Reza Fazeli

Reza Fazeli — Biography

Reza Fazeli was born on 3 July 1935 in Tehran. After roughly a year in Iran's Imperial Air Force, he left the country in 1953, spending time first around the Persian Gulf, in Lebanon and in Egypt, then eight further years studying and working across France, Germany, Britain and the United States. Back home he built a career acting and directing in both Iranian cinema and international productions; his son, Bijan Fazeli, likewise went into filmmaking.

Fazeli, whose studies included the philosophy of religion, left Iran for good after the 1979 revolution and founded the company KVC to produce political documentaries against the new government; in exile he became known as an opponent who criticized religious superstition and religions including Islam. From 2002 to 2005 he worked at the US-based AZADI TV, which broadcast against Iran's clerical rulers, and afterward continued similar political work at another Persian-language channel, Pars TV. Reza Fazeli died on 13 April 2009 in California.