Zahirah Macwilson turned 27 last February; her son, Isaac, celebrated his first birthday bash the month before. In 2020, she debuted in Bulan dan Pria Terhebat, an action-packed comedy film directed by Ghaz Abu Bakar, as Bulan, a fierce Indonesian special forces trainee who gets embroiled in a human-trafficking syndicate while trying to find her kidnapped sister, Melati.
Then, just a day after her cover shoot and a scant few hours before our interview, both her and her manager had another project that lasted till two in the morning. “It is what it is,” they both said, and waved away my concerned tittering with serene expressions.
Her father, Zainol Macwilson, is a veteran in both the local entertainment industry and out—literally, because not only is the man an actor who starred in 40 television dramas in the ’90s and had five films to his name, including the decade’s iconic Jimi Asmara, he was once a corporal that served in the British Army in the ’80s, touring in then West Germany as well as Northern Ireland. He was contemporaries with many of Malaysia’s biggest names, such as Tiara Jacquelina, Ridzuan Hashim, Alice Voon and Dato’ Jalaluddin Hassan.