Khandkar Mohammad Adil Hussain is an Indian actor who is known for his work in several Indian independent and mainstream film productions, as well as international cinema, in films such as The Reluctant Fundamentalist and Life of Pi (both 2012). He received National Film Awards (Special Jury) at the 2017 National Film Awards for Hotel Salvation and Maj Rati Keteki.

Early Life and Education

Born in an Assamese Muslim family in Goalpara, Assam on 5 October 1963, where his father was the headmaster of a high secondary school, Hussain was the youngest of seven children. Hussain's family comes from long line of private tutors (khandkar) to emperors. In an interview he described his multiethnic background, as his maternal grandfather was Iraqi while his maternal grandmother had Assamese, English and Italian roots.

Hussain acted in school plays. He left home at age 18 to study philosophy at B. Borooah College, Guwahati, he started acting in college plays and performing as a stand-up comedian.

He also mimicked popular Bollywood actors in between the performances of a local stand-up comedian group, the Bhaya Mama Group. He worked as a stand-up comedian for six years, joined a mobile theatre and also did some local cinema, before moving to Delhi, where he studied at National School of Drama (1990–1993). He also studied at the Drama Studio London on a Charles Wallace India Trust Scholarship.

Career

After his return to India in 1994, Hussain joined the mobile 'Hengul Theater' in Assam, where he worked for three years, before moving to Delhi. He started his stage career in Delhi, though he continued training under Khalid Tyabji. After Tyabji he trained with Swapan Bose at Sri Aurobindo Ashram, Pondicherry, before starting training with Dilip Shankar in Delhi.

As an actor, he first received acclaim in Othello: A Play in Black and White (1999), which was awarded the Edinburgh Fringe First, and later Goodbye Desdemona also directed by Roysten Abel. He remained the artistic director and Trainer of the Society for Artists and Performers in Hampi from 2004 to 2007, and a visiting faculty at Royal Conservatory of Performing Arts, The Hague. He is also a visiting faculty at his alma mater, the National School of Drama.

In 2004, he made his Bengali film debut along with Soha Ali Khan in the period drama Iti Srikanta, where he played the lead role. On television, he appeared in the lead role, in the detective series Jasoos Vijay (2002–2003), produced by BBC World Service Trust.

Though he had appeared in a few Assamese films, did a small roles in Vishal Bhardwaj's Kaminey and Sona Jain's For Real, it was his role in Abhishek Chaubey's Ishqiya (2010) that got him attention in Bollywood, though his first major role was in Saif Ali Khan-Kareena Kapoor Khan starrer Agent Vinod released in early 2012. In the same year, he appeared in Italian director Italo Spinelli's Gangor, Mira Nair's The Reluctant Fundamentalist, and Ang Lee's Life of Pi.

He next appeared alongside Sridevi in the comedy drama English Vinglish (2012), and also received critical acclaim for his role in Lessons in Forgetting at the New Jersey Independent South Asian Cine Fest. After these he acted in Aditya Bhattacharya's Bombay Most Wanted and Partho Sen-Gupta's Sunrise.

Life Membership

In 2013, after having conducted a film workshop at University Film Club, Aligarh Muslim University, Hussain was granted a lifetime membership in the university's film club. Hussain has been honoured by Sandeep Marwah with the life membership of International Film And Television Club of Asian Academy of Film & Television at Noida Film City.

Personal Life

During the 1999 Edinburgh Film Festival, Hussain, cast as Othello, fell in love with Kristen Jain, who was playing Desdemona. He ended up tightly hugging her, much to her and the audience's shock, instead of "killing" her as per the script, thus forcing the curtains to be brought down immediately. They eventually got married eight years later, in 2007.