Behzad Dabu Talks ‘How to Get Away With Murder’ and Roles For People of Color on TV [Exclusive Interview]

This is Behzad Dabu. He’s a cool, calm, collected cucumber that stars on How to Get Away With Murder Season 3 as resident hate magnet, Simon Drake. Mr. Dabu will have you know, however, that he’s not the villain.

“I find funny [that] a lot of the audience is like, ‘oh, Simon Drake such a jerk,’ and from an actor’s point of view, I’m thinking, ‘well the other five have killed people.’ So far what we know of Simon is that he hasn’t killed anyone.”

So far.

Behzad is a Syracuse native with a 12 year background in theatre, having earned a B.F.A in Acting from Columbia University in Chicago and earning critical acclaim for his roles in several stage plays, including Samsara and, most recently, Disgraced, originating the role of Abe. 

Despite an impressive few years wearing the acting hat, Behzad says the transition from stage to screen is not as simple as you might think.

“The major difference is that you have to able to stop and start,” he said. “Once you take that first step on stage, you’ve started the race. With screen, you have to be able to turn it on, and then stop, and then turn it on again, and then stop, and turn it on again. You might do that scene 54 times.”

Behzad’s role as Simon Drake on How to Get Away With Murder is one many would call polarizing; you either hate him or you don’t watch the show. But very little is known about Mr. Drake except that he’s, well, kind of a jerk. Behzad—again, a cucumber fella—is the opposite of that.

So how does he relate to the jerk with a heart of jerk?

“Whenever you play someone that isn’t like you, you have to find what is like you,” he said. “I think [Simon] sort of represents some of the other students in the class who are sort of feeling like, ‘hey, why are these five always hanging around Miss Keating? What’s so special about [them]? We all work hard. I do all my work. I show up.”

Behzad doesn’t see his character as a villain, and neither should we.

“Some of the five aren’t even good students,” said Behzad. “And thats the way I kind of got into the character. I would understand if five students were getting all the attention from the professor, and they weren’t working any harder than I was. That’s something [we can all] relate to in his character.”

In reality, Behzad is a champion of diversity, having assisted in the creation of the Chicago Inclusion Project as one of its original members. Founded in 2015, the Chicago Inclusion Project is an organization dedicated to increasing the presence and visibility of women, people of color, LGBTQ people, and people of disabilities in media.

Naturally, How to Get Away with Murder was a good fit.

“I do a lot of work with diversity and leveling the playing field for people of color in television. There just isn’t a show that’s better for that than How to Get Away with Murder,” he said. “[The show doesn’t] just have people of color in roles where people of color are featured. They just have people of color in regular roles. The lawyer, the judge, the lead, whatever it is. They do diversity in the right way.”

Like How to Get Away With Murder, the Chicago Inclusion Project aims to fill roles regardless of color, gender, sexuality, or physical ability, bridging the gap of opportunities for anyone that isn’t what Behzad calls a pervasive “default.”

“We don’t just want to put more Black people in Black roles or Mexican people in Mexican roles or Asian people in Asian roles. When [a script] calls for the role of lawyer or doctor or boyfriend, we call in all actors.”

What did I tell you? Cucumber.

As for his character, Behzad could only tell us so much (under threat of death from Shonda herself.)

“I can say this: I can say that [in Season 3 Episode 5], my character’s going to get a lot more involved. You’re going to find out a little bit more on why Simon Drake is as sassy as he is, and you’ll start to see how he fits into the narrative more.”

The real question is: will we come to like Simon as much as we like Behzad? Only time will tell.

You can catch Behzad Dabu on How to Get Away With Murder airing Thursdays at 10/9c on ABC and find him on Twitter @BehzadDabu.

Check out his website, BehzadDabu.com and the Chicago Inclusion Project. 

Featured image credit: Ian McLaren