An English teacher who helps educate immigrants and people from deprived backgrounds has landed himself a role in the new Netflix series of The Crown.
Mohammed Kamel, who grew up in Wembley, can be seen playing Egyptian businessman Ali Al-Fayed in the series about the Royal Family.
Outside his acting career, which has begun to blossom over recent years, Mr Kamel spends his time teaching at Wembley’s Functional Skills Educational Centre.
The actor has spent 18 years as a teacher, explaining that it’s a good side-gig to have as he cannot commit to fulltime work with his acting.
He said: “It’s a very rewarding job, you get a lot of satisfaction from helping people and knowing it opens up a lot of opportunities for them.
“I’ve been quite fortunate, as the people I work for are quite flexible. So they now when I have auditions and filming and let me go in short notice.”
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He said his father, Galal Kamel, is his “biggest hero" and the inspiration behind the move into acting.
He said: “When my father first came to England, he had to start from scratch, working as a waiter and a porter to scrape a living. But from a very early age, he recognised I had a passion for film.
“When I was a kid, I would stay up way past my bedtime and watch films that I was too young to watch, like The Godfather and Enter the Dragon.
“My father told me that he would only allow me to stay up and watch these movies on the condition that I got a pen and paper, took notes and wrote down my thoughts on the film and the characters.”
After graduating from Brunel University, Mr Kamel went on to train as an actor at ArtsEd and then began to write and direct short films in 2015.
The Wembley actor also credited buddying actor Hainsley Lloyd Bennett with supporting his move into acting.
They met at a bar in 2014, and Mr Kamel was inspired that Mr Bennett, another aspiring person of colour from Alperton, was venturing into acting.
Mr Kamel can be seen in season five of The Crown on Netflix. He will reprise the role in season 6 next year.
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