Do you want to be a free thinker or not? Do you want to be discerning? Do you want to
cross-examine things yourself or do you want to go with the mob? And for me, what I learned
about myself in that moment was I was strong to who I was.
Hi, I'm Jess Rowe and this is the Jess Rowe Big Talk Show, a podcast that skips the small
talk and goes big and deep with our most loved personalities, from love to loss and everything
in between. I want to show you a different side of people who seem to have it all together
in these raw and honest conversations about the things that matter. I don't know about
you, but in this time of social isolation and Instagram, I really crave connected conversations.
So I'm going to dig deep to give you a new window into the souls of the people we all
love and admire. I always cry and have a laugh, so you can expect some tears and laughter
as we celebrate the real-life flaws and vulnerabilities that make us human.
In this episode, I speak with TV and film actor Faraz Durrani. He's best known for
his Logie-winning performance in Underbelly, The Golden Mile. Faraz has acted alongside
Robert De Niro and Vin Diesel and has been directed by Mel Gibson. And more recently,
Faraz caused headlines when he starred on SAS Australia. But he's much more than that,
a sensitive, thoughtful soul with a wicked sense of humour.
Now Faraz, when I see you, I have to say your name with like, the people who are listening
can't see what I'm doing with my hands.
Yeah, you're doing a lot with your hands here.
So I can pronounce it properly.
There's, you're still not rolling the R though, Jess.
I can't roll my R's.
It's a rrrrr, it's a firas.
I can't. I think I sound like a cat with a furball when I try and roll my R's.
There's nothing wrong with that.
So the way I try and say your name is at least with my hands going firas.
I love the energy. It's important, isn't it?
Of course it is. And what I love about you though, is that you do have pizzazz.
Because I first met you two years ago when we did the real Dirty Dancing together.
For people who mightn't be familiar with it, essentially,
it was about finding Johnny and Baby from the movie.
From the film Dirty Dancing.
And we had to inhabit those characters.
And I remember too, remember we had to do this date.
We had a wonderful dinner.
We had a really magic dinner and I think that was the first time we kind of had a quiet time
and we had an intimate conversation instead of, you know, dancing and doing all the other hurrah.
Which was great. It was good to kind of sit down and get to know you.
What I loved about that night was getting to know more of you.
Because that's a side that not everyone sees.
Because I don't think they take the time to ask the right questions.
And I think when we sat down, I think we connected on so many different levels.
In the sense of the way we perceive the world and our philosophies and our approach.
Because you then shared with me your time in journalism and I connected to that.
Because this wild film television radio land is quite hard to kind of navigate sometimes.
And I guess why some people don't get to know who I am is because
maybe they have to earn it a little bit.
Maybe I'm not as open as I think I am.
But I have been through things and I think people that do take the time,
like how we were talking about pronouncing people's names and the intention behind that.
I think there's so much to be said about that in the sense of,
I don't want to get too deep too quickly here, but cultural understanding.
If you had a foreign name, if you're open, that can take you to so many different places.
Because if you're really compassionate about someone who's sitting opposite you
and you want to get to know who they are, you ask the questions sincerely, willingly.
And it opens up a whole new world.
So tell me a little bit about that.
Because how does a boy from Blacktown become a Logie Award winning actor
and someone who all of Australia knows and loves most of the time?
Most of the time.
Except last year when they hated you.
Now we're going to get to that in a minute.
I don't know, Jess.
I'm still trying to work it out and I'm still always envisioning and always
meditating and always attempting to be better.
But it's amazing though, I think, your dad who didn't complete school was one of how many?
So yes, I mean, my father was the eldest of 10 kids.
And he immigrated to Australia in 1967 on a boat, which took him like six weeks to get here.
And he was never sent to school.
And that's why my parents were really mad advocates of education and making sure
all their three sons went to school and went to uni and were really looked after.
Because they never got that themselves.
And for me, to listen to my father's story and my mum's story in particular,
because they both have a very similar story.
And I actually just produced, wrote and directed a documentary about my father.
But I guess going back to your question about Blacktown,
I was born in Blacktown, raised in the west of suburbs.
And it was an unusual time because at the time I went to a private school,
my mum sent my two older brothers to a public school because they went through
the public school system and they got into some fights through that system.
Because they were the only Lebanese kids in that school in the 90s,
in the western suburbs in Cambridge Park and Penrith.
You didn't find Lebanese folk or Italian.
It was quite Australian, you know, Australianer.
So for me, she said, you know what, you're going to a private school.
And so she sent me to a private school.
And after that, that's when I developed my passion for acting and storytelling
and expressing myself on stage and film.
Was that hard to do though, to find that voice?
Yeah, because it wasn't something people nurtured and cultivated.
It was a foreign occupation or passion that people didn't really know about.
There was no facilities.
There was no institutions where you go, you know, I'll go down to the,
I mean, you know, Nepean acting school.
And my parents didn't know anything about it.
They weren't, they're not artists.
They're hard workers.
You know, dad came over here and he worked in the railway.
He was in construction.
Mum was a housewife.
She raised three boys.
And so when I came and I said, listen, I want to do this acting thing.
I want to do this, you know, I want to act in films
and I want to be on stage.
And they said, what are you talking about?
What does that even mean?
We're not a family of artists here.
We don't understand what that is.
Oh, that's really cute.
I'm sure he'll forget about that when he gets older.
He'll become an engineer or a doctor or whatever.
They had that old guard, old rigid mentality of
you'll become a doctor, you'll be an engineer or a lawyer.
A professional that earns money, that you have a routine,
that you get a paycheck that makes sense to us
because we don't know what this art is about,
what acting is all about.
So it was completely foreign to them.
So how did you then reconcile your passion,
what you wanted to do with what they were saying?
I fought every day.
It was adversity.
It was like frustration.
And they didn't see it for so many years.
When did they see it?
Was there a moment for them when they went, I get it?
When the paycheck started coming in.
No, but seriously, come on.
When the money started coming in.
I remember getting my first paycheck, right?
And what was that for?
I'll tell you what it was for.
It was for a film called Pitch Black.
I was 15, I had done a film with Vin Diesel
and Ryder Mitchell and Cole Hauser
and that was filmed in like Queensland and Coober Pedy.
You did that with Vin Diesel?
Yeah, that was at 15.
How on earth did you manage that?
I wanted to get out of the Western Southern.
And that was my only ticket out.
I remember I was 10.
I was working in my parents' supermarket
and I was serving and I was bagging milk and bread
and I was like, how do I get out of here?
So then you're with Vin Diesel, the paychecks start coming in
and then your family, they then start to see this is your path.
Well, yeah, that was the first time I remember being in my bedroom
and I got my first check, my first residuals check from Pitch Black
I said, I opened it and I read it was like $118,500
and I was about 17.
I said, mom, can you come check this?
Can you have a look at this check?
I think it says $118,000.
She goes, you're reading it wrong.
It's upside down.
It must be upside down.
I'm sure it's not upside down.
This is a really good check.
And then she snatched it off me and went, oh my, wow,
there's money to be made here.
So I think that's when she looked at me and said,
no one's made this kind of money at this age.
So maybe we should support him.
And now then did you head off to New York?
Then I did study in New York.
That was later on in my life.
I then, I did actually get into law, business law in Sydney.
Excuse me, I didn't know this.
You got into business law.
Because I was still like entertaining the idea,
should I do law because they were pressuring me so hard
to kind of like take this law path.
At the same time, I had auditioned for this acting school
called the Actors College of Theatre and Television.
So I got into law and then I had a girlfriend at the time.
She said, do this school and audition for this school.
And I got into this school and that was the decision.
I had law in front of me and I had acting.
I said, what do I do now?
This is going to change my trajectory forever.
Do I take the law path or do I take the acting path?
And I said, you know what, I'm going for it.
I'm just going to take this acting and do this acting thing
and see what happens.
Do you ever regret that decision?
Never, no, because I get to meet people like you,
wonderful people like you.
I got to be exposed to so many different people
of different walks of life, different philosophies,
challenging my constructs, my perspective.
And that for me was priceless because even though
some of these people are not in the acting world,
for them, they still speak of that experience,
of that three years of just playing and being silly
and having conversations, having deep conversations
about the world, about philosophy, about science,
about performance, about art and going, wow,
it really shaped me and it really kind of pushed me
to the occupation I'm doing now.
And so it was so worthwhile.
Because it's about, I think, being open,
being open to people and being vulnerable
because the feeling I get knowing you,
speaking to other performers,
it's that sense of being vulnerable
and putting yourself out there.
Yeah, and not feeling like, using the right terms as well,
not feeling embarrassed about what you do.
I think someone says, I don't believe in embarrassment,
I feel like in completely exposing myself.
And it resonates with me.
I think the more you put yourself out there,
because in the end, no one cares, right, Jess?
Like, it's not like, no one's watching Jess going,
oh, what's Jess doing now?
Oh my God, I'm gonna write this one down
and then send her an email.
Like, no one cares.
No one cares about what you do, about what you,
like, it's fine, just put it out there,
put as much output as you can and see what happens
because, you know, as fail, fail big.
And fail quickly, you know, all that failing stuff,
it makes sense because no one's watching you.
Well, I think, well, people are watching you.
They are watching.
But it's about not caring what they think.
And I'm a big believer.
You do that well.
Yes, but it's taken time for me.
You do that very well.
Of course it has.
But practice, but it's also maturity.
You know, I wasted far too much of my 20s and 30s
worrying about what everyone else thought of me
and what I was doing.
And, you know, I was the serious newsreader then
and that's not me.
There's a lot more to me.
And so I did feel sort of constrained and restricted.
But then when I realised actually,
that's just a part of me.
It doesn't have to be all of me.
I am going to take risks.
I am going to be silly.
I am going to audition for play school very badly.
Did you audition?
I can see you on that show.
You're perfect for it.
Well, I'm not because I can't sing.
And that's the issue.
Can't they dub you?
Why can't they dub you?
Well, that's what I had hoped or thought.
But I did an audition.
And that's why, you know, I think about you as an actor.
Each audition, you put yourself out there.
I did this play school audition.
Nothing like the sorts of auditions you've done.
I'm doing the dino stomp.
I'm singing, sing a rainbow with all these big hand movements
thinking that'll make up for my lack of pitch and tone.
And at the end, I'm waiting.
I'm thinking the director's going to go, you've got it.
You're enthusiastic.
He just opened the door and went, thank you very much for coming.
But I didn't give up.
I then had singing lessons.
For maybe six months.
But I loved, you know what?
What I learned during that process was that I loved learning.
And although I was singing Little Peter Rabbit Had A Fly Upon His Nose endlessly
and other nursery rhymes, that hour with my singing teacher was just for me.
And I love that sense of this is something that I'm just doing.
So then when I did my next audition, I still was a little bit out of tune,
but I was more in tune than I'd ever been.
Still didn't get it.
But that didn't matter because I knew I had done as much as I could have done.
And I learnt about myself.
I learnt that it doesn't matter if you don't win or get the job.
It's the experience.
And I met my singing teacher through this and all these other wonderful,
creative people that I wouldn't have met otherwise.
I mean, it's wonderful because through that experience,
you took that headwind and transformed it into tailwind.
And I think that's the lesson for all letdowns and frustrations and adversity.
And how do we build resilience?
And seeming failure.
You made another decision and you got all these wonderful, beautiful experiences.
You got to meet the singing teacher and you got to have these
intimate moments with yourself.
Sometimes it's just about.
And little Peter Rabbit.
Yeah, little Peter Rabbit.
You know, you got to know about him and you're really connected with him.
I want to talk to you about auditions because day in, day out,
you are putting yourself on the line.
And then how do you do that?
But then reconcile, oh, that didn't work out or maybe it does work out.
That's a good question.
Try not to take it too personally because I'm in an industry where it's super subjective,
whether it's the director or the producer that's casting the characters and the story.
It's a collective consciousness that are making these really important decisions.
And in the end, you can't strike yourself down
because I'm not seven foot tall and I don't look like this guy
and I don't sound like George Clooney and I'm not that person
because in the end, you need to be yourself first.
You need to love yourself.
You need to be OK with who you are.
And I think one of the main kind of misconceptions that people have
of characters and acting is that this whole transformation thing.
I think good actors are good at doing themselves first
because they know who they are.
They know their vulnerabilities.
They know their weaknesses.
They know their voices and they know how to be themselves
and be comfortable in their shoes.
And I think good directors hire actors that are OK with themselves.
And then maybe they can transform and do the more versatile characters.
But for me, I've been rejected a lot.
It's been 25 years of rejection.
But how do you manage that?
And are you comfortable in your shoes?
Sometimes more so than other times.
Sometimes I feel really comfortable.
I think meditation has helped me a lot and really governing
what I do with my spirit and what I consume, whether it's food
or whatever it is, if it's sound or visual or the people in my life
or who I am and questioning who I am.
Really understanding how did I get here?
Did I get here unconsciously or consciously?
Is this a manifestation of insecurities that I had in my 20s?
How did I get to this position right now in my life and is it serving me?
Obviously, there's recurring dark elements that come back,
feeling validated and feeling respected and going,
oh, well, how can I miss out on that?
They're working with him.
They work with him.
And the person that really cares about this,
the guy that is crafty and has passion and they pick that guy,
the guy that obviously that comes back all the time.
You know, I used to be a lot angrier than I am now.
I think intrinsically, we're angry.
But I think that's how we're that's the inception.
That's how we've been conditioned and cultivated, right?
How do you manage that anger though?
Because I think about that amazing character that you played in Underbelly.
Well, it's not that complicated for me, mate.
I'm trying to build something here.
You know, I'm trying to make something out of myself.
Yeah, but for who?
It's always about you, Johnny.
You and your bloody image.
You're the one with the image problem.
Running around with your piss-head prison mates like some freak show.
You know, that character.
There was a lot of, although you were very calm on the surface,
there was underlying anger.
I think it was, you know, I've never always,
I've never been the cool kid at school.
I was never the cool kid.
You see, that surprises me because I look at you now and you're cool.
I was the goofy kid.
Like I was the goofy kid that wasn't handed things to him and I wasn't sought after.
And I had to really work for who I am.
I think that is kind of historically, I needed to work hard to become who I was.
I wasn't gifted anything.
I wasn't given anything easy.
I wasn't given the easy road.
So I had to work for everything.
I had to fight for my acting career.
I had to fight for a certain pathway.
And also, you know, being a little bit culturally different.
You have to be more on your feet and have your wits about you.
In case there's people around you who's trying to take advantage of that.
Really be self-effacing.
And some of the things that I would do is be the clown to get out of things.
Just in case they were to strike me down or to minimise me or marginalise me.
You know, I'd be the clown and maybe they would like me more there.
So you have played then, that class clown, since you were little.
I mean, school for me was an opportunity to entertain people.
You know, classrooms were audiences for me.
And so I think it's now in my late 20s,
I think when I got to a point in my late 20s where you get so consumed by society, right?
I mean, and then you question yourself and you go, okay, who?
I think it was around 29, 29, I started to question myself, you know, why am I here?
And I felt like I was pleasing everyone and kind of society started to seep into me.
And I thought, you know, I need to question and pause for a moment.
Well, you were being, I think, and all of us do this at different times in our lives.
We try and be all things to everyone.
And we miss out on, well, actually, what do I want and what will make me happy?
Because in your 20s, it was a full on time.
You had this massive role.
You got loggies, you were recognised everywhere.
You were a bachelor of the year.
You know, there's all that bright lights.
And that, for a young bloke, I think must have been hard.
It's a foreign environment because you're not, no one tells you about it.
No one kind of, there's no preface.
I wasn't warned about.
And one day, you know, the public is going to change their perspective on you.
Just all of a sudden.
And for me, walking down the street, one moment I was just feed ass walking down the street.
And the next moment, people change their attitude towards me.
And that, for me, questioned why.
Because they knew who you were and the role you were playing.
They knew who I was and they watched the show.
And that, for me, didn't sit right.
You know, I questioned that, you know, initially intrinsically from the get go.
I wasn't like, oh, wow, I knew I've always been special.
Now they all know it has been told.
You know, society knows.
Wasn't that at all.
I was like, wow, this is really weird.
This is like people reacting in a weird way.
What is going on?
I need to pause, take a breath and understand why these dynamics are happening around me.
But how also did you manage that on a day to day level?
I mean, I partied.
Well, yes, exactly.
You want to ask me about the party?
So would you say, you know, you self-medicated yourself through a lot of that time?
I abused the alcohol and I was, you know, I wanted to be the party dude.
The guy that's always fun.
The people pleaser.
The people pleaser.
The guy that pays for dinner and the guy that's the centre of the party and gets the party going.
And that's when that all was happening in the eye of that storm.
That's when I had to pause and then ask myself what is going on around me?
How did I get to this point where I'm always drinking and always partying?
You know, having a hedonic lifestyle is fun and it's part of the desires, right?
And you can be addicted to that, but you need to question yourself.
Is that, that's not what life is about.
Well, not all of life.
And I think the thing is there's a part of growing up.
And so sure, there's a time in your life when you are crazy and silly and carry on like a lunatic.
But then there's a moment where, not necessarily one moment,
but there is a sense of I need to grow up now.
There has to be more to life and I want to be present for it.
Did anyone say to you, take you aside and say, hey, what are you doing?
No, because they were having fun with me.
They were saying, yeah, keep going.
You're on the same level as me.
What I discovered, your friends are not going to stop you and say,
Jess, I think you've had too much.
Maybe you've had friends that did that and I'm, you know, I take my hat off to them.
But I never had a friend where they said, dude, your career, mate, you love your career.
You care about it.
You're dedicated.
You've, you know, you've worked hard for it.
Maybe you should really rein it in here.
You've got an audition tomorrow.
No one ever said that.
Do you wish there was someone who said that?
I mean, I guess it was the small voice.
I was listening to the little voice, the tiny voice that was saying there's more to you than this.
You've envisioned something bigger than this.
You're going to waste it on people you don't care about.
You're going to be in the corner of a bar somewhere talking to someone you don't care about.
And then your ears are bleeding and you don't care.
You're not pretending, but you're so induced that you care about what this guy's got to say.
But this is not the environment to be in.
And you need to walk away.
And actually, I remember when I walked away, I said to my friends, listen,
I am going to do something.
I'm going to break up the band here because I would like you guys to go explore yourselves,
do something beyond this.
And if you guys think that it was me that started all this,
well, I'm going to put an end to it now.
I'm going to walk away.
And they're like, sure, you're going to walk away.
I dare you to walk away.
And I did for almost two years.
And it was magical.
It was so thrilling to kind of find out who I was again,
because it was, you know, you start drinking at 15.
I started drinking at 15.
I remember being at a rap party and someone was buying me bourbon and coke at 15.
And that just, you know, develops.
And it continues.
And it's that sense of you get used to that feeling and used to that,
you know, with work, there's the adrenaline high.
You're working, working, working.
You wind down with some drinks with people around you until the next time.
So you listen to that voice, that small voice inside of you.
You said for two years, what then made you come back?
It was like, I wanted to come back to see if the donkey was really dead, you know?
You couldn't, you couldn't.
I wanted to prod.
Yeah, poke the bear.
I wanted to see if I was missing out on anything, you know?
I didn't want to miss out FOMO, right?
I don't want to miss out on anything.
And also society.
Society is very much around alcohol, all of that.
If you're sad, you have a drink.
If you tie shoelaces, you have a drink.
If you buy a coffee, you're going to have a drink.
If you start a job, you're having a drink.
If you finish a job, you're having a drink.
If you're going on a holiday, you know the game.
You know how it works.
And because there's so many pressures of like being in the film and TV world.
And you know about this, Jess.
You're on a set and everyone's going through a divorce.
Everyone's, you know, drinking way too much.
Everyone's abusing drugs.
It's an environment where you're like, okay, this is toxic.
And if I'm going to sign up for this, how willing, how far do I sign up?
Like how much of this people pleasing do I do?
And when is it going to take a toll?
And for me, I just said, I have to pump the brakes.
I have to jump back and take a look at my life from a different perspective.
And that's what I did.
And that takes courage.
It was super scary.
I was, I didn't know if I was going to enjoy myself.
If I was going to enjoy my own time and who I was.
Because it takes so much time.
And so what did you find?
What did you find?
And are you still not drinking?
So I stopped drinking.
I went back again.
I failed a few times.
But you need to do that.
You need to do the groundwork because it changes every time.
The triggers change.
The way you share changes and how you place yourself in environments.
Change because you don't want to make people feel uncomfortable.
You know, you arrive to a party and you say, I'm not drinking.
Why aren't you drinking?
Are you doing, are you doing like...
And you can't say you're pregnant.
And you can't say I'm pregnant.
Damn, that's one thing I can't do.
Yeah, that's a good one.
And then it puts them in a state of like shame and guilt and FOMO.
Like, what do you know that I don't know?
Like, should I be doing this?
Because a lot of people I think and have that little voice is whispering and saying,
what else is there?
What else can I do?
If I do eliminate the drink, can I accomplish some of these goals?
Can I write that book?
Can I become physically inclined and be in shape?
Have sustained cognitive function.
I was scared that maybe later in life I might lose my mind
or lose the function of my organs or anything can happen.
Like, I don't know.
And especially in that state, you don't think about those things
because you feel like you're invincible, right?
Of course you do.
How many times have you felt invincible?
Of course you do.
I'm like, I'm going to have 3000 bottles of this champagne.
And I'm so interesting and funny and everyone wants to be with me all the time.
I can stay up for a week.
And as you say though, it's not healthy long-term.
And I think as well, and again, this is very courageous and brave of you,
is that you listen to that voice because all of us have that in our lives.
For you, it was around alcohol and partying.
For me, I've had a voice around the sort of life I want to lead, career.
Am I really happy?
And tapping into listening because we lose track of, well, what is my heart telling me?
That's what my voice is, my heart.
And I think to myself, is this the life I want to lead?
And that takes courage to listen to that because otherwise we are doing the people
pleasing or living the life that we want everyone else to think, oh, look, they've got it together.
They know what they're doing and none of us do.
Some of us are just better at pretending.
And also you don't want to find yourself in a life that wasn't mindfully and consciously
That's the thing.
I think we find ourselves in a point where you're like, how did we get here?
And is this all I am?
Is this who I am?
There's so much more life to be explored.
As soon as you untie yourself and unshackle yourself and disconnect yourself from certain
belief systems, philosophies, from certain attachments like, yeah, I am the party guy.
You don't need to identify yourself with anything and you can re-calibrate and rejuvenate
yourself and recreate yourself any time through your life.
And I think this is why we connect, Jess, is because you're so much more than that.
You're just a vessel that has these experiences and you're as human as the next person
and you fluff about and we're clumsy and we do all these things and that's fine.
But sometimes it just takes a bit of work, a bit of breath, a bit of work and a bit of
patience with yourself as well.
You know, you've got to be patient and that's why I probably slip back into those
habits because as soon as you switch off, you're back.
You're back into that old rigid, those pathways that suck you back in.
They just come back, you know where you want to go.
Yes, and it's very comforting and easy to do that.
But at the same time, I think it's important for you to be gentle on yourself and that
for all of us to be gentle on ourselves because we are going
to fall into those old habits because it's what's comfortable.
It's what's easy.
It's what has served us well in the short term and it's making those big,
hard changes that are difficult.
And we are, all of us are on a path of sort of reinvention.
We're all a work in progress.
We are a work in progress.
And what though I do want to talk with you about too is SAS because I, my daughters and
I were watching that and we were outraged on your behalf because I know you and my girls,
although they haven't met you, they know I've spoken about you a lot to them.
And you know, when you went on the radio and you expressed your notions, I was like,
thank you, Jess, thank you, one person, just one individual has spoken.
I was like, oh, it warmed my heart.
Even I had a conversation with my mum like, I can't believe Jess, you know,
just, you know, took a chance and went out there and spoke.
I'm like, I know, but it wasn't a chance.
It was more, I felt it was unfair how you were portrayed because again, it came down to,
you know, we saw those parts of your personality where you were the makarapara
and you were the clown, but that's not all of you.
No, but we're in a really foreign situation.
We're not going to war.
We weren't going to war.
It looked like you were though.
It was terrifying.
But I felt like I was Jim Carrey in the Truman Show.
Like I was the only person that knew I was on a TV show.
We're on a TV show here, ladies and gentlemen, please.
I'm about to go crazy.
I'm losing my mind, you know?
And yeah, because I'm an actor.
I'm a person that has faults and they were pushing me around and they were
yelling at me at every given moment of the day.
Of course it's going to, it might create some tumultuous reactions from you.
But of course, because as you say, they're yelling at you and belittling you.
And I just think, oh, why did you actually do it though?
Why put yourself in that scenario?
Well, they offered me the show and I thought it was a great fresh premise.
And I thought, you know, these guys, these commandos, they're coming from London.
They're coming from England.
That must be the real deal.
They've got 25 or 30 years of military experience between the four of them.
And I thought, wow, I would love to be part of that because I would love to
test and challenge my mental space, my mental acumen.
And that's what I did.
I wanted to, I'm that person.
I like to throw myself in the deep end and see what happens, you know?
See if I can rise to the top.
And it was challenging.
Jess is like, yeah, I would never do that.
It was cold and it was, I remember they were saying to me, you know, we've got athletes.
We've got Olympians.
We've got all these, we've got these national PT guys.
And I'm like, you know, I would love to put myself with that fabric and see how I come across.
What did you learn from it?
What did I learn?
When you're in that situation, you can easily because you can grasp at the mob
because the mob says you're okay.
If you go with the mob, the mob says these commandos were conquering and dividing.
They're saying, here's the bad apple.
That's what we want you to think.
It's just like society.
It's like, do you want to be a free thinker or not?
Do you want to be discerning?
Do you want to cross examine things yourself or do you want to go with the mob?
And for me, what I learned about myself in that moment was I was strong to who I was.
And even though there was so much pressure from the commandos and from the guys around me,
that was just when they wanted to kick me out.
And I thought to myself, okay, if I feel like I'm conscious,
does that make them unconscious?
Or whatever the case, okay, I'm in a situation.
Do I stick to my word, to my belief system?
Or do I just go against who I am and go with the mob?
And I didn't do that.
And I stuck to who I was.
Well, I was very proud of you.
I was because I was just looking going, this is like my idea of hell.
I would be in tears.
I mean, you've seen me in tears and that was over a dancing show.
That's why I'd make great TV.
We want to see you on there.
We want to see the tears.
No, I was in tears when we were doing the dancing
because I was worried you were going to drop me.
Well, I wasn't going to drop you.
No, I know you weren't going to drop me.
I know you're double my size and height.
That was the part.
That doesn't mean I can't carry you.
I know you're like, he's going to drop me.
I would love to see you on SAS.
Oh, you got to do it.
It'd be brilliant.
That would be brilliant.
What I did just want to finish on is another thing that makes me laugh when I think about you two.
When we finished the Dirty Dancing Show, we all went to that shocking nightclub somewhere in Virginia.
And we all had those drinks in the red plastic cups that are always in the American movies.
And there was the most shocking rap music.
It's called Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg and Eminem.
It was good stuff.
It was the best of the best.
I walked in there and I felt like a granny because I was literally like,
it's too loud, they're swearing.
This is really bad.
But I'll tell you something.
You didn't move like a granny.
I'll tell you that much.
You did not move like a granny.
Because I was freestyling.
You were freestyling.
You had it going on with that Dr. Dre.
It was brilliant.
I did like the lyrics, but you know what?
You are my freestyler, Firas.
I love chatting with you.
And thank you so much.
Thank you for having me.
You're a darling heart.
It's been a pleasure.
Oh, I had fun catching up with my dance partner and high jinx friend.
Isn't there so much more to Firas than meets the eye?
Who knew he got into a business law degree before deciding that performing was his life?
And behind his clowning persona is a sensitive and deep-thinking man
that is carving his special place in the world.
If you enjoyed this conversation with Firas as much as I did,
please share it with a friend or take a moment to rate and review.
To stay up to date with Firas and his latest projects,
why not follow him on Instagram?
His tag, at Firasal.
My guest for next week is international star Dani Minogue.
She grew up in front of us on our screens,
and she talks about her search for joy being behind every one of her big decisions.
I think joy is the most, you know, valuable thing.
You can't put a price on that.
And it's been interesting, like, just going into the start of COVID,
there was the TV show that came on, Murray Condo,
you know, clearing out your space and how that affects the way you feel.
And it was when she put it into words, what sparks joy.
And then if you start asking yourself that in everything that you do,
from your work to what's around you, it's there.
All those feelings are there.
They tell you what you should be doing and you've just, you've got to follow them.
The Jess Rowe Big Talk Show was presented by me, Jess Rowe,
audio producer Chris Marsh, executive producer Nick McClure,
supervising producer Sam Kavanagh.
Until next time, remember to live big.
Life is just too crazy and glorious to waste time on the stuff that doesn't matter.