Indo-British actor Ricky Sekhon, who played Osama bin Laden in Kathryn Bigelow’s “Zero Dark Thirty,” says he was known as "Osama bin Loungin” on the set because he got so comfortable lying in a body bag. Even though Sekhon’s character is central to the film, the actor hardly has any screen presence and not a single dialogue in the film.
The film focuses on the 10-year manhunt for bin Laden. The showdown occurs when SEAL Team Six lands in bin Laden's compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, and works its way through the house searching for the al-Qaida leader and eventually shooting him.
In interviews to several leading newspapers, including an op-ed in the Jan. 16 New York Times, Sekhon talks about the painstaking preparation he went through to prepare for the role, even though the tip of his nose is the only part that is shown in the final version of the film.
“If I had known that my nostrils’ poking out of a body bag would be the main feature of my performance in Kathryn Bigelow’s film 'Zero Dark Thirty,' it would have saved me eight weeks of heart palpitations as I prepared for my role as Osama bin Laden,” Sekhon wrote in The New York Times.
The 29-year-old, 6-foot-4 actor, who describes himself as “the least dangerous person I know,” said he got the part after auditioning for a role the casting director was not allowed to name, The New York Post reported.
Sekhon has previously been cast as a terrorist, drug dealer, drug addict and henchman - a list of roles that would imply he'd been typecast largely based on his appearance. "I think it's something to do with how I look," he told The Telegraph. “It’s not that easy to be an actor of Asian ancestry in Britain or America,” Sekhon said, adding, “There are fewer leading roles for us, but then again, there are also probably fewer of us going up for those roles.”
Writing about his casting audition in The New York Times, Sekhon said,“I think I was asked about my height a few times, and that made me think, ‘OK, I’ll be playing a tall man or woman.” He was told he’d be playing bin Laden only after he bagged the role. After learning that, the London native reportedly immersed himself in studies about the enigmatic terrorist, many of which would not be needed for his eventual portrayal.
He said that one of the biggest physical preparations that he underwent was a taxing workout regime and a minimalist diet. He told The Telegraph that a personal trainer friend sent him on morning runs uphill in Jamaica while on vacation and he limited his meals to lean meats and proteins and as a result, lost 25 pounds.
In spite of the lack of screen time, Sekhon told The Telegraph that he's now getting more film projects as a result of the publicity from the film; he added that he is now working on a Swedish thriller.
According to his biography on whoislog.info, Sekhon has been a part of the Outreach programs at The New York Times for many years, taking drama to urban youth centers, directing short films and shooting a film, "The Induction," with the inmates at Feltham Young Offenders Institute. He has worked on directors' courses and short films at the London Film School in Covent Garden.
Born in Southall, West London, to Indian parents, Sekhon was brought up and educated in and around West London, and graduated from Royal Holloway, University of London, in 2004 with a bachelor's in drama and theater studies.
He was seen as Hazeem in the 2010 comedy “The Infidel,” as well as several other independent films, short films, commercials and theater productions in the United Kingdom and Europe. He was an acting member of the National Youth Theatre from 2001-05, and recently returned as an assistant director for the new courses.
