While watching a recent repeat of the film "A Perfect Murder", I remembered something I hadn't thought about for a while. This 1998 suspense thriller about a jealous husband who plots to kill his unfaithful wife was a landmark for Arab-American viewers not for anything to do with the story, but for one single character. It contained an Arab-American character, Mohamed Karaman, the was the wise detective on the case who knew better than to dimiss the possibility that the husband, played by Michael Douglas, was totally innocent. Although detective Karaman was never identified as an Arab-American, he spoke Arabic in the film, even exchanging a few lines with actress Gwyneth Paltrow who played the wife and target for murder by her husband.
This Arab-American character made me remember the time (the only other time) I had ever seen an Arab character like this --not evil, not portrayed as a strange looking foreigner, not a religious fanatic, a terrorist, or, the latest category: a victim. A few TV shows post- 9/11 have featured Arab-American characters being portrayed as victims of hate crimes, which, although necessary sometimes, still isn't the kind of film or TV character I always hoped for. Where are the fictional characters like: the pediatrician Dr. Jamal Haddad, or Samir Hosni, the writer, or Ms. Aisha Abdallah the teacher, the taxi drivers, the students, the homemakers, the shop owners, the nurses, .......well, you get the idea. When will these sort of everyday Arab-American characters make their way onto the big screen and television?
Anyway, back to my mention of "A Perfect Murder". This character was a normal, everyday American who happened to be of Arab descent. His ethnicity was not used as a means to portray evil or violence or filthy wealth, or anything else negative. While watching this character, I remembered the Lebanese-American character, Maxwell Q Klinger (a corporal then sergeant), played by actor Jamie Farr on the hit TV show M.A.S.H. Although I don't know if he ever made mention of his cultural background on the show, he, like the character in "A Perfect Murder, also spoke in Arabic much to the delight of Arab-American viewers. As far as I knew, this was a first. I remember watching it as a child and feeling amused and somehow proud to know that he was Arab-American. Sure the character was odd, since he often dressed as a woman in order to be dismissed from the military as mentally ill. But this was a comedy, and actor Jamie Farr was a great part of this hit show.
