Actor Rupert Friend is best known for his role as troubled agent Peter Quinn in the hit Showtime TV drama Homeland, alongside Claire Danes and Mandy Patinkin for which he earned an Emmy nomination in 2011.
Now in the film Hitman: Agent 47, out on Thursday, August 27, he portrays another troubled hero, as he pulls on the iconic black suit and bright red tie of the title character from the hit video game series. Directed by Aleksander Bach, the film also features Star Trek stars Zachary Quinto and Hannah Ware.
How did the Hitman journey begin for you?
It was a long time ago when they were prepping this film, and they asked me to read for John Smith, who’s the antagonist Zach [Quinto] plays. And I clearly did a terrible job because that didn’t come back around. [laughs] It was very, very fast when it happened, and they apparently had presented the studio with a number of options. You would have heard of all of them, and I was the one that they hadn’t heard of. So they took a gamble on me, for which I’m enormously grateful.
You’ve come back for additional photography to enhance the action — do you enjoy the physical stuff?
I love it. You know, I think audiences are so smart these days. Nobody wants to see the back of someone’s head doing a load of fighting, and then you cut and the actor kind of goes, “Whew.” You’re like, “Oh, come on, that clearly wasn’t you!” So I said to them from the beginning: “I want to do everything.” Depending on the cut, you should always see that it’s me — unless it’s super dangerous.
The team behind John Wick — Chad Stahelski and David Leitch — have created the second-unit sequences. How have they been to work with?
They're the best in the business. They run the most-successful action design sequence company in the world, actually. So they came up as stuntmen, then fight coordinators, stunt coordinators, and then second-unit directors, and now they're absolutely flying. People can't get enough of them. I think they understand action in the best way that I've ever seen working on set, and when you see them design a piece and then how they film it, it's pretty damn thrilling. They want it to be real, so I've been working and training in Krav Maga, Filipino knife fighting, judo and karate. They call it Gun Fu — which they devised for Hitman: Agent 47 and John Wick — which is basically kung fu, but with guns in your hands. So as you saw in the trailer, I'm breaking people's necks with my legs, which I did about 65 times. It's full on and they want full contact. Their guys are tough as all hell and they don't pull any punches.
How did you feel when you first watched the trailer?
I thought it was excellent. I don't actually tend to watch my work, but I pre-recorded an introduction to a version of that trailer at Comic-Con because I couldn't make it while I was doing Homeland. So I watched it mainly because I wanted to know what I was introducing, and I wanted to know if we could be proud of it — and I was super proud of it. I think it's stylish; I think it's slick and I think it's true to what the game-makers set out to do. I think it's definitely true to what we set out to do, which was make an intelligent, original, thrilling version of this world.
What went into recreating the iconic suit and shaved-head look of Agent 47?
We went through every major option you would imagine. Every fashion house you’ve heard of, we had them all begging to do it because it is so iconic. Eventually we got a tailor from Madrid flown in and he designed the suit, and cut each one just for me, along with all the shirts. So everything was tailor-made. There’s no elastic or anything in them, so they’re tricky to fight in, but I’ve been doing it for some time now.
Were you at all familiar with the games?
I'm not a huge gamer. I had heard of this character, and I played the game to prepare for this, and I was struck by the intelligence of the gameplay. Even though I grew up with Wolfenstein and all of that when I was a kid, I found there was only so much brainless gunplay you could do before getting bored, no matter how bad the boss was. What I loved about Hitman was, you know, don't pull the gun out. Do it without that. Use stealth. Use cunning. Use disguise. As an actor, the idea of disguise is very attractive. So when I came on board, I wanted to involve more costume changes, more stealth. I wanted to do all the stuff that, to me, was important about the game, which was that this is not just a brutal killer, but also a fiercely intelligent killer.
What was the biggest challenge of bringing a video-game character to life?
For me, the important thing was to translate the game, not transliterate the game. The game is wonderful and you play it — it’s interactive. A film is not interactive. What I didn’t want was for you to be just standing behind 47’s head in third person — I mean I’m not directing this film, but none of us wanted to do that. We wanted to go into this brilliantly created world, and then tell our own story. I approached it as I would approach any part, really, and didn’t try to do an impersonation of a video game, but to create a flesh and blood version of 47, which I think is much more interesting.
He’s also a bit of mystery. We don’t really know where he came from and what his design is. Does that add to the challenge of creating a character for you?
Yeah, I mean, I was super fascinated by the idea that potentially he’s a little bit of a corrupt clone, you know, that the 47th incarnation of this uber-human had a couple of flaws. I loved the idea that he’s not quite perfect, and that his makers were a little bit threatened by that. He did go rogue and he did try to take them down. It implies original thought and all that stuff about machines taking over. I find that debate very interesting and so that does play in, at least to open the conversation a bit.
How does he relate to those around him?
He feels that there is a very strong connection between him and this Katia figure, who's central to the whole film, and really there's a cat and mouse going on between John and Katia and 47 and Katia. She's the linchpin, the answer, the secret to the whole story. And then we have wonderful supporting turns from Ciaran Hinds and Thomas Kretschmann, and lots of other great actors that came on board. We have a cameo now from Jurgen Prochnow from Das Boot, and it's a great honour for me, personally, to be in a film with him.
How much has playing Peter Quinn on Homeland helped you to play this role, in terms of skill and training?
I’ve had a gun in my hand for three years straight, so that’s been helpful. Agent 47 is ambidextrous with his guns. That takes some doing — safeties and reloads with two hands. It’s a bit of a tricky one. But I’m very familiar with weapons and fighting and, again, with doing all my own stunts, so that’s been hugely helpful. But 47 is an engineered human being. He’s better at everything than everyone, and Quinn is kind of psychotic in some ways. I don’t think 47 loses his cool in that way. Things are way more thought out than Quinn has the ability to do. Playing 47, I did have this one image of a wolf just sitting on a hill watching over something. There was something about the way that wolves can work in a pack and can kill very effectively. They’re incredibly loyal, but they go straight for the throat very efficiently.
How would you describe working director Aleksander Bach?
I think Ali’s a very visual director and his vision for the film was this iconic, sleek feel for Syndicate International — which is the corporation that’s trying to use agents for bad — full of very clean white lines. I wouldn’t say futuristic, but I would say modernist. And I think that translates to the whole colour palette being very cool and blue. Ali had a great understanding of the nature of the world.
artslife@thenational.ae
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Ms Yang's top tips for parents new to the UAE
- Join parent networks
- Look beyond school fees
- Keep an open mind
TOUCH RULES
Touch is derived from rugby league. Teams consist of up to 14 players with a maximum of six on the field at any time.
Teams can make as many substitutions as they want during the 40 minute matches.
Similar to rugby league, the attacking team has six attempts - or touches - before possession changes over.
A touch is any contact between the player with the ball and a defender, and must be with minimum force.
After a touch the player performs a “roll-ball” - similar to the play-the-ball in league - stepping over or rolling the ball between the feet.
At the roll-ball, the defenders have to retreat a minimum of five metres.
A touchdown is scored when an attacking player places the ball on or over the score-line.
COMPANY%20PROFILE
%3Cp%3E%3Cstrong%3ECompany%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Vault%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EStarted%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EJune%202023%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ECo-founders%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EBilal%20Abou-Diab%20and%20Sami%20Abdul%20Hadi%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EBased%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EAbu%20Dhabi%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ELicensed%20by%3A%3C%2Fstrong%3E%20Abu%20Dhabi%20Global%20Market%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EIndustry%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EInvestment%20and%20wealth%20advisory%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EFunding%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E%241%20million%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3EInvestors%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3EOutliers%20VC%20and%20angel%20investors%3Cbr%3E%3Cstrong%3ENumber%20of%20employees%3A%20%3C%2Fstrong%3E14%3Cbr%3E%3C%2Fp%3E%0A
The five pillars of Islam
Mia Man’s tips for fermentation
- Start with a simple recipe such as yogurt or sauerkraut
- Keep your hands and kitchen tools clean. Sanitize knives, cutting boards, tongs and storage jars with boiling water before you start.
- Mold is bad: the colour pink is a sign of mold. If yogurt turns pink as it ferments, you need to discard it and start again. For kraut, if you remove the top leaves and see any sign of mold, you should discard the batch.
- Always use clean, closed, airtight lids and containers such as mason jars when fermenting yogurt and kraut. Keep the lid closed to prevent insects and contaminants from getting in.
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
The bio
Job: Coder, website designer and chief executive, Trinet solutions
School: Year 8 pupil at Elite English School in Abu Hail, Deira
Role Models: Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk
Dream City: San Francisco
Hometown: Dubai
City of birth: Thiruvilla, Kerala
RESULTS
5pm Maiden (PA) Dh70,000 (Dirt) 1,400m
Winner AF Nashrah, Tadhg O’Shea (jockey), Ernst Oertel (trainer)
5.30pm Maiden (PA) Dh70,000 (D) 1,400m
Winner Mutaqadim, Riccardo Iacopini, Ibrahim Al Hadhrami.
6pm Maiden (PA) Dh70,000 (D) 1,600m
Winner Hameem, Jose Santiago, Abdallah Al Hammadi.
6.30pm Maiden (PA) Dh70,000 (D) 1,600m
Winner AF Almomayaz, Sandro Paiva, Ali Rashid Al Raihe.
7pm Handicap (PA) Dh70,000 (D) 1,800m
Winner Dalil Al Carrere, Fernando Jara, Mohamed Daggash.
7.30pm Handicap (TB) Dh70,000 (D) 1,000m
Winner Lahmoom, Royston Ffrench, Salem bin Ghadayer.
8pm Handicap (PA) Dh70,000 (D) 1,000m
Winner Jayide Al Boraq, Bernardo Pinheiro, Khalifa Al Neyadi.
Henrik Stenson's finishes at Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship:
2006 - 2
2007 - 8
2008 - 2
2009 - MC
2010 - 21
2011 - 42
2012 - MC
2013 - 23
2014 - MC
2015 - MC
2016 - 3
2017 - 8
The smuggler
Eldarir had arrived at JFK in January 2020 with three suitcases, containing goods he valued at $300, when he was directed to a search area.
Officers found 41 gold artefacts among the bags, including amulets from a funerary set which prepared the deceased for the afterlife.
Also found was a cartouche of a Ptolemaic king on a relief that was originally part of a royal building or temple.
The largest single group of items found in Eldarir’s cases were 400 shabtis, or figurines.
Khouli conviction
Khouli smuggled items into the US by making false declarations to customs about the country of origin and value of the items.
According to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, he provided “false provenances which stated that [two] Egyptian antiquities were part of a collection assembled by Khouli's father in Israel in the 1960s” when in fact “Khouli acquired the Egyptian antiquities from other dealers”.
He was sentenced to one year of probation, six months of home confinement and 200 hours of community service in 2012 after admitting buying and smuggling Egyptian antiquities, including coffins, funerary boats and limestone figures.
For sale
A number of other items said to come from the collection of Ezeldeen Taha Eldarir are currently or recently for sale.
Their provenance is described in near identical terms as the British Museum shabti: bought from Salahaddin Sirmali, "authenticated and appraised" by Hossen Rashed, then imported to the US in 1948.
- An Egyptian Mummy mask dating from 700BC-30BC, is on offer for £11,807 ($15,275) online by a seller in Mexico
- A coffin lid dating back to 664BC-332BC was offered for sale by a Colorado-based art dealer, with a starting price of $65,000
- A shabti that was on sale through a Chicago-based coin dealer, dating from 1567BC-1085BC, is up for $1,950
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
The biog
Fatima Al Darmaki is an Emirati widow with three children
She has received 46 certificates of appreciation and excellence throughout her career
She won the 'ideal mother' category at the Minister of Interior Awards for Excellence
Her favourite food is Harees, a slow-cooked porridge-like dish made from boiled wheat berries mixed with chicken
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
The specs: 2018 Volkswagen Teramont
Price, base / as tested Dh137,000 / Dh189,950
Engine 3.6-litre V6
Gearbox Eight-speed automatic
Power 280hp @ 6,200rpm
Torque 360Nm @ 2,750rpm
Fuel economy, combined 11.7L / 100km
Specs
Engine: Electric motor generating 54.2kWh (Cooper SE and Aceman SE), 64.6kW (Countryman All4 SE)
Power: 218hp (Cooper and Aceman), 313hp (Countryman)
Torque: 330Nm (Cooper and Aceman), 494Nm (Countryman)
On sale: Now
Price: From Dh158,000 (Cooper), Dh168,000 (Aceman), Dh190,000 (Countryman)
The White Lotus: Season three
Creator: Mike White
Starring: Walton Goggins, Jason Isaacs, Natasha Rothwell
Rating: 4.5/5
MATCH INFO
Manchester City 1 Chelsea 0
De Bruyne (70')
Man of the Match: Kevin de Bruyne (Manchester City)
History's medical milestones
1799 - First small pox vaccine administered
1846 - First public demonstration of anaesthesia in surgery
1861 - Louis Pasteur published his germ theory which proved that bacteria caused diseases
1895 - Discovery of x-rays
1923 - Heart valve surgery performed successfully for first time
1928 - Alexander Fleming discovers penicillin
1953 - Structure of DNA discovered
1952 - First organ transplant - a kidney - takes place
1954 - Clinical trials of birth control pill
1979 - MRI, or magnetic resonance imaging, scanned used to diagnose illness and injury.
1998 - The first adult live-donor liver transplant is carried out
The specs: 2019 BMW X4
Price, base / as tested: Dh276,675 / Dh346,800
Engine: 3.0-litre turbocharged in-line six-cylinder
Transmission: Eight-speed automatic
Power: 354hp @ 5,500rpm
Torque: 500Nm @ 1,550rpm
Fuel economy, combined: 9.0L / 100km
Attacks on Egypt’s long rooted Copts
Egypt’s Copts belong to one of the world’s oldest Christian communities, with Mark the Evangelist credited with founding their church around 300 AD. Orthodox Christians account for the overwhelming majority of Christians in Egypt, with the rest mainly made up of Greek Orthodox, Catholics and Anglicans.
The community accounts for some 10 per cent of Egypt’s 100 million people, with the largest concentrations of Christians found in Cairo, Alexandria and the provinces of Minya and Assiut south of Cairo.
Egypt’s Christians have had a somewhat turbulent history in the Muslim majority Arab nation, with the community occasionally suffering outright persecution but generally living in peace with their Muslim compatriots. But radical Muslims who have first emerged in the 1970s have whipped up anti-Christian sentiments, something that has, in turn, led to an upsurge in attacks against their places of worship, church-linked facilities as well as their businesses and homes.
More recently, ISIS has vowed to go after the Christians, claiming responsibility for a series of attacks against churches packed with worshippers starting December 2016.
The discrimination many Christians complain about and the shift towards religious conservatism by many Egyptian Muslims over the last 50 years have forced hundreds of thousands of Christians to migrate, starting new lives in growing communities in places as far afield as Australia, Canada and the United States.
Here is a look at major attacks against Egypt's Coptic Christians in recent years:
November 2: Masked gunmen riding pickup trucks opened fire on three buses carrying pilgrims to the remote desert monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor south of Cairo, killing 7 and wounding about 20. IS claimed responsibility for the attack.
May 26, 2017: Masked militants riding in three all-terrain cars open fire on a bus carrying pilgrims on their way to the Monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor, killing 29 and wounding 22. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack.
April 2017: Twin attacks by suicide bombers hit churches in the coastal city of Alexandria and the Nile Delta city of Tanta. At least 43 people are killed and scores of worshippers injured in the Palm Sunday attack, which narrowly missed a ceremony presided over by Pope Tawadros II, spiritual leader of Egypt Orthodox Copts, in Alexandria's St. Mark's Cathedral. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attacks.
February 2017: Hundreds of Egyptian Christians flee their homes in the northern part of the Sinai Peninsula, fearing attacks by ISIS. The group's North Sinai affiliate had killed at least seven Coptic Christians in the restive peninsula in less than a month.
December 2016: A bombing at a chapel adjacent to Egypt's main Coptic Christian cathedral in Cairo kills 30 people and wounds dozens during Sunday Mass in one of the deadliest attacks carried out against the religious minority in recent memory. ISIS claimed responsibility.
July 2016: Pope Tawadros II says that since 2013 there were 37 sectarian attacks on Christians in Egypt, nearly one incident a month. A Muslim mob stabs to death a 27-year-old Coptic Christian man, Fam Khalaf, in the central city of Minya over a personal feud.
May 2016: A Muslim mob ransacks and torches seven Christian homes in Minya after rumours spread that a Christian man had an affair with a Muslim woman. The elderly mother of the Christian man was stripped naked and dragged through a street by the mob.
New Year's Eve 2011: A bomb explodes in a Coptic Christian church in Alexandria as worshippers leave after a midnight mass, killing more than 20 people.
