They re… they changed part of the constructions, but he wanted to come especially to that one. So we're in the middle of a stony desert, which actually turned out with ships on them. So when you see... Have you seen the movie?

13:02Jawad MirYeah. That, I just re-watched the three hour and 13 minute version this morning, so.

13:07Mariam Lee AbounouomOkay.

13:07Jawad MirYeah.

13:07Mariam Lee AbounouomSo scene where they are on the boats, so that's done in Morocco in the stony desert. There's no water there. So it was quite fascinating to be able to see how they photographed these boats. I mean, they were quite impressive. They were, they had, like, a whole system that they brought over from Spain to make those boats, move with a lot of, blue screen all around, visual effects, for the visual effects, special effects to, start throwing water on the boats. We had about 500 extras that we p… prepared, every day. And, it was very much different because this time I was not in the shoes anymore of a, of the technician, but I was actually part of, like, the supervising team, which puts quite a bit of

14:02Jawad MirOkay

14:02Mariam Lee Abounouom... Also a pressure.

14:05Jawad MirYou're, you're talking about now Gladiator 2, the opening…

14:08Mariam Lee AbounouomGladiator 2

14:08Jawad Mir... Sequence, right?

14:09Mariam Lee AbounouomYes.

14:09Jawad MirThe whole... Yeah.

14:10Mariam Lee AbounouomYes.

14:10Jawad MirYeah.

14:10Mariam Lee AbounouomThat's it. So what they shot is that the whole part of Numidia was shot in Ouarzazate. So even the arena, the arena where the baboon were, where the baboon fight, that was also done in Morocco. And, a lot of the crews were the, we had,.. In my department I had people from Malta, from Italy, from Spain, English, Moroccans. Yes. And so it was a big, a big melting pot.

14:52Jawad MirThat's amazing. I know, I th… I'm sure you know about this film. It was partially shot, initially shot in Morocco, The Message. Right? You know which one…

15:02Mariam Lee AbounouomYes

15:02Jawad Mir... I'm talking about, right?

15:03Mariam Lee AbounouomYes.

15:04Jawad MirYeah. Which is something I've seen, like, I don't even know how many times, and, considering it was done back in 1977, I think. And then to see all... I mean, I was, I was reminded of some of the scenes in Kingdom of Heaven of that, especially when they're building stuff, like when, Orlando Bloom's character comes in, into that, in… into Jerusalem, and he's helping out people. And just seeing all that stuff and the amount of detail that goes into it, and obviously, you know, it's... A… I'm glad you mentioned the army because mil… film crew is, like, a hierarchy. Like, you cannot…

15:41Jawad Mir... Function as, unless it's, like, a military ranking system, right?

15:45Mariam Lee AbounouomYes, exactly

15:45Jawad Mir... But, you know, it's really interesting that how you have, one, worked as a makeup artist, and now you're almost, like, producing or co-producing or, you know, being in charge of the set. What have you learned in the last 20 years in, you know, that made you a better producer, a better human being? We're always pos… evolving. How do you, how do you see yourself? Like, if you look, reflect back 20 years from now and where you are today, w… what do you think that you have ach… you know, learned over all these years, and how does that make you feel?

16:23Mariam Lee AbounouomWell, first of all, I say that every day is like a, I always come with the idea that I only started today.

16:31Jawad MirGood.

16:31Mariam Lee AbounouomI think the one thing that I'm very grateful about my career as a makeup artist is that it gave me a sense of detail, so I look at a lot at the, at the detail. But I never consider n… any job like a low job because I remember this was a message that I carried with me. It was this, the producer of, Kingdom of Heaven. His name was Branko Lustig. He passed away, couple of years ago. But he told me, I, he said to me one day, he says, "You know what's the job of a producer? Is to sweep the floor when it's necessary."

17:10Mariam Lee AbounouomAnd so I understood that at that moment that there is no big job or high job. You know, it's just the job needs to be done no matter where you, what position you are. And, I carried that with me. And also having my father being a big producer in Morocco is not someone that is, like, sits on a, on a throne and, you know, he's, we are in the field, being involved in all departments, understanding what every department's needs are, because that's only the way that we can, satisfy their needs but also keep an eye on the cost. So it's,.. What I like from being, working in Morocco, because I work with a lot of, like, foreign crews, is actually to take pe… m… like, my people, and some of them, you know, they come from small villages or, you know, they're, people who've never probably been to school, and to actually empower them to bring, to elevate their spirits to feel that they are at same level as, an English man or a German or a South African or an Australian, you know, an American.

18:25Mariam Lee AbounouomSo for me, that's what I like actually a lot in my job. Every day teaches me to be very humble, to... I learned to manage my anxiety a bit more You know, than what it was before.

18:42Jawad MirThat's awesome.

18:42Mariam Lee AbounouomTo know how to navigate through complicated situations, to always say that, you know, when you start a project, it always has its way to also reach an end. That it's…

18:55Jawad MirYes

18:55Mariam Lee Abounouom... Not, you know, the... To always remind us, yes, we are trying to make some extraordinary things, but we still remain human, and making faults is, it's a human, it's human, and m… to not, say, punish myself for making a mistake. Of course, you know, the mistake should not cost a lot of money, but…

19:20Jawad MirYeah

19:22Mariam Lee Abounouom... The,... But I think what I really like into production is actually empowering the smaller people.

19:29Jawad MirThat is so cool. I'm so glad to hear that. And, you know, and you talked about the producer Bronco with,... Do you know Sonja Klaus, the production designer who worked…

19:39Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah

19:39Jawad Mir... On the first…

19:41Mariam Lee AbounouomYes

19:41Jawad Mir... So she, so she's worked with Ridley for the last…

19:44Mariam Lee AbounouomYes

19:44Jawad Mir... 20 years. I've had her on a couple of times, and she had…

19:47Mariam Lee AbounouomOkay

19:47Jawad Mir... A great, she had a great story of him when she was working on, American Gangster. We'll send you the link. You'll, you'll enjoy it. It's

19:55Mariam Lee AbounouomOkay

19:56Jawad Mir... It's one of the most amazing stories, hilarious stories that I've heard. And the way she port… told the story was really cool too. So I, you men… she mentioned his name, so I remembered.

20:07Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah.

20:07Jawad MirBut, you know, working on Gladiator II, were you at ever times keeping your... Like, l… l… turning around and looking at the makeup artist, like, oh, you know, 20 years ago I was this, and now where I am? Like, does that, did that ever happen or you…

20:25Mariam Lee AbounouomIt kind of... For me, it was because right before Gladiator, I quit working for five years. I had a son, and so I made the decision that I wanted to stay home and take care of my child because, it just feels like you go from project to project, but how many times am I gonna get to see my child grow in front of me? So I…

20:47Jawad Mir100%

20:47Mariam Lee Abounouom... I, yeah. So I took that decision, and then after, when Gladiat… two came, my, colleague who is also like a, she was a sister and a mentor because I started with her on Alexander, she contacted me and she said, "Please," like, "I need you to do this job." And she was not sure whether I would accept it or not. And just, it was... Something came that it felt that Gladiator II was not, it was not a movie, it was a spiritual journey. 'cause when I was in, on, Kingdom of Heaven, I was 24, and then I reach Gladiator II and I'm 42, and I'm like, okay, maybe there's something behind this that I need to do this project. And so, I came with, really the idea to make, to bring and to empower the people that I work with, but under a certain,...

21:53Mariam Lee AbounouomI set certain rules. So which my colleague at first she didn't understand, but I said to her, "No, I really want to approach it this way because it's the only way that we should, we need to make things easier for us and not easier for the technician." It's about the flowing of the department. So I had, I brought in, people from a lit… from all kind of, from different generations, older makeup artists, younger makeup artists, w… even those that did not speak the language but they were great at the work, because I wanted to also say that, the language is not a barrier, you know. Everybody can speak the work language.

22:35Jawad MirSure.

22:35Mariam Lee AbounouomAnd it went really smoothly. I had times where my crew were, felt that they were, not really being involved, and so I would speak up, speak up for them because, we're here as a team. I really m… wanted people to understand that even if we come from a third world country, that we don't work for th… for them, but we work with them. We are, we do remain a team. And at the end everybody was very happy from the work, that we were solicitated to go to Malta to finish the job. But then just things kind of happened into the way and then we, you know, we start. But it was, it was actually, we were very honored to have had that opportunity to be called into, wanting to, that the designer wanted us to come, to come with them to Malta. But then it was…

23:36Jawad MirShe…

23:37Mariam Lee Abounouom... I think there was the strike, so probably…

23:40Jawad MirYeah

23:40Mariam Lee Abounouom... We couldn't go.

23:42Jawad MirDo you, do you rec… I mean, I'm always... I mean, 'cause that's all we do, right? You, myself, a bunch of others, all of us in film industry, stories is something that connects us, right? Whether it's a film story or a behind the scenes story, which a lot of people don't know about. Gladiator II, which i… which came out very recently, last year…

24:00Jawad Mir... You know, do you remember any interesting stories, whether they were, you know, moving, funny or, you know, anxiety driven and how sort of you dealt with it, or how, what you saw on the set? Anything that you can share?

24:16Mariam Lee AbounouomSo me personally, because I'm as a supervisor, I wouldn't go. I used to send my crew to set.

24:23Jawad MirOkay

24:23Mariam Lee Abounouom... Wouldn't so much, so much on set. But I remember it was like the last, it was the last shooting day and we had these, scenes where they had the military. They were, they were on the boat, and there were second unit that were shooting. And I arrive in the morning because we used to, we used to split the, we used to split the units between the civilian unit and the military unit. So I told my colleague, "Okay, you do the civilian unit and I'll take care of the military." So I arrived the, in the morning and I see there was this, the second AD was, like, completely lost his colors. And I was like, "What's wrong?" He's like, "Yeah, the extras, they would not get dressed." And it was pretty cold, and their costumes, you know, were kind of short, so they didn't want to get dressed. And from my experience to moving into production, I actually have been, I've been on location, been location manager, has worked in the AD department.

25:25Mariam Lee AbounouomAnd so I asked the AD to c… to come with us. And I went begging every single extra, you know, saying, to, for just the sake of, his, the health of his mother, you know, like, you know, like us Orientals, we always like, praise the mom, to actually come and do, and do the scene. So then when the costume department started, wanting to, dress, you know, all the people with the short clothes, and I said, "No, we're gonna start with the people that are wearing the longer clothes because then they could stay warm." And I started, like, coordinating all this, and we managed really to be on time. So I went to the second AD and I said, "Okay, so how did you..." And he was like, "Oh, thank you very much." Like, "You saved it," you know? So there is, there is like a way for us, here in Morocco, because since we don't have all the equipment, all the technicities, the schools, all that things, we have to become very creative into the way that we work.

26:32Jawad MirWhich is good.

26:35Mariam Lee AbounouomNot everything is on paper.

26:36Jawad MirYeah.

26:37Mariam Lee AbounouomAnd sometimes you have to be able to be flexible and to turn things around, you know? So, having h… learned, having studied in Germany and having the very rigid, very strict, structured mind, but the very versatile Moroccan has helped a lot into also, like, in my career into understanding, and the foreigners that come to Morocco to film, and also understanding the Moroccan, and actually how to be able to fuse them into, having the same mindset or at least going into the same direction. So that was

27:20Jawad MirI get it. I get it

27:20Mariam Lee Abounouom... The, another one I remembered on, also on Gladiator was we had, a lot, they had a lot of extras that had, like, really short hair, so we needed to take wigs that we've already fitted with the names. And so since they were the two teams, the supervisor from the civilian team, like, calls me in panic, you know. He's like, "Yes, what are we gonna do? We fitted, like, almost 1,000 people. Now all their wigs are go… are gone." So I had, some kids from the film school, and I said, "Okay, we have a choice. Either we work very, we work today and tomorrow, but we don't have, like, our weekend off, or we can work today very late at night, and then you can get our Saturday and Sunday. So which do you wish to do?" So I said, "We would like to work very late." So we were literally worked until 4:00 in the morning. We managed to get everything back in its place except for two wigs. So when the next day they came, it was, like, very happy because it just, like, made the workflow go again.

28:24Mariam Lee AbounouomAnd I could see, like, on the, on the, those, students that they really felt very happy and empowered because they managed to save a situation that could have, been very dramatic and could have cost a lot of money due to the time. So it's, it was nice.

28:45Jawad MirThat's cool. I was gonna ask you know, you said that you came back after, w… was it your first kid?

28:52Mariam Lee AbounouomYes

28:53Jawad Mir... So how, being a mother for five years and then diving back into work, that motherhood, did that sort of bring... Obviously, I'm guessing it's naturally came on the set, but did you notice that, you know, you're a different person now that you've sort of r… you know, given birth and raised a f… a kid for five years?

29:14Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah.

29:15Jawad MirWere th… those mother… motherly instincts, did that arrive on set, do you think?

29:19Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah, they do. Yeah. Total… totally. Totally. Because I saw, I see every, crew member as my, as a child, you know, that I have a responsibility to speak up for them when it's, when it's needed. But also as, if they do make a mistake, then you do follow up them, you know, as a mother would do.

29:42Jawad MirOf course. Yes.

29:43Mariam Lee AbounouomI think, like, at first, when I used to work on project, it was kind of like all, in a way, all over the place. But becoming a mom, grounded me. It gave me, like, a purpose. I know now to, create, like, the right balance, for my son and for myself and my work. And, he li… I'm fortunate also to be able to, being a head of a department, to be able to bring him with me to work, so I c… I explain to him, what I do. So even the people who I work with, they're excited to see him, so they will explain what the, what the job is about, what are the different departments, what is. So, and he's somebody who's very curious. He'll probably end up, I think, in the movie industry.

30:43Jawad MirI've, I was gonna say, you know, if you're exposing him to this world, more than likely he might. How old is he now? 10, 11?

30:51Mariam Lee AbounouomHe's seven. Seven.

30:52Jawad MirSeven. Seven. Yeah, so that's…... That's pretty neat. I actually have this… It's here somewhere. Wait, I have a book, on Kingdom of Heaven. I should…

31:03Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah, I see it. It's, one, two, three, the fourth one, like, you see where the yellow one is.

31:08Jawad MirThis one, right? Yeah. Yeah.

31:08Mariam Lee AbounouomAll the way in the top. No, the yellow on the top.

31:11Jawad MirOh, yes. Right there.

31:12Mariam Lee AbounouomThere you go.

31:13Jawad MirSo I never can keep track of this, and I read this a long time ago. I should have read this before talking to you, but, it's a great,.. You know, it has all the storyboards and bunch of stuff in there, and it's, it's a great book. I remember reading and enjoying it very much. But, you know, it's movies like Kingdom of Heaven and so many other films that, you know, a lot of people work on, including yourself. I… Kingdom of Heaven is something that nobody has ever done before.

31:41Jawad MirYou know, the whole story about the Crusades and, Salahuddin, and Jerusalem, and all that. Being from Morocco and seeing that kind of a story coming in, you know, to sort of, for the lack of better word, in some ways educate the Western audience, do you, do you remember feeling that in any way, that this is different? Or were you too involved? And maybe you were too young for that. I don't know. I'm just guessing. But was that ever…

32:14Jawad MirDid that ever cross your mind?

32:17Mariam Lee AbounouomYes. I mean, it didn't cross my mind then, but, it crosses my mind now, where talking to more filmmakers and like why is it, why does the Western world come and tell our, stories? W… there is,.. We have done recently, a TV series, about the Arabian sword, and it's doing really well in Qatar, 'cause when the Qatari, they come with the money, and we come with the ex… expertise.

33:06Jawad MirOf course.

33:06Mariam Lee AbounouomBut the difference, the difference is that they control so much, like, of the script, where in Hollywood, you know, they just, they want to tell the story. So at times it's, for us, the Arabs, difficult to tell our own stories in our own countries, but when someone else brings them, you know, the big, structure like Hollywood that comes, there's not many, like, re… restrictions. But I think it's time for us to wake up and actually do tell our stories. There are things, for example, if we talk about, you know, if it would be, like, a story about the Prophet Mohammed, then obviously we cannot showcase, we cannot put him on screen. It's, there's a lot, a lot of control about that. I myself are looking into different stories, but if they touch anything that is political or too historical or something that can, affect, a political relationship between two countries, then they kind of, res… kind of restrict it.

34:20Mariam Lee AbounouomSo…

34:22Jawad MirAnd I am so glad that you brought that up because that's something I talk about on a daily basis with so many people, is that I find... I live in Canada, right? So my mindset is maybe Western/Eastern because…

34:38Jawad Mir... I've lived in Canada most of my life. But I find that the trouble with that part of the world is, you know, whether it's, Middle East or Asia, even Africa, is that there is this tendency of not showing vulnerabilities.

34:55Jawad MirAnd the reason Hollywood works, in my view, is that they would show even vulnerabilities for, you know, a character like Nixon, John F. Kennedy, like, you know, anybody. Like, 'cause... And I think weaknesses is something that we tend to avoid to show in that part of the world, and s… and not criticize anybody.

35:16Jawad MirBut what we've... I think that's what connects to the audience.

35:21Mariam Lee AbounouomExactly.

35:21Jawad MirThose are the, those are the thing, the perfections nobody cares about. People go to watch movies for entertainment and also for relatability, and we're not perfect.

35:29Mariam Lee AbounouomOf course.

35:29Jawad MirAnd I think... Then that's, I'm glad you mentioned that because that needs to change, and that's the problem that w… I'm produ… I'm directing a film, right now. It's a short fiction, proof of concept, that wants to make into a feature. And the problem that I've run into raising capital, so far is that there's some people who understood and g… gave us the money, but some are like, "You know, it has to be this way," and I'm like, "I'm not going to change my script because you're gonna give me, you know, 20, $30,000," because there is that tendency. So I'm glad you mentioned that.

36:05Mariam Lee AbounouomYes. It's,.. I've been into the producing world not long time ago, 'cause, I did a, we did a feature film. It was a kind of a genre, a genre movie. And on that one I insisted, I said, "I don't want, like, nudity," but there's gonna be kind of like a, an erotic scene. But the er… the eroticism is just that the, there's a, one of the guys…

36:41Jawad MirIt drives, it drives the story basically.

36:43Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah.

36:43Jawad MirThe characters and the story. Yeah.

36:44Mariam Lee AbounouomYes. I didn't want any insults, you know, because, like, the, even the Moroccan movies, it goes, like, from one extreme to another. You know? It's like here we're very conservative. Very conservative. So when they started making movies… T… they were shocking, but you don't need to necessarily shock to make a message come through. You can actually…

37:07Jawad Mir100%

37:07Mariam Lee Abounouom... Put it in a, in a way where you can do it in a gentle way where you start educating the people. And I see also the movies that's, that when they do it to the Western world, that they talk about our countries and we have to w… show the miserabilism of the misery of our countries for them to tell the story. But we're not all just, like, about…

37:28Jawad MirYes

37:28Mariam Lee Abounouom... Camels and donkeys and the village and, you know, poor people, and it's, it's not only that. There's so much more to it. W… it's a, there's a very rich cult… very rich culture. So when I started, when I, after the Djinn film, I had a vision for it that I didn't want it to be, to look, for a movie like for TV. I want it to be more c…

37:56Jawad MirCinematic

37:57Mariam Lee Abounouom... Cinematic.

37:58Jawad MirYeah.

37:58Mariam Lee AbounouomSo I imposed, that we needed to have a rhythm and, l… the camera and the images, they need to be Hollywood. They had to be the same standard of the movies that we do the executive production for. If the story doesn't work so well, you know, it's okay. You know, it still remains a movie coming out from Morocco, Third World, so there are some excuses, but the fact that the cinematography and the rhythm, and if we keep the viewer, like, very interest… like interested into the story and captivated…

38:36Jawad MirYeah

38:36Mariam Lee Abounouom... It will work. So my first, my first, question was to a producer is like, "Okay, what am I suppo… what should I do?" So it said by 15 minutes if you don't grab your viewer you'll, you lost them. So I took the, there was a, an, a scene that was quite important. I put it exactly at 15 minutes, and then I started editing backwards, so there was a lot of things that I had to chop off that jeopardized a little bit the story, but not so much. You know? It's like people are going to remember the beginning, part of the middle, and then the end, so these parts need to be very important. And so that's how I started editing. It didn't, it was a bit conflictual sometimes with the director, but I was like, "No, we have to go down this r… this route because we're taking it, we want to take the Moroccan filmmaking to another level." and it was a movie that was entirely produced in Morocco with, I think we just, hired a DP, We hired a DP from France because we wanted someone who has traveled and have, experienced, different lights, and the color grading was also something that we took, because it's just better, outside of Morocco.

39:46Mariam Lee AbounouomBut it taught me my, that it, I wanted to start making more stories, but stories that were ours, without having the restriction of not telling them the way that they are. So at times I find myself that, you know, you have to, with my screenplay writer I'm like, "Okay, we're gonna write this scene, and if this, it's is based on this historical, we're gonna put like a little star and say, okay, and this book, referenced for this is what it says about this time." He's like, "Well, I've never done this for a script before." And I'm like, "Well, this time we're gonna do it because we're doing it for another mentality where you, we, where we have to show that it has been proven and even in local books that, it really existed so that we can go with the idea of the story that we want to tell." Otherwise, we will probably have to sell it to, a foreign production company, that is based either in Europe or United States so that they can come and do it, and then we find a way to become like the production service or anyway.

40:53Mariam Lee AbounouomBecause otherwise there's just too many restrictions, on the, on the story, which is, which is a shame because we should be able to tell freely the stories, you know? People want to have the em… feel the emotion, you know? And be able to identify with the chara… with the character that we're talking about.

41:12Jawad MirI mean, that's the whole point of the story. You have to tell it freely because it might, it might, you're not gonna please everybody, right? It might offend some people, but as long as…

41:21Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah

41:21Jawad Mir... You know, there's always a protagonist, and if you have a strong antagonist it makes the protagonist more interesting, and to have, and to show even the most darkest human being as a human being… ... People like that. They may not acce… they may not say that, but people are, you know, in Net… at Netflix now the, one of the most demanded projects is, genre is, crime documentaries.

41:43Jawad MirBecause people love watching murder, murderers and serial killers. I don't. I don't, but there's an audience for it, right? A massive audience. But another thing that you mentioned about, you know, like for example South Korea and Turkish, they have really, and I have only seen maybe bits of it, not too much, but I hear people talking about Turkish series and South Korean series.

42:08Jawad MirMy wife has been watching a South Korean series on Netflix she thinks is like one of the best things she's ever seen. And the fact that those things are coming to Netflix…

42:17Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah

42:17Jawad Mir... Right? Why is that pe… you know, from movies from Saudi Arabia or Morocco or Jordan or TV series, why are they not being, coming to Netflix? Because that's, if you want to change people's perceptions, that's the audience. The audience that you're, we're all catering to, they already have the same mindset as you are making the film, too. Like, if you wanna make a change, then you have to make something for the Western audience. I'm not saying go crazy, but to make them understand that this is the world, and maybe then they will understand that more. Isn't that something that, is that something that you see happening or you think about or that's going to happen, you think?

42:59Mariam Lee AbounouomSo I think, the new generation… Will change that. Because they are tired of having to tell, to cater their stories, in a certain way. They want to be able to have that freedom of expression. I think also is that the strength of the, of TV series, whether it's, the Turkish or the Korean, is that the cinematography, the cinematography, they manage to bring it to a level that is also West… Western…

43:45Jawad MirStandards

43:45Mariam Lee Abounouom... Understood and standard.

43:46Jawad MirBut it's, but it's also the story and the characters that are interesting, right?

43:50Mariam Lee AbounouomExactly.

43:50Jawad MirThat's... Right.

43:51Mariam Lee AbounouomYes. But they kept their identity, their identity in it. So I mean, if we take, like Squid Game, when it came out, everybody was like, "Wow," you know? Everybody was, like, hooked on it. But at the end, it does stay a South Korean, South Korean series, with, South Korean, their culture in it is very present. It's... I think it's also how just cinema… to understand the Western cinematography, and to apply your own, your own culture in it without…

44:30Jawad MirOkay

44:31Mariam Lee Abounouom... Killing your identity. Your,... So I see, for example, a lot of... There are some directors that try, but the one thing that a lot of, directors in Morocco, they depend on the money from the Moroccan Film Committee.

44:54Mariam Lee AbounouomBut they don't all go and search for co-producers to help…

45:01Jawad MirFrom other countries, yeah

45:02Mariam Lee Abounouom... From other count… for other countries. Or to... They, there is not that knowledge of you need to have a sales agent or a distributor before even starting your movie. S… they... A lot of them would come and then, the producers would not invest so much into the movie, but more into, 'cause they would take those funds and, you know, finance their own personal life for that. I always told them that, you know, they should... Like, when we look at Iranian movies, Iranian movies…

45:38Jawad MirYeah

45:39Mariam Lee Abounouom... They have their identity, and they are so proud of it. And they do, would do anything. They don't let anyone stop them from telling…

45:46Jawad Mir100%

45:47Mariam Lee Abounouom... Their stories.

45:48Jawad Mir100%.

45:48Mariam Lee AbounouomI think, you know, you cannot be led by fear making films, you know? There is, you do take risks, and when you take a risk, there will always be a price to pay, one way or the other. I think these…

46:07Jawad MirI think... Sorry, go on.

46:08Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah, that we, you cannot be, stay in your comfort zone, won't, won't lead you to making masterpieces.

46:16Jawad MirIt is so true, because I think... You know, the thing is that people, like even if you look at Hollywood right now, right? Like, there's the same sequels and remakes they're doing, and they're afraid to try something new, not because of freedom of expression, but because of money, right? Like, the, obviously it's a business. But when somebody takes that risk and does it properly, 99% of the time it's going to work. And even if it doesn't work financially, it's gonna set you up for the next project, and that's how you have to look at things, that you have to keep, you know, this is not it. This is not the first and last project. If you make it, if you're happy with it's taken chances and it's done okay or really bad box office-wise, but then you're a good storyteller, you will reap the rewards of it later.

47:03Jawad Mir'Cause that's what studios see, right? So…

47:05Mariam Lee AbounouomYes

47:06Jawad Mir... I mean, look at, you look at, what's his name? Christopher Nolan. He made Memento with…

47:11Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah

47:11Jawad Mir... Guy Pearce, and now look at his career.

47:13Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah.

47:13Jawad MirRight? So, but no, I'm glad that you're, you're talking about this, because I rarely talk to anybody who feels the same way, because everybody's sort of stuck in that, you know, it has to be done this way. But what's, what's on the, on your plate next, or what are you working on now that's something you can disclose? Anything exciting?

47:34Mariam Lee AbounouomSo right now I'm, so I've been, nominated for, from the Moroccan Film Committee for the opening and, of, film theaters and digitalizing them, so, t…

47:52Jawad MirCongratulations.

47:53Mariam Lee AbounouomThank you very much. So that's one of the things I am on. At the same time, I am, I'm, I'm learning to become a producer. Like, how to... Not an e… not an executive producer, because we do executive production a lot in Morocco, but actually how do we make a film? That's, so I s… am starting, an online school to learn to become an AD. And after that, I wanna do a course to learn how to become a director. Not to become a director, but actually to be able to understand the director's language so I can, be a better producer, because my, I want to be able to produce, stories in Morocco. There was something that I spoke to him with, 'cause we're a family business, I spoke it to my father and I said, "You know, you brought, you brought, production service so far, to such a high level in Morocco that right now we should take all that expertise and everything that you have done, and actually start creating and making our own stories, so that we can start bringing and showing, the world that we can actually make great stories."

49:08Mariam Lee AbounouomI do work a lot with,... Young directors and encour… encourage them to not anything like stop them. They to just be able to go and, take their telephones and make, short films.

49:25Jawad MirYeah.

49:25Mariam Lee AbounouomSo I f… you know, I have like my little group of people then. But for now as a, as in job we're, we are on, we're doing the, Paramount series that we're gonna be shooting this summer.

49:45Jawad MirAwesome.

49:45Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah.

49:46Jawad MirThat's great. You know what you should, you were talking about going to school for directing. There's a great book, that I read last year, and I reread it again this year as I'm prepping up for my film, Directing Actors by Judith Weston. And, it's, it's an incredible book. There's a 25th anniversary edition. It really t… it really t… tells you how to direct. I mean, not from a technical standpoint only, but more so like your relationships that you build with your crew, and mainly especially for actors, like how to work with actors, how to understand their dilemmas and their…

50:21Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah

50:22Jawad Mir... Fears and all that. And so I highly recommend that. If it's something that you're gonna do, read that book. It… it's a great book.

50:30Mariam Lee AbounouomYes, because that's a, that's another, that's another side of, I would say of p… of production that I sometimes struggle with, is, I can manage the whole, I can manage the crew, but actors sometimes it feels like…

50:45Jawad MirYeah

50:45Mariam Lee Abounouom... 50 kills.

50:45Jawad MirYou know, but you know the thing with actors is, I mean, I… the thing is that I think it's, I think they have more fear and insecurity, at least…

50:54Mariam Lee AbounouomYes

50:54Jawad Mir... That's what I got from this book.

50:56Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah.

50:56Jawad MirBut because of that fear and insecurity, they be… they create this little wall, and they guard themselves, so they comes…

51:03Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah

51:03Jawad Mir... They come across as, you know, full of vanity, which they might be to some extent. But I think if you make things comfortable for them and make things and direct them and direct them, 'cause a lot of directors believe, and one of those things I read in the book was that a lot of directors believe that, you know, you give the script to the actors, and you let them act, and that's it.

51:22Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah.

51:22Jawad MirThat can work for people like Anthony Hopkins or, you know…

51:25Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah

51:26Jawad Mir... Richard Gere. But even they need direction. Like, okay, what are you trying to tell? And unless they have direction, then they're confused, and then that's when they lose their sanity.

51:35Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah.

51:35Jawad MirIs that, "Why am I here?" So, but yeah, that's, that's the gist of it. I thought I should just let you know, but it's, it's been amazing conversing with you. Obviously, I did not expect this conversation in any way, which is so, which is so am…... Which is so amazing, which is what I do, is like whenever I…... Talk to people, I know a little bit about them. But I mostly know about the film, and then I let the conversation unfold. But this has been one of the most unique experiences. I… Out of the two, out of the 235 episodes I've done, this has been one of the most unique experiences, thank you so much.

52:06Mariam Lee AbounouomThank you. Thank you. It was my pleasure.

52:09Jawad MirYeah. I would love to have you again ... If I'm ever in, if I'm ever in Marrakesh, which could be soon.

52:15Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah.

52:16Jawad MirI'll, I'll…

52:16Mariam Lee AbounouomPlease

52:16Jawad Mir... Yeah, let you know

52:17Mariam Lee Abounouom... Please come visit us. I'll be happy to show you around and to show you around our film studio, because we have now the first film studio in Marrakesh.

52:28Jawad MirAmazing.

52:28Mariam Lee AbounouomSo yes, it's a, it's a baby we've been working on for the past two years. So we are, we've built, this studio actually to bring the work, to bring the work in, and where most of other film studios in Morocco, it's actually the project that builds the sets and then leave them behind.

52:52Jawad MirYeah. Yeah. But that's good. That's good that you might be able to attract more, you know, Western or even like, you know, Middle Eastern or Eastern productions…

53:00Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah, we…

53:00Jawad Mir... In there because, yeah.

53:02Mariam Lee Abounouomhuh. We have, we have been co… So after doing the Arab Sword, which is, now doing really well and, Arabian Sword, it's, for Qatar TV, and it's…

53:17Jawad MirYeah

53:18Mariam Lee Abounouom... A, on a platform called Shahid.

53:20Jawad MirOkay.

53:21Mariam Lee AbounouomAnd it attracted another... So we've been contacted by NBC to do another episode where they wanted us to be, to produce, for them. We've had, different, countries, Belgium, Netherlands also that have been interested into coming. So yes, it has been attracting quite a bit of, interest. And, also one of my tasks right now is I go around to film festivals and start promoting, what we do, with our studio, because we are like in Marrakesh, we are a 360 facility.

54:03Jawad MirThat's super cool. Are you planning to come to Toronto anytime soon?

54:06Mariam Lee AbounouomI would love to.

54:08Jawad MirWell, there's…

54:08Mariam Lee AbounouomI would love to

54:09Jawad Mir... TIF is coming up in about three months. Do come.

54:12Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah. Yeah, I will, I will enroll f… I will enroll in this, get an accre… accreditation for TIF. I'd love…

54:19Jawad MirYeah, 'cause they d… they do have, I remember last year I went, and they had these, all these little sections like, you know, tax breaks if you shot in India, in New Zealand. Like, they had all these countries.

54:31Jawad MirI didn't, I think the only Middle Eastern country that I saw, or even African for that matter, was Saudi Arabia, and that's it.

54:39Mariam Lee AbounouomOf course.

54:40Jawad MirYeah. That was, that was the only thing I saw, so maybe you should explore that.

54:43Mariam Lee AbounouomWell, it's, it's something that I'm trying to put into the f… the Moroccan Film Committee, is that it would be good to have a country that does like co-productions, because we do have s… co… co-production agreements with a couple of countries, but none with Nor… North America, and I think Canada could be, could be an interesting one. So…

55:04Jawad MirFor sure. Well, good to have you here, and then maybe…

55:06Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah

55:06Jawad Mir... We'll see each other here or there.

55:08Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah.

55:09Jawad MirAwesome.

55:10Mariam Lee AbounouomOkay.

55:10Jawad MirWell, thank you again for your time.

55:11Mariam Lee AbounouomYeah, thank you.

55:12Jawad MirWe'll be in touch, and I'll send you a personal email too, and we can stay in touch. Thank you so much.

55:17Mariam Lee AbounouomOkay. Yes. Bye.

55:18Jawad MirTake care. Bye.