Zuleikha Robinson

Zuleikha Robinson (born 29 June 1977) is a British actress. She first came to attention as Yves Adele Harlow, a mysterious thief on the 2001 series The Lone Gunmen. She has appeared in the films Hidalgo (2004), The Merchant of Venice (2004) and The Namesake (2006). Robinson later was a regular cast member on the series Lost (2009–10), the political thriller Homeland (2012) and the drama The Following (2015). In 2019, she joined the cast of Law & Order: SVU for their 21st season, in the recurring role of Assistant District Attorney Vanessa Hadid. Early life Robinson was born in London and brought up in Thailand, Singapore and Malaysia by an Indian-Burmese mother and an English father. She is also of Scottish, Burmese , Indian, Malay and Iranian descent. She is a graduate of the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in Los Angeles. She is the sister of British field botanist Dr. Alastair Robinson. Career Robinson made her film debut in the 2000 experimental film Timecode. She gained attention on the 2001 series The Lone Gunmen, part of The X-Files franchise. She played Yves Adele Harlow, a mysterious thief who often aided (and sometimes hindered) the starring trio. Robinson's first lead role brought her to Morocco, playing a 19th-century Arabian princess named Jazira, opposite Viggo Mortensen and Omar Sharif, in Disney's $80 million Western epic Hidalgo (2004), directed by Joe Johnston. The film tells the story of long-distance endurance horse rider, Frank Hopkins. In 2006, she played a Bengali character called Moushumi Mazumdar in Mira Nair's acclaimed film The Namesake, based on the book of the same name.