The Oscar-nominated actor Omar Sharif spent the remaining years of his life immersing himself in
a popular card game. So what game was it? And how else did the legendary actor spend his final days?
Award-winning actor Omar Sharif was an acclaimed international movie star. His leading roles in two
hit films in the 1960s, both epics by director David Lean, catapulted him into superstardom.
Lawrence of Arabia earned him an Oscar nomination and a Golden Globe win for best
supporting actor in 1963, while Doctor Zhivago earned Sharif a best actor Golden Globe in 1966.
Sharif was easily recognized by his dashing good looks and gap-toothed smile,
and he worked steadily in the movies from his 1953 film debut in Egypt, where he was born,
onward. He notably appeared opposite Barbra Streisand in her first film, Funny Girl,
and then with Julie Andrews in the spy thriller The Tamarind Seed. By
the mid-1970s his acting career dwindled as he focused on the card game bridge.
Sharif was so successful at the game that he was ranked among the world's best players.
Sadly, in early 2015, his agent confirmed that Sharif had been
diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. The actor died July 10 of that year at the age of 83,
from a heart attack. Sharif's condition was first revealed by his son, Tarek El-Sharif,
in 2015 to the Spanish newspaper El Mundo. His son told the newspaper:
"It's difficult to determine what stage it's at.
It's obvious he'll never improve and it will get worse."
Tarek said that his father had begun showing signs of dementia three years prior. While suffering
from the degenerative disease, Omar Sharif apparently still lived a comfortable life close to
his son, only moving to a hospital at the very end of his life. The actor stayed in a luxury hotel
in a resort town in Egypt, and kept to a daily routine of sitting on his terrace during the day
and listening to live music at the hotel bar at night. But any deviation from this routine,
such as going to a restaurant in town, left Sharif insecure. His son Tarek told El Mundo,
"He still knows he's a famous actor. The loss of memory affects above all specific things,
details like when he was in a specific place or who he acted with in a specific film."
Tarek also said that his father sometimes believed that approaching fans were people he knew
and had forgotten about. A common early symptom of Alzheimer's is sudden aggression or anger,
which might explain Sharif's behavior in 2011, when he impulsively slapped a fan who had asked
for a photo with the actor. Sharif had been noted for his testiness in decades prior as well — he
faced a misdemeanor and was forced to take an anger management class in 2007 for punching a
parking valet, and also reportedly got into a fight at a Paris casino in 2003, per NBC News.
Sharif's strong will persisted even as he fought the disease — he refused to believe he was sick,
according to his son, and didn't do exercises prescribed by his doctors to prolong his life.
In his final days, when he was moved to one of Egypt's top hospitals,
Sharif refused to eat and was put on a drip.
Before his sickness and death, Sharif had a long and interesting life, even as his acting career
faded. Sharif played in international bridge tournaments and in the 1964 and 1968 Olympics
in the World Bridge Federation. He wrote books and released videos and video games on
bridge — he even published a syndicated column on the game. Sharif was such an aggressive gambler,
according to NBC News, that he once won $1 million at an Italian casino — but also
lost a villa at a card game in the 1970s. As Sharif got older, his film roles tapered off,
and when he did accept roles, he would later describe them as, quote, "rubbish."
"Look, I stopped making movies because for the last 25 years I've been making a lot of rubbish."
He declined parts in the 1990s, explaining that he had lost his, quote,
"self-respect and dignity." But he did accept a film in 2003,
a French drama titled Monsieur Ibrahim, in which he played a Muslim shopkeeper in Paris who adopts
a Jewish boy. His performance earned him the César Award, the French equivalent of the Academy Award,
and also earned Sharif some of his best reviews in decades, according to the BBC.
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