Waleed F. Zuaiter is one of the few people in American theater and film who embodies the intersection of cultural heritage, artistic versatility, and advocacy for underrepresented voices. Zuaiter was born on January 19, 1971, in Sacramento, California. He is a Palestinian-American actor and producer who has been pushing the limits of performance and innovation behind the scenes for decades. Zuaiter has not only wowed audiences around the world, but he has also used his fame to spread stories from the Middle East and beyond. He has been nominated for an Oscar as a producer and a BAFTA as an actor. As of 2025, he is still growing his influence by combining high-stakes drama with a dedication to real representation.
Early Life and How He Got to the Stage
Zuaiter’s journey starts in the most unlikely of places: the sun-baked deserts of Kuwait, where he spent most of his childhood after his Palestinian family moved there from California. Waleed was the youngest of three brothers. Abbas “Eddy” and Ahmad Zuaiter are both high-ranking executives at Soros Fund Management. Waleed grew up in a world where two cultures coexisted. His early exposure to both Arab traditions and American roots would later help him write about complicated, often overlooked characters in a nuanced way.
When he was a young man, Zuaiter came back to the U.S. and went to George Washington University in Washington, D.C. There, he got a degree in philosophy and theater. His passion began to grow here, in the city’s historic theaters. He honed his skills at the well-known Studio Theatre Acting Conservatory and made his debut in local productions that showed off his natural talent and strong presence. By the early 2000s, Zuaiter had moved to New York City, where he traded the closeness of D.C. for the brightness of Broadway.
He broke through on off-Broadway with roles that called for emotional depth and cultural understanding. In George Packer’s Betrayed (2008), he played a former Iraqi translator who had to deal with betrayal and stay alive. Critics praised his performance for being so real. Other notable stage credits include David Greig’s The American Pilot, Tony Kushner’s Homebody/Kabul, Ilan Hatsor’s Masked (in which he played the oldest of three Palestinian brothers during the First Intifada), and Eliam Kraiem’s Sixteen Wounded, which was his Broadway debut with close friend Omar Metwally. In Bertolt Brecht’s Mother Courage at The Public Theater, Zuaiter shared the stage with stars like Meryl Streep and Kevin Kline. This solidified his reputation as a theater powerhouse. He also helped start the New York Arab-American Comedy Festival and is a member of the Arab-American theater group NIBRAS. He puts a lot of effort into getting Arab voices heard in both comedy and drama.
From Goats to Global Stages: Moving to Film and TV
Zuaiter’s rise to fame on screen was smooth, with roles that took advantage of his ability to speak both English and Arabic and his ability to switch between being scary and vulnerable. The indie comedy Eat Me! (1999) was his first movie, but it was the 2008 drama The Visitor, directed by Tom McCarthy, that got him noticed in Hollywood. In the DVD commentary, McCarthy later praised Zuaiter and said he wanted to work with the “respected New York theatre actor.”
Zuaiter made a lot of different movies in the late 2000s and 2010s. He played Mahmud Daash, a terrorist operative, in The Men Who Stare at Goats (2009), which starred George Clooney and Ewan McGregor. He played a sheikh’s bodyguard in Sex and the City 2 (2010), which was funny. In Elevator (2011), a claustrophobic thriller directed by Stig Svendsen, he was stuck in a high-stakes Wall Street bomb scenario. He had a big role as Sgt. Brody’s torturer in Homeland (2011) and a guest role in the NBC pilot Copper, directed by Spike Lee and written by Tom Fontana and Barry Levinson. His real-life son, Laith Zuaiter, also appeared in Copper with Bobby Cannavale.
But it was the HBO/BBC miniseries House of Saddam (2008) that made him famous all over the world. Zuaiter played Saddam Hussein’s loyal advisor in a movie shot in Tunisia. His performance, which made the regime’s inner circle seem more human, won praise around the world.
Television has also been a good place to grow. In USA’s Colony (2016–2018), Zuaiter played Vincent, a resistance fighter in a dystopian Los Angeles. His terrifying performance as Syrian Colonel Amin al-Hafiz in Netflix’s The Spy (2019) with Sacha Baron Cohen showed how well he knows how to tell historical stories. He played the mysterious Samir Abboud in Altered Carbon (2018) and the former Iraqi police officer searching for his missing daughter in Baghdad Central (2020). The latter role won him a BAFTA nomination for Leading Actor in 2021. He played Hassan Asfour, a key Palestinian negotiator, in HBO’s Oslo (2021), and Koba, a ruthless Georgian killer, in Gangs of London Season 2 (2022). As of 2025, Zuaiter will play Howard Sanderson in the new series The Girlfriend, which will have six episodes and more complex storylines.
Production Ventures: Supporting Stories That Aren’t Often Told
Zuaiter’s influence goes well beyond acting. He co-produced and starred in Omar in 2013. The movie is a tense thriller about a baker caught up in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The movie won the Special Jury Prize at Cannes and Best Feature at the Asia Pacific Screen Awards. It also got a historic Oscar nomination for Best Foreign Language Film, which was the first time Palestine had ever been nominated. Zuaiter started FlipNarrative after Omar’s success, which was a big deal for him and his brothers Abbas and Ahmad through their company ZBROS. The production company, which Joana Vicendeau and Amin El Gamal helped start, is focused on “amplifying underrepresented and historically misrepresented voices” from the Middle East and the global diaspora.
FlipNarrative has a list of adaptations, including Shannon Chakraborty’s fantasy novel The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi, which will be made into a TV show in 2024. Zuaiter has also bought the rights to Ibrahim Fawal’s PEN-Oakland Award-winning book On the Hills of God. His philosophy of producing, which is based on honesty and working together, has made him a mentor to up-and-coming Arab talent, just like his work as a dialect coach on Adam Sandler’s You Don’t Mess with the Zohan (2008).
Awards, Advocacy, and Thoughts on the Matter
The 2013 Muhr Arab Award at the Dubai International Film Festival for Omar, the 2021 BAFTA TV nomination for Baghdad Central, and the long-lasting Oscar nomination as producer all show that Zuaiter is a great actor and producer. But his advocacy is even better. In 2023, as violence in Gaza and Israel grew, Zuaiter used his platform to call for a ceasefire, sharing petitions and talking about how Arab people are represented in the media. He told Arab News in 2023 that “we need stories that humanize, not stereotype.” He stressed that Arab actors have a duty to take back stories.
Zuaiter lives in Los Angeles with his wife, Joana (a FlipNarrative co-founder and former publicist), and their two kids. His X account (@waleedzuaiter) gives us a peek into his life by promoting projects, celebrating birthdays (like Gangs of London co-star Shuka Ete’s in 2023), and sharing family moments, like a 2025 link to his wife’s Instagram page. There are more than 1,300 people who follow him, which is a small but active group for a man with a global reach.
Waleed Zuaiter is at the height of his creativity in 2025. His career shows how strong and diverse he is, from stage whispers in D.C. to Oscar-winning movies and TV thrillers. In an industry that gets a lot of flak for typecasting, Zuaiter doesn’t just act; he makes a difference, one real story at a time.
