Homayoun Ershadi Age, Death, Wife, Children, Family, Biography

Bio/Wiki
Other Name	Homayon Ershadi
Profession	Architect-turned-actor
Famous for	Acting in films like Zero Dark Thirty and The Kite Runner
Physical Stats
Height (approx.)	5' 8" (173 cm)
Eye Colour	Brown
Hair Colour	Salt & pepper
Career
Debut	Persian Film: Taste of Cherry in 1997 (as Mr Badii) English Film: The Kite Runner in 2007 (as Baba)
Last Film	Persian Film: The Town in 2022 English Film: A Most Wanted Man in 2014 (as Dr. Faisal Abdullah)
Awards	• Best Actor for Short Film Award for Blue Lantern at Sepanta Awards in 2017 • Best Lead Actor Award for Waiting for Kiarostami in 2017
Personal Life
Date of Birth	26 March 1947 (Wednesday)
Birthplace	Isfahan, Iran
Date of Death	11 November 2025
Place of Death	Isfahan, Iran
Age (at the time of death)	78 Years
Death Cause	Cancer
Zodiac sign	Aries
Nationality	Iranian
Hometown	Isfahan, Iran
College/University	Ca' Foscari University of Venice, Italy
Educational Qualification	Bachelor's degree in architecture (graduated in 1970)
Religion	Islam
Food Habit	Non-vegetarian
Social Media	• Instagram • Threads
Relationships & More
Marital Status (at the time of death)	Widower
Family
Wife/Spouse	Susan Karimi
Children	Son- Houman Daughter- 1
Other Relatives	Grandchildren- 5 • Anthony • Michael • Nicholas Son-in-law- Paul

Some Lesser Known Facts About Homayoun Ershadi

• Homayoun Ershadi was born in Isfahan, Iran.

• After completing his studies, he worked as an architect in Iran for several years. In 1980, following the Islamic Revolution, he moved to Vancouver, Canada, with his wife and family.

• He worked there in an architectural firm until the early 1990s. After his marriage ended and his children grew up, he returned to Iran to live near his parents and siblings.

• Ershadi’s two children settled in Vancouver, where he visited often to see his five grandchildren.

• In the mid-1990s, while sitting in his car at a traffic light in Tehran, he was approached by Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami.

• Kiarostami introduced himself and invited Ershadi to act in his new film Taste of Cherry (1997). Ershadi accepted and played the lead role of a man searching for someone to bury him after his planned suicide.

• The film won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival in 1997 and launched Ershadi’s acting career. After this success, he left architecture to continue acting full-time.

• In 1998, he acted in The Pear Tree, directed by Dariush Mehrjui. He later appeared in Portrait of a Lady Far Away by Ali Mosaffa in 2005.

• By 2006, Ershadi had just finished reading Khaled Hosseini’s novel The Kite Runner when he received a call from a London casting agent.

• The agent invited him to audition for the film adaptation of the book. Two weeks later, he flew to Kabul, Afghanistan, to meet director Marc Forster.

• Forster was auditioning Afghan actors and children for roles in the $20 million production. Ershadi initially told Forster that he did not resemble the character Baba, who was described in the book as a tall, large man.
  

  Homayoun Ershadi in a scene of The Kite Runner

• Despite this, Forster asked him to read his lines, and after three readings, selected him for the role. The film, The Kite Runner (2007), was shot in San Francisco and Kashgar, China, due to instability in Afghanistan.

• The story depicted three decades of Afghan history, focusing on friendship, betrayal, and redemption. Ershadi’s role as Baba earned him international praise for portraying a strong but emotionally distant father.

• During filming, he met the novel’s author, Khaled Hosseini, who visited the set with his father. Ershadi described the young Afghan actors as intelligent and natural performers who needed little rehearsal.

• Following the film’s release, Ershadi became widely recognised among Western audiences. He later appeared in Alejandro Amenábar’s Agora (2009) and Kathryn Bigelow’s Zero Dark Thirty (2012).

• He acted in Anton Corbijn’s A Most Wanted Man (2014) and Asif Kapadia’s Ali and Nino (2016). In 2018, author Nicole Krauss published a short story titled Seeing Ershadi in The New Yorker, inspired by him.
  

  Homayoun Ershadi during the shoot of Ali and Nino

• Ershadi continued working in Iranian films, including Lelah, Mahoor, and The Hill of Kites. He was also rumored to have been cast in Terrence Malick’s project The Way of the Wind, though it was not confirmed.

• Ershadi lived partly in Iran and partly in Canada, visiting his family frequently.

• He passed away on 11 November 2025 after a battle with cancer, at the age of 78.