Operandi Gerhana's Fir Rahman On Following Aaron Aziz's Action Hero Footsteps: "I'm Too Old Already, Bro"

Fir Rahman hopes his latest role will score brownie points with action enthusiasts who only know him from his dramas.

Operandi Gerhana (or Phantom Squad), now streaming on mewatch and Netflix, follows the exploits of Omar (Fir) and Yusof (Malaysia’s Kamal Adli), two undercover cops leading an anti-triad task force in 1955 Singapore. (Picture Mata Mata but filtered through The Untouchables.)

The six-part, filmed-on-Batam Malay language series also stars Jamie Aditya, Carmen Soo, Alaric Tay, Cassandra Spykerman, Aaron Mossadeg and Shane Mardjuki.

While Fir is no stranger to action — he appeared in the 2018 Malaysian film Polis Evo 2 — Operandi Gerhana was entirely a different beast. “This is more chia lat!” he tells 8days.sg over Zoom.

In Polis Evos 2, Fir’s badassery was limited to handling firearms, but in Operandi Gerhana, he had to jump down from the second floor (“when you look down, your b***s are in your throat”), outrun a fireball (“you can feel the heat and all”), and throw a few punches here and there. 

Fir recalls performing a fight sequence with a stuntman, a real-life silat competitor, who really took his job seriously. So much so that the Lion Mums alum urged him to dial down his intensity: “I told him, ‘Bro, bro, this is just acting.’”

Occasionally, the play-pretend would inevitably end up real. “I accidentally punched a stuntman on his forehead and he had this baluku”, he says. “I also injured my finger which took two months to heal completely.”

Fir chalked up his garang-ness to his regular workout regimen (he's a certified personal trainer) and a kick-ass stunt team, Ronin Action Group — led by the Golden Horse Award-nominated action choreographer/actor Sunny Pang, who have a few scenes in the show as a gangster (surprise, surprise) — watching his six.

“The Ronin guys were really helpful — we really needed them, seriously.”

Elsewhere, to get under the skin of a PTSD-stricken veteran who served during the Malayan Emergency, Fir looked at American Sniper for pointers.

“I didn’t want to watch too many references because I might be copying them too much,” he says. “I told [director] Mike [Wiluan] I want to do my own [take on PTSD]. Mike encouraged me to play Omar low-key, while he let Kamal play Yusof as this larger-than-life character, so we can see the contrast.”

The father of four continues, “The last time I played this kind of [subdued] character was in Apprentice,” referring to Boo Junfeng’s 2016 death penalty drama where he portrayed an executioner.

On working with Kamal for the first time, Fir admits that it took him some time to get a hang of his co-lead's MO. “Kamal likes to ad-lib a lot, which is fine,” he says.

“It makes his character believable and natural, but when he got too comfortable at ad-libbing, he would throw in some modern Malaysian lingo, which is very far off from the 1950s vernacular. Each time we wandered off too much, I’d say, ‘Hey, bro, come back, come back.’”

Other than that, they got along swimmingly. “We clicked well because we shared the same chalet [at Nongsa Point Marina] during production,” Fir says. “So every day we saw each other’s face, we ate together — that was how we built our bond. He’s easy to work with.”

Sparring with Jamie onscreen was something else too. While the former MTV VJ played an unhinged thug, off-screen, “he’s still as goofy, and he loves to sing and he would entertain us between takes,” Fir says. But like Kamal, Jamie had issues delivering lines in period-authentic Malay. “Because he’s so used to Bahasa Indonesia, at times, he would have problems with the pronunciation.

“We could see from his face that he was trying to memorise the lines instead of being in character. We had to do a few takes. Mike had to give him more time and we, as his co-actors, had to be more patient with him. But, all in all, what you see onscreen is his best lah, so really kudos to him.”

Does Fir plan to follow Aaron Aziz’s footsteps and explore opportunities in Malaysia as an action hero?

As much as he loves to, he believes that that train has already left the station. “I’m too old already, bro,” says Fir, 42. “Aaron Aziz moved to Malaysia when he was in his 20s.”

Too old? Surely, he’s heard of this guy named Liam Neeson? He was 56 when Taken reinvented him into an action icon.

“I don’t mind going over to Malaysia and do those action movies — I’m just waiting for the opportunities. I’m not saying no, but if you know, maybe after they see Operandi Gerhana, they’ll go, ‘Oh, who is this guy playing opposite Kamal?' Maybe they’ll call me. Yeah, of course, I’ll go over. Why not?”

Operandi Gerhana (Phantom Squad) is now on mewatch and Netflix. It’s also on Suria, Mon-Thur, 10.30pm, starting Oct 2. Watch the first episode here: