Adeel Akhtar
British actor celebrated for his BAFTA-winning dramatic range, from darkly comic roles to emotionally powerful lead performances on stage and screen.
Adeel Akhtar - Personal Information
- Name: Adeel Akhtar
- Date of Birth: September 18, 1980
- Place of Birth: London, England, UK
- Gender: Male
- Job Title: Actor
Biography
Akhtar is known for the bumbling Muslim extremist Faisal in Chris Morris's film Four Lions. Other comedic performances include Gupta in The Angelos Epithemiou Show, Maroush in The Dictator and Smee in Joe Wright and Pan.
Akhtar has also won acclaim for his dramatic performances: in 2015, he was nominated for a BAFTA for Best Supporting Actor for his 2014 role as Wilson Wilson on Channel 4's Utopia. He played shopkeeper Ahmed alongside Toby Jones in the BBC mini-series Capital, and DS Ira King in the BBC's River. Reviewing River in The Daily Telegraph, Michael Hogan wrote, "This series was beautifully written by Abi Morgan, stylishly directed, and most of all, superbly acted. The quieter, less showy supporting players also shone. Not just stalwarts [...] but fresher faces: Adeel Akhtar as River's endlessly patient sidekick and Georgina Rich as his psychiatrist".
In 2016 Akhtar appeared as Shahzad in the BBC one-off drama Murdered by My Father. He won the 2017 BAFTA award for Lead Actor for this role, the first non-white actor to do so. He also appeared as Rob Singhal in the acclaimed BBC miniseries based on John le Carré's The Night Manager.
Adeel became a patron of Half Moon Theatre in autumn 2016.
Selected Filmography
A selection of Adeel Akhtar's most notable recent screen and stage appearances.
- National Theatre Live: The Estate (2025) as Angad Singh
- Down Cemetery Road (TV - 2025) as Hamza Malik
- Black Doves (TV - 2024) as Prime Minister Eaves
- Fool Me Once (TV - 2024) as Sami Kierce
- Dickens: Phantoms and Fiction (2023) as Readings
- The Walk (2023) as Amar
- The Puppet Asylum (2023) as The Narrator
- Murder Mystery 2 (2023) as The Maharajah
- Enola Holmes 2 (2022) as Lestrade
- Sherwood (TV - 2022) as Andy Fisher
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