Sacha Baron Cohen: FBI Started File On Me After Borat Terrorist Complaints

Sacha Baron Cohen has revealed that the FBI started compiling a file about him following the making of comedy hit ‘Borat’.

The British comedy star seemingly piqued the interest of the Federal Bureau of Investigation because Americans thought he was a terrorist.

Speaking on Marc Maron’s WTF podcast, he said: “[The FBI] got so many complaints there was a terrorist traveling in an ice cream van. It was a couple of years after 9/11.

“So the FBI got so many complaints that they started compiling a little file on us and eventually they came to visit us at the hotel.

“I obviously went missing when I heard because they were like ‘FBI’s downstairs. Sacha, disappear’. Because they didn’t want me to be apprehended.”

The 2006 movie, full title 'Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan’, made Cohen a star in the US.

It also scooped an impressive £187 million from a relatively tiny £13 million budget.

Cohen went on to explain how he was warned during the making of 'Bruno’, his outwardly gay Austrian fashionista character, that the Kansas police warned him and the crew they’d be arrested if anything went awry during the shoot.

“We hire a guy and his job is, he’s a bit like [Grimsby’s] Nobby, actually… his job is to prevent me from being arrested,” he added, explaining once incident where he was warned of the arriving police and had to jump from a window, breaking his heel and delaying production in the process.

He also spoke about how his run-ins with the law have only lead him to push things further.

“When we’re making the film, we’re like 10 guys on the road, and you get addicted to the adrenaline. Once you beat the cops once, you go 'right, great, what can we do now?’ Then you beat the FBI.”

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Image credits: Universal/Fox