Amir El-Masry on Dislocating Finger While Playing Boxer Prince Naseem in ‘Giant’ With Pierce Brosnan Who Told Him: ‘F— the Film. Worry About Your Health’

British-Egyptian actor Amir El-Masry, who plays iconic British-Yemeni featherweight “Prince” Naseem Hamed in the biopic “Giant” – which opens Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea Film Festival – is on a roll with a trio of movies launching in rapid succession, all of which bridge his multi-cultural upbringing in very different ways.

After appearing in Julia Jackman’s ensemble fairy tale “100 Nights of Hero,” which draws from The Thousand and One Nights and debuted at the Venice Film Festival, El Masry is appearing as the lead in both “Giant,” which is directed by Rowan Athale, and in Egyptian director Abu Bakr Shawky’s “The Stories,” where he plays a pianist from Cairo who becomes pen pals with an Austrian girl whom he then marries.

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Born in Cairo and raised in London, Amir El Masry broke out internationally in 2016 with a small standout role as a hotel chef opposite Tom Hiddleston in Susanne Bier-directed miniseries “The Night Manager.” El-Masry subsequently garnered critical praise for his role as Syrian asylum-seeker living on a small Scottish island in Ben Sharrock’s 2020 drama “Limbo,” for which he won a BAFTA Scotland acting award. He also scored a role as a military chief in “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.”

More recently El Masry has played Mohamed al-Fayed, the former Harrods owner and father of Princess Diana’s lover Dodi, in Netflix’s “The Crown.” He’s starred in Egypt’s hit musical TV series “Crazy About You” and in the BBC’s  Scotland-set submarine hit mystery “Vigil.” He will soon appear in British-Iranian director Fateme Ahmadi’s psychological thriller “Daughter of Eden,” alongside Yasmin Al-Khudhairi, Hiam Abbass and Lindsay Duncan.

El-Masry speaks to Variety about transitioning from roles as a cocky boxing champion to playing a shy introverted pianist and why he loves working with Pierce Brosnan.

What drew you to this role. What did Prince Naseem represent for you?

Naseem represented so much even on a political level. He represented perseverance at a time when growing up in Sheffield it wasn’t a multicultural or a diverse area. And he managed to find his own community there through the free boxing gym run by Brendan Ingle. He was small in structure, which is why the film is called “Giant.” It’s ironic, in a sense, because he’s so small, in comparison to all the other fighters he fought. But he knocked them all out. He had an incredible power punch on him. And he did the same thing in his life, you know. He blocked out the noise. He managed to kind of put one foot forward in front of the other and come out of Sheffield and be world champion. Not just a British champion, but someone who was akin to being Muhammad Ali. And for me, growing up in London, I find that wholly inspirational to see someone that is quite similar to me culturally.

Talk to me about the physical challenge of this role. I’ve read that you did some training and had to bulk up a bit. But I also heard that you dislocated your finger, so you had to deal with that as well.

I had [several] 12 hour days of training. I would wake up at six in the morning and go to the gym at seven every day. And I managed to bulk up quite quickly. It was insane to do all of that in four and a half weeks. But we did it. Then of course, in the penultimate week, they invite Johnny Nelson – they invite all of boxing royalty – to come watch us. And the stuntman opposite me, goes: “Let’s give him a show! Just punch me. Punch me. Don’t worry about it.” I was like: “Are you sure?” And then when I punch him – when I went for his ribs – his immediate reaction was to guard himself, when, in actual fact, he was meant to let go. So I hit his elbow and my finger popped out of its socket. I was in immediate shock. I didn’t feel the pain. It just didn’t feel right. My finger is outside of a socket and it’s dangling. And then they just popped it back in, and, my God, the sound reverberated in the room. It was a massive popping noise, my hand swelled up, and I rushed to the doctors. I was emotional. I was like: “Please let me be allowed to fight! Which they did. But Pierce saw me, and he grabbed me, and he was like: “Don’t worry about the film. Fuck the film. Worry about your health, worry about your family.”

So what was it like working with Pierce Brosnan?

He’s a consummate professional, a leader, a father figure, and he is someone who really cares about his tribe and his community. In that [dislocated finger] moment, it really was like a father-son relationship.

As I understand it you are going to be onscreen with him again. Is that right?

Yes. It’s a little cameo in the [Guy Ritchie] TV series “Mobland.” I got a phone call from my agent, who said: “Do you want to want to work with Pierce again?” I was like: “Yeah. Of course, absolutely!”

You recently went from playing a boxer (with a dislocated finger) to playing a gentle struggling pianist in Abu Bakr Shawky’s “The Stories.” Was that a difficult transition?

It was interesting. Because, like you said, their personalities are polar opposites. One’s more showy and the other is very introverted. The lovely thing is that I had reference points for both. For Nassim my kind of Bible were the YouTube videos. And with Abu’s film, which is loosely based on his father – whom I got to know during the shoot – Abu would send me notes with these sort of nuggets of his personality. And I drew from that. I also drew from the idea that when you’re a pianist, your expressions come from your hands. Not from your face. A good pianist is able to show their personality through how long they spend on certain notes musically.

Next year you will be back on set with Ben Sharrock on a film titled “Alone Together.” What can you tell me about it?

Yeah, it’s another one of Ben’s soon-to-be masterpieces. I mean, whatever that man writes, he’s just, gonna come out with gold. It’s set in Oman and it’s about this man who’s going on kind of a writing retreat, and also maybe escaping from an impending divorce. But over there, at that time, he meets my character and he kind of goes on this journey of self discovery. But of course Ben being Ben, there will be some – what’s the word? – extensive imagination.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.