Andrew Divoff

In 2015 and 2016, Divoff had a recurring role as Karakurt in Season 3 of The Blacklist in episodes "The Djinn," "Sir Crispin Crandall," "Zal Bin Hasaan," "Kings of the Highway," "The Director," and "The Director: Conclusion."

in 2014, Divoff developed his own craft beer, the Djinn's Hellabrew, which he has sold to benefit charities including Smile Train, Operation Provider, and the Hollywood Police Activities League. In 2017, Divoff formed his own brewing company, Three Marm Brewing, a "marm" being the part of a tree trunk that forks into two or more trunks. The partners of Three Marm Brewing are predominately members of Divoff's former logging crew. Divoff and his partners are planning to open a taproom in Crestline, California, and have other new beer flavors in development, including the Logger Lager and Mystic Mast Stout.

Other recurring television roles included his turn as Ivan Sarnoff on CSI: Miami Season 7 (2008–2009). Ivan Sarnoff was a Russian Mobster leader who owned an MMA fighting studio in S07E04 Raging Cannibal. Ivan also ran a horse race betting scam in S07E13 And They're Offed. Then Ivan targets the CSI team in S07E19 Target Specific. In the last episode of the season, Ivan escapes an assassination attempt by the Russian mob in S07E25 Seeing Red.

Divoff had a recurring role on Lost (Seasons 3 and 6, 2006-2007 and 2010 respectively) as Mikhail Bakunin, a Russian member of the Others who lived in the Flame station of the DHARMA Initiative. He appeared in "The Cost of Living", and later in "Enter 77" and "Par Avion". He later appeared, in flashbacks, in "One of Us," and reappeared in the episodes "D.O.C.", "The Man Behind the Curtain", "Through the Looking Glass" and "The Package".

in 1999, Divoff and a friend penned a script for a third film called Wishmaster: The Third Millennium, which had a Y2K theme involving "American warship in Asia and it is hit by a missile, and all hell breaks loose. Incidentally, there is a meeting going on at the UN and monsters come to life right there and go through the crowd and start ripping it up." Divoff's script also required lavish special effects, and featured "gargoyles on buildings coming to life and coming down into the street."

1997 proved to be another breakthrough year for Divoff, with the release of Air Force One and Wishmaster. In his portrayal of a Russian terrorist henchman in Air Force One, as in many other films, Divoff performed his own stunts. Divoff stated in an interview that he has performed his own stunts so frequently that it is often assumed that he used to be a professional stuntman, however, this is not the case. He simply preferred to perform his own stunts because it gave him complete control over every aspect of his characters.

Divoff states that he is passionate about environmental issues and water rights, and believes that the best form of activism is simply to help people in need. Several years after his move from actor William Boyd's former home in Hollywood to the Lake Arrowhead region of the San Bernardino Mountains in 1992, Divoff formed a logging crew during a time when he described acting opportunities as scarce. Divoff and his crew focused on removing trees that were dead or dying due to a pine beetle infestation.

Prior to 1990, Divoff landed small roles in big films such as The Hunt for Red October, and big roles in smaller projects such as television movie Fear Stalk, in which he portrayed a serial stalker - his first role as primary villain.

Divoff's breakthrough role came in 1990, when he was cast as the outlaw biker Cherry Ganz in Another 48 Hours. Divoff was vacationing in Berlin when he received the call that he won the role. He went out to celebrate at a nearby pub and then attended the tearing down of the Berlin Wall, grabbing a sledgehammer and participating in the Wall's destruction. Divoff marks Another 48 Hrs. as the film that allowed him to quit his limo driving job and focus on acting.

Divoff has pursued a number of other business ventures in addition to professional acting, and uses many of these businesses as a springboard for philanthropic and environmentalist efforts. In the early 1990s, he was a co-owner of the blues bar and restaurant Sunset Social Club.

His first film role was in the 1986 cult horror film Neon Maniacs, in which he played a demonic surgeon. Divoff had a falling out with the filmmakers due to what he believed constituted animal abuse: real dead pigeons were used in one of the film's scenes.

After returning to California, Divoff worked as a dispatcher for a limousine company, eventually becoming a limo driver in 1983. During his evenings off, Divoff took acting lessons; his teachers included Milton Katselas, director of Butterflies are Free. His first role was that of a Russian guard for a 1986 episode of Misfits of Science. Divoff won the role via a telephone audition, in which was asked to scream, "Stop that truck!" in Russian and then in English with a Russian accent.

Divoff's subsequent TV appearances in the 1980s included bit parts and work as an extra in The A-Team, The Twilight Zone, MacGuyver, Scarecrow and Mrs. King, and Matlock. Divoff's multilingual skills and international background helped win him some of these early roles. When auditioning for a guest role as a limo driver for Thirtysomething, Divoff pretended to be a Russian immigrant, and maintained the farce on set until the filming ended, dropping the Russian accent entirely.

Divoff's mother worked for the State Department, and he moved with her when she was transferred to Spain. Divoff lived five years in Vilassar de Mar (Catalonia), between 1973 and 1977, feeling himself to be Catalan too. While in Spain, Divoff tutored English-speaking students in Spanish and attended the University of Barcelona, where he completed a research project on linguistics in The Canterbury Tales. He transferred his credits to Georgetown University, where he continued his study of languages and linguistics, and has resided in the United States ever since. Divoff did not graduate from Georgetown University, instead deciding to take a year off to help his father settle in California for retirement.

Andrew Daniel Divoff (Russian: Андрей Ди́вов , correctly transcribed as Divov; born July 2, 1955) is a Venezuelan actor and producer of Irish and Russian descent. Divoff has played many villains in film and on television, including drug cartel leaders, terrorists, and organized crime bosses, though he is best known for playing the evil Djinn/Nathaniel Demerest in the first two Wishmaster films. Other noteworthy roles include the villains Luis Cali in Toy Soldiers, Cherry Ganz in Another 48 Hrs., Ernesto Mendoza in A Low Down Dirty Shame, Boris Bazylev in Air Force One, M (short for as Mephistopheles) in Faust: Love of the Damned, Ivan Sarnoff in CSI: Miami, Mikhail Bakunin in Lost, and Karakurt in The Blacklist.