In the past in Egypt the only place to get an education in the cinematic arts — acting, directing, screenwriting, cinematography, editing — was the Higher Institute of Cinema, founded in 1959 by Gamal Abdel-Nasser's minister of culture Tharwat Okasha to serve the public sector. More recently, in 2003, the late filmmaker Raafat Al-Mihi founded the Academy for Cinema Arts and Sciences. “This academy is the realisation of a dream I've had all my life,” Al-Mihi told Mohamed El-Assyouti in Issue 663 of Al-Ahram Weekly. “I realised that over the years Egyptian cinema began to lose its principal and perhaps only asset, in a word — craftsmanship. Even in mainstream films you find many technical errors, where scriptwriters fail to connect scenes and directors fail to connect shots. So I decided to try to contribute to countering this phenomenon. For two years I studied the programmes offered by filmmaking schools, such as the New York Film Academy. When it was finally time to launch this academy, I insisted that all the teachers should be skilled as craftsmen and working in the field. It is an attempt to preserve what we used to be distinguished by as an industry — something reflected in the fact that the first-year classes are named after major Egyptian filmmakers like Said Al-Sheikh, Abdel-Aziz Fahmi and Ezzeddin Zulfuqar.” Al-Mihi's academy produced generations of professionals who successfully engaged in cinema, their passion having led them to the academy once they had graduated in other fields. Graduates of the academy are entitled to membership of the Acting Professions Syndicate. Following Al-Mihi's courageous initiative and with a rising demand from people interested in seeking a career in cinema, film education has gone viral, from specialised workshops conducted by famous directors and screenwriters to complete courses. It is a profitable business, with three-four month courses costing LE6,000-7,000. Screenwriter Azza Shalabi, best known for her debut film Asrar Al-Banat (Girls' Secrets, 2002) and the 2012 TV series Napoleon wal Mahroussah (“Napoleon and Cairo the Protected”), worked as a screenwriting instructor in Pro Step Film School in Mohandessin. “Two months is the duration of the screenwriting workshop,” she told the Weekly, “during which they learned the basic rules of scriptwriting. We watched European and Asian films, entirely different from the mainstream Hollywood films everybody is familiar with, followed by in-depth discussions. Workshop members are required to write a short film by the end of the two-month course. As for their professional work as screenwriters afterwards, it is very rare for one of them to find work immediately, simply because the duration of the workshop is not enough unless someone is really talented. But it shows immediately if a person has talent and sense in the workshop, from our discussions and their short film. Of course, screenwriting is an ongoing learning process, it doesn't end. It's important to follow new book releases about it and to watch films from around the world, that's one of the factors that maintain your identity as a screenwriter.” In addition to filmmaking by Hani Lashin and acting by Sameh Ezzat, Pro Step Film School also offers a workshop for children, “Reflection Acting Workshop”, also by Ezzat. This is a rare thing for film academies, which generally target adults; it is widely appreciated. Filmmaker Ahmed Maher's Escape Home, by contrast, specialises in screen acting for professionals. Maher has coached actors Khaled Sarhan, Dalia Al-Beheiri, Nour and many others. Sarah Essam, a 34-year-old took part in the Stars in Maadi workshop conducted by casting director Marwa Gebril, acting coach Ahmed Khairi and director Alaa Al-Seoudi: “Initially I approached the acting workshop to break the routine of my life with a new experience, and it was thrilling to be trained with such a talented team, to submit to the allure of pretending to be someone else and to think about how to dress that person, how to make her talk and move. Such details are very interesting. After three or four classes, I found myself impatiently waiting for my following class. The workshop lasted nearly for four months and I think I will join the second level.” Ahmed Al-Hadeka, a 32-year-old aspiring filmmaker, joined the Calibre and Badrkhan Film Academy (which offers screenwriting by Ali Al-Guindi, directing by Ali Badrakhan, cinematography by Mohamed Assar and editing by Ghada Gobara, one after the other all in the same course) to jump-start the career for which he had developed a strong passion. “My interest in documentary filmmaking is what really made me join this workshop,” Al-Hadeka says, “though of course if I had the chance to work with feature films or TV drama I would be thrilled.” Besides her restless efforts to bring non-commercial films from all over the world to Egypt, filmmaker-producer and director of Zawya Art House Marianne Khoury also organises the Dahshour residences project — held at her own family house in Dahshour — conducted by filmmakers and film critics such as Jean-Michel Frodon, a French journalist and film critic, Ayman Al-Amir, a specialist in rewriting and development of film scripts and filmmaker Basel Ramsis. The Cairo Jesuits Centre also offers workshops as part of the Jesuit Film Festival that was founded in 2012, which aims at training and supporting young artists and reinforcing freedom of expression in a number of Upper Egyptian cities as well as Cairo. Sandy Sawiris, a 31-year-old architect, took part in Zat's five-month intensive acting workshop in Heliopolis, conducted by Shady Khalaf, Maria Doyle, Luke Lehner, Hassan Al-Geretli and Jakob Lindfors. “At the end of every month there is a small project like acting a brief scene. I joined this workshop because it's something related to art, which I thought would add to me besides my interest in drawing and dancing. I've always been keen to try myself to see whether I have this gift in acting or not. I've been enjoying the classes very much. Khalaf uses the technique of sensory exercises designed by Montessori, the attempt to use every quality identified by the senses. These exercises help to make the acting come from within and not only through external emotions and words.” The Dahab Media Training and Arts Academy in Mohandessin presents more of the same workshops like acting with Mohamed Adel, scriptwriting with Tamer Habib and cinematography with Samir Farag. Nevertheless, its edge shows in offering a number of different workshops like radio arts workshop with the veteran radio presenter Inas Gohar, radio and television with Sanaa Mansour and Samir Sabri, singing with Mohamed Al-Helw and photography with Adel Mobarez. This is relevant in the light of the fact that, while more and more people want to work in the cinema, there is less and less space in the industry.
