Mohammed Al-Tuwaiyan

Biography

His first roles date from 1965 to 1974: evening television programmes and series, of which little is known today.

Mohammed Al-Tuwaiyan was born on 9 May 1945 in Burayda, in Saudi Arabia. His father traded between the Levant and the north of Saudi Arabia and took his son along, so his childhood was spent in the north of the country. There he picked up the northern dialect. The family then returned to the Qassim region, and later he settled in Riyadh. He studied in the United States and, after returning, went on working in television. In 1982 he played Hazeez in the series “Al-Sa’ad Wa’ad”; this role is usually called his first notable success. In 1985 the series “Awdet Osoeid” (“The Return of Osoeid”) appeared: Al-Tuwaiyan took part in it as an actor and also wrote the script. Later he wrote the script for the series “Lo’bat Al-Shaytan” (“The Devil’s Game”, 2012). For ten consecutive seasons he appeared in “Tash Ma Tash”, one of the most popular series in the Arab states of the Persian Gulf. His other work includes the series “Ghash Mashm 2009”, “Selfie”, “Game of the Adults” and “A Place in the Heart”, and, in cinema, the film “Mandoub Al-Layl” (“The Night Messenger”, 2023).

Al-Tuwaiyan was also a painter. He is credited with an artistic school of his own, but there are no details of his painting, and I will not try to judge it.

He is credited with having discovered a number of well-known actors and directors. The names given are the Syrian director Najdat Anzour and the actors Ayman Zidan, Nasser Al-Qasabi and Abdullah Al-Sadhan. This is hard to check.

In 2024 he received the “Theater and Performing Arts” award of the National Cultural Awards Initiative, in its fourth edition. In the same year he was honoured at the opening of the fourth Gulf Film Festival.

Mohammed Al-Tuwaiyan died on 31 January 2025 at the age of 79.