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Omar Sharif (April 10, 1932 - July 10, 2015) was an [[UsefulNotes/{{Egypt}} Egyptian]] actor of Syrian and Lebanese descent.

Born Michel Dimitri Shalhoub in Alexandria to a family of Christian[[note]]Melkite Greek Catholic rite, to be precise[[/note]] [[UsefulNotes/{{Lebanon}} Lebanese]] origins, he came up through the Egyptian film industry of the 1950s before breaking into worldwide cinema playing Sherif Ali in 1962's ''Film/LawrenceOfArabia''. After ''Lawrence'', he is best remembered for ''Film/DoctorZhivago'' and ''Film/FunnyGirl''. He continued appearing in both Egyptian and international films until shortly before his death in 2015.

He was fluent in Arabic, English, French, Italian and Spanish, which allowed him to be cast as a wide range of characters of various ethnicities during his 60-year-long career.

He was also a championship-level TabletopGame/{{Bridge}} player, at one point ranked in the top 50 worldwide. He contributed to a syndicated bridge column, and lent his name to a long-running series of video game versions of the game.
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!!Selected Filmography:

* ''Film/LawrenceOfArabia'' (1962): Sherif Ali.
* ''Film/TheFallOfTheRomanEmpire'' (1964): Sohamus.
* ''Film/GenghisKhan'' (1965): UsefulNotes/GenghisKhan.
* ''Film/DoctorZhivago'' (1965): Dr. Yuri Andreyevich Zhivago.
* ''Film/TheYellowRollsRoyce'' (1965): Davich.
* ''Film/TheNightOfTheGenerals'' (1967): Major Grau.
* ''Film/FunnyGirl'' (1968): Nicky Arnstein.
* ''Film/MackennasGold'' (1969): John Colorado.
* ''Film/TheLastValley'' (1971): Vogel.
* ''Le Casse'' (1971): Abel Zacharia.
* ''Literature/TheMysteriousIsland'' (1973): Captain Nemo.
* ''Film/{{Juggernaut|1974}}'' (1974): Captain Alex Brunel.
* ''Film/ThePinkPantherStrikesAgain'' (1976): Egyptian assassin.
* ''Film/{{Inchon}}'' (1981): Colonel A.G. Rangaraj
* ''Film/OhHeavenlyDog'' (1981): Bart.
* ''Film/TopSecret'' (1984): Agent Cedric.
* ''Series/GulliversTravels1996'' (1996): The Sorcerer.
* ''Film/MysteriesOfEgypt'' (1998): Grandfather.
* ''Film/TheThirteenthWarrior'' (1999): Melchisideck.
* ''Film/{{Hidalgo}}'' (2004): Sheikh Riyadh.

!!Tropes:
* CelebrityEndorsement: The other thing most French people born before the 2000s know him from outside of ''Film/LawrenceOfArabia'' and ''Film/DoctorZhivago''? The TV UsefulNotes/EquestrianSports magazine announcements he did in TheEighties and TheNineties. To be fair, he really did have a "great passion" for said sports, being a good horseman on his own.
* FakeNationality: [[PlaysGreatEthnics Played all sorts of these]]; including a Russian poet (''Film/DoctorZhivago''), an ancient Armenian (''Film/TheFallOfTheRomanEmpire''), a German Nazi officer (''Film/TheNightOfTheGenerals''), a Jewish-American gangster (''Film/FunnyGirl''), an East Indian (''Literature/TheMysteriousIsland''), and UsefulNotes/GenghisKhan himself (''Film/GenghisKhan'').
* MoneyDearBoy: Sharif liked to gamble and admitted that he sometimes accepted roles just to make up for the money he had lost.
* WhatBeautifulEyes: Large, dark and expressive, even towards the end of his life.
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