British actor Damian Lewis caused a minor stir recently when he sent President Obama a box set of Homeland DVDs with the personal message “from one Muslim to another.”
Lewis, aka “that guy from Band of Brothers ,” stars on the critically acclaimed Showtime series Homeland , and, aside from his acting chops, the Brit is known as a devious prankster. His mischief has reached the highest office in the land, with a personal gift sent to the desk of President Obama himself (who is, reportedly, himself a Homeland fan ).
On Homeland , Lewis portrays Nicholas Brody, a USMC Sergeant and former al-Qaeda prisoner of war who was turned during his capture. The character is both an undercover Muslim running for US Congress and the show’s primary antagonist.
Referencing his character and the popular myth that President Obama is secretly and undercover Muslim himself, Lewis sent the POTUS a box set of Homeland DVDs with the personal message “From one Muslim to another,” reports MSN .
The gift was from the entire Homeland cast, Lewis recalls. Co-star Claire Danes “had written something really lovely and sweet” to President Obama, and, “I thought, I’ve got to think of something great… something classy. And I went: ‘From one Muslim to another’ in an indelible Sharpie,” reports Politico .
“And I couldn’t take it back,” he added. “I was then writing emails for the whole of the next week going: ‘I do hope he understands irony.’ ”
President Obama is known for his sense of humor, so the joke was probably taken lightly by the POTUS, though that’s purely speculative as he hasn’t responded to the gift publicly.
To give you a sense of Lewis’s shenanigans, we have embedded his slightly odd-ball Emmy speech below.
Are you a fan of Homeland ? Was Damian Lewis’s “Muslim” joke harmless or offensive?
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