Shohreh Aghdashloo's deep, raspy voice and unhurried authority make formidable women convincing. We value the feeling she brings to family conflict, too, and are less persuaded by scripts that ask her chiefly to sound in charge.
Fi1m perspective
In Renfield (2023), Shohreh Aghdashloo gives Bellafrancesca Lobo the unhurried grandeur of a crime matriarch. Ben Schwartz supplies the idiot heir; she supplies enough authority to make the family hierarchy immediately clear. Her pleasure in the part is welcome, though the film gives us too much Lobo business and too little Dracula. That is a useful introduction to her strengths and to the limitations of casting her simply to sound formidable.
Her deep, raspy voice makes authority easy to convey; the more interesting work comes when the character has something else to do. The early Iranian films include The Report (1977), followed much later by the American breakthrough of House of Sand and Fog (2003). As Nadi Behrani in the latter, she brings emotional weight to family and cultural conflict, a useful corrective to the notion that she is chiefly there to intimidate. Television gave her a longer stretch as Chrisjen Avasarala in The Expanse (2015–2022), where that authority belongs to a shrewd, layered character.
Chris McKay's Renfield shows the danger of relying on her presence to make supporting material worthwhile. The script keeps pulling the film away from Nicolas Cage's Dracula and Nicholas Hoult's put-upon familiar to pursue the Lobo crime plot. We were impatient with the detours through corrupt colleagues and a stakeout because we wanted Cage back. Her composure gives the gangland scenes some pleasure, without making them necessary. A better part would give that composure something to contend with, rather than using it to lend weight to a diversion.
The Penguin (2024), in which she plays Nadia Maroni, is a better recommendation, with a qualification: our enthusiasm is principally for Colin Farrell and Cristin Milioti. Its familiar gangland plotting, slow opening and overlong flashbacks remain drawbacks, whatever the cast can do with them. Aghdashloo's name alone should not be asked to guarantee the evening, especially when formidable women have become such a regular assignment. For a fuller encounter with her work, start with The Expanse.
Biography
Shohreh Aghdashloo is an Iranian-American actress. She was born Shohreh Vaziri-Tabar on 11 May 1952 in Tehran, Iran. After establishing a career in Iranian theatre and film in the 1970s, with roles in films including Chess of the Wind (1976) and The Report (1977), she left Iran during the 1979 revolution and moved to England, where she studied international relations at Brunel University. She later settled in the United States and became a US citizen.
Aghdashloo gained wider recognition for her supporting role in House of Sand and Fog (2003), which earned her an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actress. She won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Miniseries or Movie for her performance in the HBO miniseries House of Saddam (2008). Her other credits include recurring roles in television series such as 24 and The Expanse, and film appearances in X-Men: The Last Stand (2006), Star Trek Beyond (2016) and Renfield (2023), in which she played Bellafrancesca Lobo. She is married to actor and playwright Houshang Touzie.
