Badi Uzzaman performing in Guantánamo: Honor Bound to Defend Freedom, 2004.
The actor Badi Uzzaman, who has died from a lung infection aged 72, was perhaps best known for playing the patient in the hospital bed next to Michael Gambon in The Singing Detective (1985). The pair's camaraderie provided some of the lighter moments in Dennis Potter's TV series and showed off Uzzaman's talent for comedic roles. In their scenes together, Gambon (as Philip Marlow) and Uzzaman (as Ali) were shown to share an outsider status, Marlow due to his disfiguring skin condition and Ali due to his race.
Uzzaman again explored British attitudes toward race in Brothers in Trouble (1995), a film directed by Udayan Prasad and based on Abdullah Hussein's novel about the experiences of Pakistani illegal immigrants in Britain in the 1960s. Uzzaman himself was no stranger to the immigrant experience. He was born in Phulpur, in Azamgarh, India, and moved to Abbottabad in Pakistan. His father worked on the railways and the family relocated whenever he had a new posting, living variously in Quetta and Lahore. He graduated in English and Urdu from Government College, Abbottabad, in 1959.
He worked as a radio presenter until the launch, in 1964, of the state-owned television channel, PTV, where he began his acting career. His move to Britain came after he appeared in Salmaan Peerzada's 1984 film Maila. The film, ostensibly about a travelling fair, took a clear anti-martial law stance and fell foul of the military dictatorship of Zia-ul-Haq. Uzzaman gained asylum in Britain as a political refugee and became a British citizen.
The next year, he appeared as a drug courier in My Beautiful Laundrette (1985), written by Hanif Kureishi. In 1987, he appeared in Prasad's Arena programme for the BBC about the work of writers from the Indian subcontinent. Prasad recalled that Uzzaman played the part of the Pakistani writer Ibn-e-Insha with great comedic relish. He collaborated again with Prasad on My Son the Fanatic (1997), again written by Kureishi.
Uzzaman gradually became a familiar face on TV, with credits including Coronation Street, The Bill, Inspector Morse, Casualty, Cracker and Torchwood. His roles were often limited to supporting parts such as shopkeepers, whom he played several times. His attitude to the smaller roles was that it was better to be working than not, and he brought the same enthusiasm to each role, big or small. He was also known for entertaining the cast and crew on set. His lifelong interest in palmistry, astrology and numerology ensured that he was always in demand for a reading in between takes, and the director Gurinder Chadha credited him with predicting accurately when and how she would meet her husband.
While the shopkeeper roles continued to come in – such as in Mad Cows (1999) and Kevin and Perry Go Large (2000) – Uzzaman also appeared in more serious projects which dealt with the 11 September attacks and the "war on terror". A small part in the film Yasmin (2004) led to the more substantial role of the father of Moazzam Begg, the British-born Pakistani who was held at Guantánamo Bay, in the play Guantánamo: Honor Bound to Defend Freedom (2004), at the Tricycle theatre in London. The production was critically acclaimed and transferred to the West End. Uzzaman, who also wrote an Urdu column in the Nation, a bilingual newspaper, later took a role in Mike Leigh's film Another Year (2010), before going back to Pakistan in semi-retirement.
He is survived by two brothers, Raqeeb and Khaleeq, and a sister, Khurshid.
• Mohammed Badi Uzzaman Azmi, actor, born 8 March 1939; died 14 June 2011
Uzzaman again explored British attitudes toward race in Brothers in Trouble (1995), a film directed by Udayan Prasad and based on Abdullah Hussein's novel about the experiences of Pakistani illegal immigrants in Britain in the 1960s. Uzzaman himself was no stranger to the immigrant experience. He was born in Phulpur, in Azamgarh, India, and moved to Abbottabad in Pakistan. His father worked on the railways and the family relocated whenever he had a new posting, living variously in Quetta and Lahore. He graduated in English and Urdu from Government College, Abbottabad, in 1959.
He worked as a radio presenter until the launch, in 1964, of the state-owned television channel, PTV, where he began his acting career. His move to Britain came after he appeared in Salmaan Peerzada's 1984 film Maila. The film, ostensibly about a travelling fair, took a clear anti-martial law stance and fell foul of the military dictatorship of Zia-ul-Haq. Uzzaman gained asylum in Britain as a political refugee and became a British citizen.
The next year, he appeared as a drug courier in My Beautiful Laundrette (1985), written by Hanif Kureishi. In 1987, he appeared in Prasad's Arena programme for the BBC about the work of writers from the Indian subcontinent. Prasad recalled that Uzzaman played the part of the Pakistani writer Ibn-e-Insha with great comedic relish. He collaborated again with Prasad on My Son the Fanatic (1997), again written by Kureishi.
Uzzaman gradually became a familiar face on TV, with credits including Coronation Street, The Bill, Inspector Morse, Casualty, Cracker and Torchwood. His roles were often limited to supporting parts such as shopkeepers, whom he played several times. His attitude to the smaller roles was that it was better to be working than not, and he brought the same enthusiasm to each role, big or small. He was also known for entertaining the cast and crew on set. His lifelong interest in palmistry, astrology and numerology ensured that he was always in demand for a reading in between takes, and the director Gurinder Chadha credited him with predicting accurately when and how she would meet her husband.
While the shopkeeper roles continued to come in – such as in Mad Cows (1999) and Kevin and Perry Go Large (2000) – Uzzaman also appeared in more serious projects which dealt with the 11 September attacks and the "war on terror". A small part in the film Yasmin (2004) led to the more substantial role of the father of Moazzam Begg, the British-born Pakistani who was held at Guantánamo Bay, in the play Guantánamo: Honor Bound to Defend Freedom (2004), at the Tricycle theatre in London. The production was critically acclaimed and transferred to the West End. Uzzaman, who also wrote an Urdu column in the Nation, a bilingual newspaper, later took a role in Mike Leigh's film Another Year (2010), before going back to Pakistan in semi-retirement.
He is survived by two brothers, Raqeeb and Khaleeq, and a sister, Khurshid.
• Mohammed Badi Uzzaman Azmi, actor, born 8 March 1939; died 14 June 2011
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