Hisham Sharbatji
Veteran Syrian director Hisham Sharbatji passed away in Damascus, Tuesday, May 16, 2023, at the age of 75, after a rich artistic career through which he enriched Syrian and Arab drama with prominent and diverse works.
Sharbatji passed away in a hospital in Damascus, after his health condition deteriorated in the recent period, after he suffered a stroke about two years ago.
The Artists Syndicate in Syria mourned the great director, and the Syrian Ministry of Information tweeted on Twitter: “The Artists Syndicate in Syria mourns the great director Hisham Sharbatji, who died this morning at the age of 75, after suffering from illness.”
And his son Yazan wrote on his social media pages: “Thank you for everything, mercy for your soul.”
And the Syrian actor, Bassam Koussa, wrote: “Mercy to the soul of Sheikh Al-Kar and the great director.” The Syrian actor Bassem Yakhour, who participated in several works, mourned him in a post on his Facebook page, describing him as a “laugh maker” and “professional teacher.”
the beginning and origin
Hisham Sharbatji is considered one of the founders of the drama industry in Syria, and one of the most prominent directors throughout the history of Syrian and Arab drama.
He was born on March 2, 1948, in the Al-Muhajireen neighborhood in the Syrian capital, Damascus.
He went to Egypt to fulfill his dream of becoming a pilot, and decided to study at the Aviation Institute in Imbaba, but the institute was destroyed due to the war, which prompted him to study arts and comparative literature. Sharbatji said about this dream: “In my youth I dreamed of becoming a pilot, but fate She wanted me to become a director.”
Sharbatji studied at the Higher Institute of Dramatic Arts in Egypt, where he obtained a bachelor’s degree, then traveled to Germany and continued his artistic studies there, obtaining a master’s degree in theater.
Sharbatji married an Egyptian woman, but later separated from her, and he gave birth to his daughter, director Rasha Sharbatji, who inherited the profession from her father and emerged in the field of drama, and his son, director and cameraman Yazan Sharbatji.
In one of the television interviews, Sharbatji said that his work in the field of directing made him lose a lot on the social and family levels: “My artistic career gave me the love of people, and perhaps the hatred of my family, as it made me lose my social life.”
He was reconciled with the idea of death and said: “I discovered after a long journey that life is shorter than a dream. I love life, but I also love death because it is another form of life.”
image copyright Musta Agha on Twitter
Bus march
The Syrian director, Hisham Sharbatji, is considered one of the founders of the renaissance of Syrian drama, and he presented works that constituted milestones in the Syrian and Arab television scene, as he directed many distinguished works that dealt with important issues, whether in a serious, dramatic manner, or in a sarcastic, critical style.
His beginnings were in Radio Damascus, as he directed many radio works.
He presented his first directorial experience on television in the eighties of the last century, and he first directed the program “Al-Anis and Al-Jalees”, then he directed the series “Al-Marah TV”.
In 1982, Sharbatji began directing the famous series “Mirrors” alongside the great actor Yasser Al-Azma. It is a critical comedy series that deals with many stories and anecdotes in a satirical comic style, criticizing the political and social conditions in Syria and the Arab countries.
His old companion, Yasser Al-Azma, mourned him in a tweet on Twitter, in which he said: “On the day of my birth, a dear friend passes away. God is his heaven, and all his sins are forgiven, and survival is only for God’s sake.
The Maraya series achieved great public success, and a group of the most important Syrian artists participated in it.
image copyright Karess Bashar on Twitter
Sharbatji also has many comedic series that have been engraved in the Syrian memory and have been popular in the Arab world, most notably in addition to the series “Maraya”, the series “Five Stars Family”, the series “Diaries of a General Manager”, the series “Spot of Light” and the series “Mabrouk”.
Sharbatji’s style was distinguished by its closeness to reality, and he believed that the viewer’s eye was the most truthful: “When I started my career, I came to an environment completely different from what I learned academically, and I had to give up everything I learned, and I found that the most sincere thing in action is to follow the feeling of the viewer’s eye because it is better.” Who appointed the director, and as a result, the director tries to achieve the equation between the abstraction of paper and texts, and the realism of life.
Among his most prominent dramas are the series “Asrar al-Madina,” “Our Sweet Days,” “Men Under the Tarboush,” “Jarn al-Shawish,” and “The Key.”
He was called “Sheikh Al-Kar” and “King of Comedy” because of his indelible imprint and works that cannot be forgotten, but he was not full of titles and he said in one of his television interviews, “I have pain that I do not want to appear to people. They called me Sheikh Al-Kar as a lie, and they called me King.” Comedy is a lie, because inside me there is a great pain that I do not want to go out to the public, so let people be optimistic .. because unfortunately I am very pessimistic.
However, Hisham Sharbatji, who enriched the Syrian and Arab dramas, hoped to leave a special imprint, and there is no doubt that he fulfilled his hope: “I tried to present love … to present a profession whose people respect each other, and complement each other .. and the honor of trying is sufficient for me. .. I love this profession.
