The performer was Frank William Kissell. Born 1865 in Fort Edward, New York. Died 1939, Utica, New York.
All of his several Arabic and Arabic-sounding stage names were fabrications, as was most all of that character's backstory. He was not from "Arabia" or Egypt. Not Muslim. Not son of a king over 2 million people. Not an immigrant to the US. Not a speaker of 17 languages.
It's true Kissell, under these stage names -- Hadji L. Cheriff, Hadj Lessik, Hadj Cheriff ben Mahomet, Hadj Le Mahofode Cheriff -- performed with Buffalo Bill's Wild West show in the 1890s and earlier with the Barnum & Bailey Circus.
The name he added -- Lessik -- is his real surname backwards.
Before this Oct. 1894 film, he performed for the same Edison Black Maria kinetoscope camera in July. But that film is not known to survive.
All of his several Arabic and Arabic-sounding stage names were fabrications, as was most all of that character's backstory. He was not from "Arabia" or Egypt. Not Muslim. Not son of a king over 2 million people. Not an immigrant to the US. Not a speaker of 17 languages.
It's true Kissell, under these stage names -- Hadji L. Cheriff, Hadj Lessik, Hadj Cheriff ben Mahomet, Hadj Le Mahofode Cheriff -- performed with Buffalo Bill's Wild West show in the 1890s and earlier with the Barnum & Bailey Circus.
The name he added -- Lessik -- is his real surname backwards.
Before this Oct. 1894 film, he performed for the same Edison Black Maria kinetoscope camera in July. But that film is not known to survive.