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Sacha Noam Baron Cohen[2] (born 13
October 1971) is an English stand-up comedian, actor, writer, and voice artist.
He is most widely known for writing and playing three unorthodox fictional
characters Ali G, Borat, and Brüno. In his routines, Baron Cohen's characters
interact with unsuspecting people who do not realise they are being set up for
comic situations and self-revealing ridicule.
Baron Cohen's work has been
recognised with several Emmy nominations, an Oscar nomination for Best Adapted
Screenplay, a BAFTA award, and a Golden Globe for Best Actor for his work in the
feature film Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious
Nation of Kazakhstan. After the release of the movie Borat, Baron Cohen stated
that because the public had become too familiar with the characters, he would
retire Borat and Ali G. Similarly, after the release of Brüno, he has stated he
would also retire the title character.[3]
****
Background Information
Born Sacha Noam Baron Cohen
13 October 1971 (1971-10-13) (age
40)
Hammersmith, London, England
Nationality British
Ethnicity Jewish
Alma mater Cambridge University
Occupation Stand-up comedian,
actor, writer, voice artist, comedian
Years active 1995–present
Notable work(s)
Ali G
Borat
Brüno
Height 6'3" (1.91 m)
Spouse Isla Fisher (m. 2010)
Children 2 daughters
****
Early
life
Baron Cohen, the middle of three
brothers, was born in Hammersmith, West London. His mother, Daniella (née
Weiser), was born in Israel, and his father, Gerald, was originally from
Pontypridd, Wales.[4][5] He has two brothers: Erran and Amnon.[6] His family is
Jewish.[7] His maternal grandmother, who lives in Haifa, Israel, trained as a
ballet dancer in Germany.[8][9][10][5] Erran is a composer and has worked on
several of his films. Internationally renowned autism researcher Simon
Baron-Cohen is his cousin.[11] Baron Cohen attended Haberdashers' Aske's Boys'
School, a private school in Elstree, Hertfordshire, near London.[12] He went on
to the University of Cambridge, entering Christ's College, Cambridge, where he
read history.[13] While attending the Cambridge University Amateur Dramatic
Club, Baron Cohen acted in the plays Fiddler on the Roof and Cyrano de Bergerac,
and performed in Habonim Dror Jewish theatre performances.[14]
Early
roles
After leaving university, Baron
Cohen worked for a time as a fashion model, appearing in many fashion
magazines.[14] By the early 1990s, he was hosting a weekly programme on Windsor
cable television's local broadcasts with Carol Kirkwood, who later became a BBC
weather forecaster. In 1995, Channel 4 was planning a replacement for its series
The Word, and disseminated an open call for new television presenters. Baron
Cohen sent in a tape of himself in the character of Kristo, a fictional
television reporter from Albania (who developed into the Kazakh Borat Sagdiyev),
which caught the attention of a producer. Baron Cohen hosted Pump TV from
1995–1996. In 1996, he began presenting the youth chat programme F2F for Granada
Talk TV. The late nineties saw Baron Cohen make his first feature film
appearance in the British comedy The Jolly Boys' Last Stand, then in 2000 Baron
Cohen played the part of Super Greg for a series of TV advertisements for Lee
Jeans which never aired, yet the website for Super Greg created an internet
sensation.[15] He also attended Ecole Philippe Gaulier, studying under Philippe
Gaulier whom he credits with enabling him to find the play and pleasure to
create characters such as Ali G and Borat
Characters
Ali G
Baron Cohen appeared during
two-minute sketches as his fashion reporter Brüno on The Paramount Comedy
Channel during 1998. He shot to fame when his comic character Ali G, an
uneducated, boorish junglist, started appearing on the British television show
The 11 O'Clock Show on Channel 4, which first went to air 8 September 1998.
Da Ali G Show began in 2000, and
won the BAFTA for Best Comedy in the following year. Also in 2000, Baron Cohen
as Ali G appeared as the limousine driver in Madonna's 2000 video "Music",
directed by Jonas Åkerlund, who was also responsible for directing the titles
for Da Ali G Show.
In 2002, Ali G was the central
character in the feature film Ali G Indahouse, in which he is elected to the
British Parliament and foils a plot to bulldoze a community centre in his
hometown, Staines. His television show was exported to the United States in
2003, with new episodes set there, for HBO.
Ali G's interviews with famous
people (often politicians) gained notoriety partly because the subjects were not
privy to the joke that Ali G, rather than being a real interviewer, was a comic
character played by Baron Cohen. According to Rolling Stone magazine, Baron
Cohen would always enter the interview area in character as Ali G, carrying
equipment and appearing to be an insignificant crew member. He would arrive with
a suited man, whom the interviewee naturally thought was the interviewer. Baron
Cohen, as Ali G, would sit down to begin conducting the interview by asking the
interviewee some preliminary questions. The interviewee, however, would remain
under the impression that the smartly-dressed director would be conducting the
interview until short notice prior to cameras rolling: this would grant an
advantage of surprise, whereby the interviewee would be less likely to opt out
of the Ali interview prior to its commencement.[16]
The resulting willingness of Baron
Cohen's targets to answer his frequently risqué questions often created
surprising conversations. Interviewees have included:
astronaut Buzz Aldrin
politician and consumer advocate
Ralph Nader
writer Gore Vidal
real estate mogul Donald Trump
former U.S. Surgeon General C.
Everett Koop
basketball players Dwyane Wade,
Shaquille O'Neal, Steve Nash, Kobe Bryant, Richard Jefferson, Tim Duncan, Ben
Wallace and Robert Horry
former US Secretary of State James
Baker III
former US Attorney General Dick
Thornburgh
businessman and billionaire Mohamed
Al-Fayed
Professor Heinz Wolff
former US Speaker of the House Newt
Gingrich
political commentator Pat Buchanan
Professor Noam Chomsky
footballer David Beckham and his
wife, ex-Spice Girl Victoria Beckham, for the UK's Comic Relief
former UN Secretary-General Boutros
Boutros-Ghali (whom Baron Cohen, in his Ali G character, referred to as 'Boutros
Boutros Boutros-Ghali')
former Conservative Party MP Neil
Hamilton
journalist Andy Rooney
Labour politician Tony Benn
DUP politician Sammy Wilson
Baron Cohen is a supporter of Comic
Relief and as Ali G has hosted some interviews for the benefit of the
charity.[17]
Borat
Borat: Cultural Learnings of
America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, a feature film with
Borat at the centre, was screened at the 2006 Toronto International Film
Festival and released in the United Kingdom on 2 November 2006, in the United
States on 3 November 2006 and Australia 23 November 2006. The film is about a
journey across the United States in an ice cream truck, in which the main
character is obsessed with the idea of marrying Pamela Anderson. The film is a
mockumentary which includes interviews with various American citizens that poke
fun at American culture, as well as sexism, racism, homophobia, anti-Semitism,
jingoism and Baywatch.
It debuted at the #1 spot in the
US, taking in an estimated $26.4 million in just 837 theatres averaging $31,600
per theatre, the fourth highest per-theatre average of all time for movies
opening wide (500 screens or more), behind Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's
Chest and Spider-Man.
Baron Cohen won the 2007 Golden
Globe in the "Best Actor – Musical or Comedy" category, his sixth such award.
Although Borat was up for "Best Motion Picture — Musical or Comedy", the film
lost to Dreamgirls. On 23 January 2007, he was nominated for an Academy Award
for Best Adapted Screenplay. He shared his nomination with the film's
co-writers, Ant Hines, Peter Baynham, Sy Mordecai Finesto, Dan Mazer, and Todd
Phillips.
Aside from the comic elements of
his characters, Baron Cohen's performances are interpreted by some as reflecting
uncomfortable truths about his audience. He juxtaposes his own Jewish lineage
with the anti-Semitism of his character Borat.[18]
In 2007, Baron Cohen published a
travel guide as Borat, with dual titles: Borat: Touristic Guidings To Minor
Nation of U.S. and A. and Borat: Touristic Guidings To Glorious Nation of
Kazakhstan.[19]
On 21 December 2007, Baron Cohen
announced he was retiring the character of Borat.[20]
Brüno
Another alter ego Sacha Baron Cohen
performed as is 'Brüno', a flamboyantly gay allegedly-19-year-old Austrian
fashion show presenter, who often lures his subjects, unwittingly, into making
provocative statements and engaging in embarrassing behaviour, as well as
leading them to contradict themselves, often in the same interview. Brüno asks
the subjects to answer 'yes or no' questions with either "Vassup" (whats up), or
"Ich don't think so" (No), or sometimes "Ach, ja!" (Ah yes!) or "Nicht, nicht"
("Nicht" means "not" in German). In one segment on Da Ali G Show he encouraged
his guest to answer questions with either "Keep them in the ghetto" or "Train to
Auschwitz". Brüno's main comedic satire pertains to the vacuity and inanity of
the fashion and clubbing world. In May 2009, at the MTV Movie Awards, Baron
Cohen appeared as 'Brüno' wearing a white angel costume, a white jock strap,
white go-go boots and white wings, and did an aerial stunt where he dropped from
a height (using wires) onto Eminem, Baron Cohen landed on his lap and his rear
in Eminem's face, prompting Eminem to exit the venue with fellow rappers of D12.
Eminem later admitted to staging the stunt with Baron Cohen.[21]
Film
After an intense bidding war that
included such Hollywood powerhouses as DreamWorks, Sony, and 20th Century Fox;
Universal Pictures paid a reported $42.5 million for the rights to the
movie.[22] A number of shill companies and Web sites were created in order to
draw potential interviewees into interviews by creating an illusion of
legitimacy.[23] The film was released in July 2009.
Performer versus characters
Baron Cohen has often been confused
with the identity of one of his characters. When he posed as Borat to host the
MTV Europe Music Awards in Lisbon, the central Hungarian news wire agency MTI
reported that the host was 'Borat Sagdiyev'.[24] As most Hungarian newspapers
and television networks take MTI as their official source, the misinterpretation
of the character spread rapidly in Hungary, with some sources (such as TV2)
emphasising that a Kazakh news reporter hosted the awards, while others (such as
Index.hu) noticed and pointed out the error.[25]
Controversies
Baron Cohen has encountered many
controversies regarding some of his comic characters:
In an interview with former British
MP Neil Hamilton in 2000, Ali G offered Hamilton what was allegedly cannabis,
which Hamilton accepted and smoked, creating some minor controversy in the
British media.[26]
At the 2006 MTV Movie Awards, Borat
introduced Gnarls Barkley's performance of "Crazy", where he made a comment
about Jessica Simpson, saying that he liked her mouth and that he could see it
clearly through her denim pants. His appearance was cut from subsequent
rebroadcasts.[citation needed]
Baron Cohen has had some trouble
because of racist or prejudiced comments his characters have made (see Da Ali G
Show). HBO spokesman Quentin Schaffer has replied to criticism concerning Baron
Cohen's characters: 'Through his alter-egos, he delivers an obvious satire that
exposes people's ignorance and prejudice in much the same way All in the Family
did years ago.'[27] Regarding his portrayal as the anti-Semitic Borat, Baron
Cohen says the segments are a "dramatic demonstration of how racism feeds on
dumb conformity, as much as rabid bigotry", rather than a display of racism by
Baron Cohen himself.[28] "Borat essentially works as a tool. By himself being
anti-Semitic, he lets people lower their guard and expose their own prejudice",
Baron Cohen explains.[9] Addressing the same topic in an NPR interview with
Robert Siegel, Baron Cohen says "...and I think that's quite an interesting
thing with Borat, which is people really let down their guard with him because
they're in a room with somebody who seems to have these outrageous opinions.
They sometimes feel much more relaxed about letting their own outrageous,
politically incorrect, prejudiced opinions come out."[29]
Baron Cohen, the grandson of a
Holocaust survivor, says he also wishes in particular to expose the role of
indifference in that genocide. "When I was in university, there was this major
historian of the Third Reich, Ian Kershaw, who said, 'The path to Auschwitz was
paved with indifference.' I know it's not very funny being a comedian talking
about the Holocaust, but it's an interesting idea that not everyone in Germany
had to be a raving anti-Semite. They just had to be apathetic."[9] Regarding the
enthusiastic response to his song, "Throw The Jew Down The Well", he says, "Did
it reveal that they were anti-Semitic? Perhaps. But maybe it just revealed that
they were indifferent to anti-Semitism."[9]
Baron Cohen walked onto the runway
during the Ágatha Ruiz de la Prada fashion show in Milan on 26 September 2008.
In the character of his latest alter-ego Brüno, he was wearing a costume made
out of velcro. He appeared on the stage with a blanket and items of clothing
stuck to his velcro suit. Lights were turned off while security intervened and
escorted him off the stage, and the fashion show resumed normally shortly
thereafter. Baron Cohen and his team allegedly accessed the fashion show using
fake IDs.[30]
During an appearance on Late Show
with David Letterman,[when?] Baron Cohen stated he was restricted from answering
David Letterman's question as to how he managed to get an interview with Pat
Buchanan while in character as Ali G due to pending "legal reasons".[31]
While introducing an award at the
2009 MTV Movie Awards, Baron Cohen was lowered upside-down from the rafters
dressed as an angel right into rapper Eminem's lap after an apparently staged
problem with his wire harness. Baron Cohen had only a jockstrap on underneath
and fully exposed his buttocks in Eminem's face. Eminem swore repeatedly,
demanding that his friends, members of D12, each of whom were sitting next to
Eminem, remove Baron Cohen, then left the auditorium.[32] Baron Cohen then
announced the winner (Zac Efron) while still hanging from the wires above the
stage. It was later revealed that Eminem and Baron Cohen had planned the gag
together.[33]
Pauly Shore claimed, in 2009, that
Baron Cohen's film, Brüno, was "stolen from Shore's 'mockumentary'", as the film
Brüno had started production after the start of production for Adopted and also
featured the main character adopting a child from a Third World nation.[34]
Future
projects
Baron Cohen will star as Freddie
Mercury of the rock band Queen in Mercury, an upcoming film about the period in
the band's history from 1971 to the Live Aid concert in 1985.[35] It was Baron
Cohen himself who contacted screenwriter Peter Morgan with the idea of
portraying the flamboyant lead singer.[36] Time commented with approval on his
singing ability and visual similarity to Mercury.[37] Cohen's next film, The
Dictator, will be a loose adaptation of the novel Zabibah and the King, written
by Saddam Hussein. It will tell "the heroic story of a dictator who risked his
life to ensure that democracy would never come to the country he so lovingly
oppressed".[38] Cohen will play the part of a Saddam Hussein–type ruler who gets
secretly replaced by a lookalike and then flees to New York.[39][40] Borat and
Bruno film director Larry Charles will direct the film.[41]
Other
work
Baron Cohen guest-starred in the
finale of the fifth season Curb Your Enthusiasm, with Dustin Hoffman as a guide
to Heaven. He also provided the voice of the ring-tailed lemur king, King
Julien, in DreamWorks' family movie Madagascar (2005) as well as its 2008
sequel, and appeared as Will Ferrell's arch rival the French Formula One speed
demon Jean Girard in the 2006 hit Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby.
He also appeared alongside Johnny Depp in the 2007 film Sweeney Todd: The Demon
Barber of Fleet Street as Signor Adolfo Pirelli, and co-starred in Martin
Scorsese's 2011 adventure film Hugo.
Baron Cohen tends to avoid doing
interviews out of character. However, in 2004, he did the talk show circuit
appearing as himself on Late Show with David Letterman, The Opie and Anthony
Show, The Howard Stern Show,[42] and others in order to promote the upcoming
season of his show on HBO. He was also interviewed on NPR's All Things
Considered.[29] He also did an interview with Rolling Stone, published in
November 2006, that the magazine labelled as "his only interview as himself".[9]
He also appeared in an interview out of character with Terry Gross on NPR's
Fresh Air on 4 January 2007.[43]
Baron Cohen has twice presented the
MTV Europe Music Awards, first as Ali G on 8 November 2001, in Frankfurt,
Germany, and then as Borat on 3 November 2005 in Lisbon, Portugal. Baron Cohen
appeared out of character to accept an award at the British Comedy Awards in
December 2006. He said at the time that Borat could not make it to the awards as
"he's guest of honour at the Holocaust denial conference in Tehran",[44]
referring to the International Conference to Review the Global Vision of the
Holocaust.
Borat director Larry Charles
explains that Baron Cohen generally appears in character partly to "protect his
weakness", by focusing public interest on his characters rather than
himself.[45] His other reason, Newsweek claims, is that Baron Cohen is fiercely
private: "...according to the UK press, his publicists denied not only that he
attended a party for the London premiere of Borat, but also that a party even
occurred."[45]
It was reported online that Baron
Cohen might play Freddie Mercury in a biographical film,[46] but his publicist
later declared that Baron Cohen would not do so.[47] However, on 16 September
2010, representatives for Cohen confirmed that he would indeed be playing the
role in an as-of-yet untitled biopic about Mercury.[48][49]
Baron Cohen shot a spread with
supermodel Alessandra Ambrosio for Marie Claire magazine to promote the film
Brüno.[50]
Sports Illustrated's 6 November
2006 issue contains a column called "Skater vs. Instigator", which illustrates
various amusing "parallels" between Baron Cohen and figure skater Sasha Cohen,
ranging from their mutually held personal significance of the number 4,[51] to
their mutual romantic interests in redheads.
Baron Cohen was featured on
Australian talk show Rove as Brüno on 28 June 2009.[citation needed]
Baron Cohen was featured in the
Time 100 list for 2007.[52]
In 2010, Cohen guest-starred on The
Simpsons in the episode "The Greatest Story Ever D'ohed" as Jakob, an angry
Israeli tour guide.
Personal life
Marriage and family
Baron Cohen married Australian
actress Isla Fisher on 15 March 2010.[53] After three years of study, Fisher
converted to Judaism in early 2007, saying "I will definitely have a Jewish
wedding just to be with Sacha. I would do anything – move into any religion – to
be united in marriage with him. We have a future together, and religion comes
second to love as far as we are concerned."[54] She has received the approval of
Baron Cohen's observant Jewish parents.[55] Baron Cohen and Fisher have two
daughters: Olive, born on 19 October 2007 in Los Angeles,[56] and Elula, born in
the summer of 2010.[57]
Legal
issues
Two residents of Glod, the Romanian
village in which the opening scenes of Borat were filmed, hired attorney Edward
Fagan to sue the makers of Borat for $30 million. They alleged that the intent
of the film was misrepresented to them, that the poorest members of their
village were made to look like "savages", and that they were underpaid,
particularly when their minute salaries were compared to the millions earned by
the completed movie. During several segments, children were filmed with guns and
other weapons and in another scene, an amputee who lost his arm was told to wear
a rubber fist sex toy.[58] The lawsuit was dismissed in New York hearing on the
grounds that the allegations were too vague to stand up in court.[59]
The government of Kazakhstan
threatened Baron Cohen with legal action following the 2005 MTV Europe Music
Awards ceremony in Lisbon, and the authority in charge of the country's
country-code top-level domain name removed the website that he had created for
his character Borat (previously: http://www.borat.kz) for alleged violation of
the law—specifically, registering for the domain under a false name. The New
York Times, (among others), has reported that Baron Cohen, (in character as
Borat), replied: "I'd like to state that I have no connection with Mr Cohen and
fully support my government decision to sue this Jew".[60] He was, however,
defended by Dariga Nazarbayeva, a politician and the daughter of Kazakhstan
President Nursultan Nazarbayev, who stated, "We should not be afraid of humour
and we shouldn't try to control everything, I think."[61] The deputy foreign
minister of Kazakhstan later invited Baron Cohen to visit the country, stating
that he could learn that "women drive cars, wine is made of grapes, and Jews are
free to go to synagogues".[62] After the worldwide success of the Borat film,
the Kazakh government, including the president, altered their stance on Baron
Cohen's parody, tacitly recognising the invaluable press the controversy created
for their country.[63]
Baron Cohen encountered another
problem around his Borat character. Two of the three University of South
Carolina students who appear in Borat sued the filmmakers, alleging that they
were duped into signing release forms while drunk, and that false promises were
made that the footage was for a documentary that would never be screened in the
US. On 11 December 2006, a Los Angeles judge denied the pair a restraining order
to remove them from the film. The lawsuit was dismissed in February 2007.[64]
On 22 May 2009, a charity worker at
a seniors bingo game sued Baron Cohen, claiming an incident shot for Brüno at a
charity bingo tournament left her disabled.[65] However, the worker later
retracted her statement, saying the "actor never struck her", but that he "beat
her down emotionally to the point she's now confined to a wheelchair".[66] The
scene did not make the final cut for the film. The case was dismissed in late
November 2009 on Anti-SLAPP grounds with all attorney's fees to be paid by the
charity worker. The dismissal was appealed and upheld on 12 September 2011.[67]
A lawsuit was filed on 30 April
2010 in the District of Columbia by Palestinian Christian Ayman Abu Aita of Beit
Sahour, Bethlehem, West Bank, against Baron Cohen relating to his interview
which was used in Brüno. Aita alleges that he has been defamed by false
accusations that he is a terrorist. Aita included David Letterman in the suit
based on comments made during the 7 July 2009 appearance by Baron Cohen on the
Late Show with David Letterman.[68] On 4 November 2010, the DC Case was
dismissed with Aita given 120 days to file in the Supreme Court of the State of
New York, County of New York, or have the case permanently dismissed (see DC
Case Docket Sheet).
Israel
and Judaism
Baron Cohen first acted in
theatrical productions featuring the Socialist-Zionist youth movement Habonim
Dror.[69]
He spent a year in Israel at
Kibbutz Rosh HaNikra and Kibbutz Beit HaEmek as part of the Shnat Habonim Dror,
as well as taking part in the programme Machon L'Madrichei Chutz La'Aretz for
Jewish youth movement leaders.
According to Baron Cohen, "I
wouldn't say that I am a religious Jew, but I'm still proud to be Jewish".
However, he keeps kosher and attends synagogue about twice a year.[70]
Baron Cohen frequently speaks in
Hebrew while playing the anti-Semitic character Borat. He also sang the lyrics
from an old kibbutz song (pretending that it was the Kazakh national anthem) in
an episode of Da Ali G Show. In one of the deleted scenes of his movie, after
being asked by the host-pastor to lead the table in a pre-meal prayer service,
Baron Cohen, in his character role of Borat, sings a lengthy hymn (not Hebrew)
that has clear similarities to the Mussaf prayer service of the Jewish High
Holidays. He actually repeatedly sings two Polish phrases (slightly
mispronounced) "Excuse me ma'am do you speak English?" and "Could you speak
slowly please?"[71]
Awards
and nominations
Awards and nominations This section
needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by
adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and
removed. (December 2010)
1999 – Won British Comedy Award,
Best Male Comedy Newcomer for The 11 O'Clock Show (1998)
2000 – Nominated BAFTA TV Award,
Best Entertainment Performance for The 11 O'Clock Show (1998)
2000 – Nominated National
Television Awards, UK, Most Popular Comedy Performer for Da Ali G Show (2000)
2000 – Won TV Quick Award, TV
Personality of the Year for Da Ali G Show (2000)
2001 – Won BAFTA TV Award, Best
Comedy (Programme or Series) for Da Ali G Show (2000) (shared)
2001 – Won BAFTA TV Award, Best
Comedy Performance for Da Ali G Show (2000)
2003 – Nominated Emmy Award,
Outstanding Non-Fiction Program (Alternative) for Da Ali G Show (2003) (shared)
2003 – Nominated Emmy Award,
Outstanding Writing for Non-Fiction Programming for Da Ali G Show (2003)
(shared)
2004 – Nominated Golden Satellite
Award, Best Performance by an Actor in a Series, Comedy or Musical for Da Ali G
Show (2003)
2005 – Nominated Emmy Award,
Outstanding Variety, Music or Comedy Series for Da Ali G Show (2003) (shared)
2005 – Nominated Emmy Award,
Outstanding Writing for a Variety, Music or Comedy Program for Da Ali G Show
(2003) (shared)
2006 – Won Ronnie Barker Award[72]
2007 – Won MTV Movie Award for Best
Kiss alongside Will Ferrell in Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby
Borat
awards and nominations
2006 – Won: Los Angeles Films
Critics Association Award for Best Actor.
2006 – Won: San Francisco Films
Critics Circle Award for Best Actor.
2006 – Winner: Toronto Film Critics
Association Award for Best Actor.
2006 – Won: Deutscher Comedypreis
(German comedy award) for Best International Comedy.
2007 – Won: Golden Globe for Best
Actor in a Comedy/Musical
2007 – Nominated: Golden Globe for
Best Picture Comedy/Musical.
2007 – Nominated: London Film
Critics Circle Award for British Actor of the Year.
2007 – Nominated: Writers Guild of
America Award for Best Adapted Screenplay (shared).
2007 – Nominated: Academy Award for
Best Adapted Screenplay (shared).
2007 – Won: MTV Movie Award for
Best Comedic Performance and Nominated for Best Movie as well and Best Fight
with Ken Davitian.
2007 – Won: The Evening Standard
British Film Awards: Peter Sellers award for Best Comedy.
Filmography
Year Film Role Notes
1995 Jack and Jeremy's Police 4
Execution victim TV special
Pump TV TV Presenter, UK regional
cable channel TV special
1996 Punch Unnamed Short film
1998 Live from the Lighthouse Ali G
TV special
1998–99 The 11 O'Clock Show Ali G
TV series
Also writer
2000 The Jolly Boys' Last Stand
Vinnie
Da Ali G Show (UK) Ali G/Borat
Sagdiyev/Brüno TV Series: 6 episodes
Also writer
2002 Ali G Indahouse Ali G/Borat
Sagdiyev Also executive producer/writer
2003 Spyz James Bond (Ali G) Short
Film
Also executive producer/writer
2003–04 Da Ali G Show (US) Ali
G/Borat Sagdiyev/Brüno TV Series: 12 episodes
Also executive producer/writer
2005 Curb Your Enthusiasm Larry's
Guide #2 Season 5, Episode 10 "The End"
Madagascar King Julien XIII Voice
only
2006 Talladega Nights: The Ballad
of Ricky Bobby Jean Girard
Night of Too Many Stars: An
Overbooked Event for
Autism Education Borat Sagdiyev TV
Special
Borat: Cultural Learnings of
America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan Borat Sagdiyev Also
Producer/Writer
2007 Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber
of Fleet Street Signor Adolfo Pirelli
2008 Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa
King Julien XIII Voice only
2009 Brüno Brüno Also
producer/writer
2010 The Simpsons Jakob Season 21,
Episode 16 "The Greatest Story Ever D'ohed"[73]
Voice only
2011 Hugo Inspector Gustav
2012 The Dictator General Admiral
Alladeen Post-production
Also producer/writer
Mercury[74] Freddie Mercury
Pre-production
Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted
King Julien XIII Voice only
Post-production
Les Misérables Thénardier
Pre-production [75][76]
Django Unchained[77] Scotty
Pre-production
References
1.^ "Isla Fisher and Sacha Baron
Cohen finally wed". News.com.au. 22 March 2010.
http://www.news.com.au/entertainment/movies/isla-fisher-and-sacha-baron-cohen-finally-wed/story-e6frfmvr-1225843610980.
Retrieved 31 July 2010.
2.^ "Baron Cohen, Sacha". BFI Film
& TV Database. http://ftvdb.bfi.org.uk/sift/individual/837355. Retrieved 6
November 2006.
3.^ Yahoo Movies: Sacha Baron Cohen
to shed Borat persona for good Yahoo, 22 December 2007
4.^ "Valley G's wicked Welsh
rootz". BBC News. 28 March 2002. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/1898402.stm.
Retrieved 22 November 2006.
5.^ a b "The Provocative Baron
Cohen Clan - Moment Magazine". Momentmag.com.
http://www.momentmag.com/moment/issues/2010/08/Baron-Cohen.html. Retrieved 31
July 2010.
6.^ Jay Rayner (4 November 2005).
"The Observer Profile: Sacha Baron Cohen , Life and style , The Observer".
Guardian (UK).
http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2002/feb/24/foodanddrink.comedy.
Retrieved 7 August 2010.
7.^ Mount, Harry (15 September
2006). "Kazakhstan launches propaganda campaign against Borat". London:
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51.^ 4 is the Supreme Number of the
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74.^ http://www.nme.com/filmandtv/news/sacha-baron-cohens-queen-biopic-given-title/254566
75.^ Sacha Baron Cohen and Helena
Bonham Carter to Star in Film Version of Les Miserables , John Logan to Write
Jersey Boys Film and William Shatner is Back on Broadway.
76.^ Sacha Baron Cohen in talks for
'Les Miserables'
77.^ "Sacha Baron Cohen joins
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Retrieved 2012-01-17.
****
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