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Elite Season 8, which dropped on Netflix last Friday, July 26, 2024, features Moroccan-Spanish actress Mina El Hammani returning as Nadia Shanaa in Netflix's longest-running Spanish messy, murderous high school drama.
El Hammani has worked on a dozen Spanish projects on both film and television before she was recognized as a scholarship student at Las Encinas in Elite. She is known for her performances in the long-running crime drama Serve and Protect as Salima and in Prime Video's mystery thriller The Boarding School: Las Cumbres as Elvira.
In Elite Season 8, viewers will see El Hammani's ambitious Nadia back in the halls of Las Encinas, four whole seasons after she went to study in New York after receiving a scholarship. She reunites with her brother, Omar, as one last mystery shakes the very foundation of the school.
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Exploring Mina El Hammani's career beyond Elite Season 8
Mina El Hammani, who grew up with her Morrocan parents in Madrid, Spain, was just beginning her acting career before the global pandemic hit. Her earliest project, per her IMDB page, was the Spanish drama thriller El Principe, where she joined the cast to play the character of Nur in the show's second season in 2015 until its season finale in 2016.
She went from a successful season in one show to the next, her second major role being in the long-running Spanish TV series Servir y Proteger, aka Serve and Protect, as Salima. She joined the star-studded cast in the show's debut season in 2017, meanwhile, El Hammani continued to appear in guest roles in shows La queue see avecina and The State.
However, it was in 2018 when the Spanish-Moroccan actress landed a role that would gain her immense notoriety in the acting scene—she was cast as Nadia Shanaa in Netflix's crime-drama thriller Elite. She reprised her role as one of the main high school students in Las Encinas for three seasons before she exited the show when season 3 ended.
Praised for her portrayal in the Netflix series, El Hammani later landed the role of Elvira in another teen drama, this time for Amazon Prime Video, called El Internado, aka The Boarding School. She reprised her role in the series for two more series, all while filming for her movie debut in the Spanish comedy Mañana es hoy.
Mina El Hammani also had recurring roles in TV shows Black Sunday and Silent Cargo before she returned to Las Encinas to reprise her role as Nadia in Elite Season 8, which would be the show's final season.
What to know about Mina El Hammani's Nadia in Elite
Mina El Hammani joined the Elite cast as Nadia Shanaa, who is a Palestinian Muslim who entered the upper-class private school Las Encinas on scholarship. In the first season, she faced discrimination from other students comparing her to Islamic terrorist groups and the principal who warned her that she would get expelled if she didn't remove her hijab.
Season 2 featured more of the budding romance between El Hammani's character and Guzman (played by Miguel Bernardeau) and her friendship with Rebeka (played by Claudia Salas). She returned in season 3 confused between Guzman, who she knew wasn't good for her, and a new guy with whom her parents would be impressed. The third season also saw Nadia competing for a scholarship to study in New York.
After going to New York in season 3, Nadia doesn't return to the series until Elite Season 8, where she is first spotted in the series trailer roaming the halls of Las Encinas and remembering key moments from her high school. She returns to Elite season 8 to support her younger brother, Omar, who also returns to their high school to collect some documents.
The actress got candid about her character in the show during a feature with Harper's Bazaar Arabia, published in October 2020. She shared:
"She's such a beautiful character and she made me tell myself what it is that I want. She's a very strong woman."
Catch all episodes of Elite Season 8, along with previous seasons of the show, now streaming on Netflix.
