2015 Edition

Laila Elwi

Laila Elwi

Born in in Cairo 1962, Laila Elwi in an iconic Egyptian actress. She is of mixed blood. Her father is Egyptian and her mother is Greek. She graduated from Faculty of commerce, Ain Shams University. She started her career at a young age. When she was a seven-year-old, she participated in radio and television programs with prominent figures and voices such as “Abal Fadila”, “Fatafit assokar”... and at the age of fifteen she appeared onstage for the first time introduced by Nour ElSherif , in a play by Galal El Sharkawy, prominent Egyptian director, called “Taman Sittat” (8 Women). She has been chosen by Ahmed Sarwat to take part in his film “For the sake of Life”(1975). But her reall take off in cinema was with Farid Shawki in “The miserables” in 1977. Despite being offered important parts because of her great beauty she always tried to diversify her roles to prove her talent in more than 70 films of different genres such as in “The destiny”(1997) by Youssef Chahin, “I love cinema”(2004), “The baby doll night”(2008), “Girls Love” (2004), “Traffic signal”, “The female”(1986), “Execution of a dead”(1985), “Wanted dead or alive”(1984), “Husband on call”(1985), “ Out and didn’t come back”(1985)...

She charmed the Egyptian and Arab viewers by her lead roles in several television series amongst “The twins”, “A girl from shobra”, “Morning light”, “The Family”, “Stories we live”, “Critical Moments” and “Shams”.

She has been honored at Egyptian and international festivals with prestigious awards for most of her roles. A lifetime achievement award during the opening of the 34th Cairo international film Festival. Best actress award for her role in “Alhagama” and best second role in “The kidnapped” from The Cinema Catholic Center. Best actress for “The Revolving stone” . She served as Jury member on several international Film Festivals in Europe such as Mons International Film Festival in Belgium, Sao Paolo International Film Festival, Sotchi international Film Festival, Valencia International Film Festival in Spain. And in the Arab world she was in the Jury committee of The National Film Festival, Alexandria Film Festival, Dubai International Film Festival, Abu Dhabi Environmental film Festival and on the last Cairo International Film Festival edition 2015.