Today we’d like to introduce you to Laith Zuaiter.
Laith Zuaiter is a Brooklyn raised actor/producer/writer/director. He was born on July 4th, 1997 in Maryland and soon after moved with his family to Cobble Hill, Brooklyn. Laith got his start in 2007, being discovered by Spike Lee for a pilot for NBC called, M.O.N.Y which came about after waiting in casting office waiting rooms with his sister Nour while his father Waleed Zuaiter went in for auditions. Spike met Laith in one of those waiting rooms and gave him an audition after finding they went to the same elementary school, P.S. 29. Laith had his on screen debut alongside Bobby Cannavale. From that point on, Laith parents barred him from audition seeing how young fame has had a negative impact on many young artists at the time. The only way Laith was going to be able to make any film or act was if he did it himself, in and outside of school. Entering high school, Laith and his friends developed an artistic collective under the name of Friendly Strangers.
Friendly Strangers Media is a collective that started in 2014 at his high school at the Los Angeles County High School for the Arts with a team of individuals who were trying to find a group of friends to make a film in a 64-hour film festival run by the school. No one wanted to have them join their group or vice versa because they weren’t apart of anyone’s immediate friend groups. They happened to find each other and acknowledged the beauty of them being strangers to each other before the project and that they were friendly enough to get the job done. From that point on, Laith realized that he’d rather continue working with strangers that were friendly mainly because it started to broaden his network of people to work with.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
The main struggle I’ve come across as an aspiring producer is that even when you’ve paid your dues in this industry, or even if you’ve jumped through so many hoops to get to where you are, people will always be looking at your age as a defining factor of your capability as an artist, but more importantly as a business person and just a person in general. There’s a lot of ageism in this industry, but more than that there’s a lot of nepotism. And at the end of the day, I’ve struggled to remind myself that no matter what, I have to constantly keep pushing forward even when I know I should be expecting a break. There are no breaks, just keep your foot on the gas and hope you get to your destination in consistent increments. Breaking the mold of the industry won’t be something that’s done overnight.
We’d love to hear more about your work and what you are currently focused on. What else should we know?
Laith is son of actor/producer Waleed Zuaiter and Joana B. Zuaiter producer. Joana, Waleed and their friend Khurram Mozaffar created a production company called Flip Narrative Media that uplifts historically mis and underrepresented stories through film, television and across the spectrum of mediums. Laith currently works with Flip Narrative as an intern, social media operator, Associate Producer for certain projects they are in development with currently. Recently, Laith had created an initiative where young creators from ages 18 and up are allowed to pitch their film, tv, theatre projects to @friendly_strangers and in turn, if the project is up to standards the script will eit
Laith has worked immensely behind the scenes, crewing for films such as 20th Century Women, Finding Steve McQueen, and as an Assistant to Producers for A24’s RAMY. Laith also finds himself working alongside notable artists such as David Choe, Ramy Youssef, Said Zagha, Adel Kamal, Mike Mosallam, Aqsa Altaf, Eddie Huang, and many more. Laith is bi-coastal between LA and New York. When it comes down to brass tax, Laith is eager to encourage the communities he’s been working alongside for several years now to use a new website he is creating that serves a greater purpose for artistic collaboration. The website will be used to encourage artists to accessibly explore and hire a plethora of artist’s portfolios along the spectrum of mediums (Theatre, Film, TV, Dance, Music, Visual Arts, etc.). Through this website, independent artists will be able to see what resources are accessible to them in whatever location they are in when it comes to potential crew members to equipment rentals to possible location options. On day one, this database will be ever-growing in its ability to allow outsiders to see what projects @friendly_strangers are making and apply to work on crews, but as the site gets more traction outsiders will be able to post their own job listings for their independent projects, wherever they lie on the spectrum. Laith is bi-coastal from NY to LA and is excited to be apart of the revolution that happening within this industry to democratize the opportunities given to independent artists.
So, what’s next? Any big plans?
We are planning on launching our website – thefriendlystrangers.com at the end of 2021 which will begin democratizing opportunities for independent artists in the industry exclusively through productions by or produced by @friendly_strangers – we are also planning on featuring live and virtual events in lieu of the pandemic including socially distant events like independent drive-in ‘pop up’ movie theatres as well as an event we have coming up in November/December called @zoology_fs which is an initiative to fundraise for varying organizations related to aiding BIPOC health or art initiatives in and around the US and the World. The live and virtual event for @zoology_fs will be at the Old Zoo at Griffith Park – stay tuned for more details. These events will be the conduit to in person networking before we dive into the virtual network. I hope you can join us in our mission to bring the community, bring love and accessible opportunities back into the entertainment industry.
Contact Info:
- Website: thefriendlystrangers.com
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/laithzuaiter?igshid=1ce9qxtkyrdfi
https://instagram.com/friendly_strangers?igshid=17wrhyxu5fg9
https://instagram.com/friendlystrangerville?igshid=4acrs8dgvnob - Other: https://instagram.com/valleyofthestarz?igshid=184n8hwahbuum
Image Credit:
By Jake Tillis and Brian Niles
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