Hamza Ali Abbasi

Abbasi was born into a Punjabi[7][8] family of civil servants to Major (Retd) Mazhar Ali Abbasi, an army officer, and Begum Nasim Akhtar Chaudhry, a politician affiliated with the Pakistan Peoples Party.[9] His sister, Fazeela Abbasi, is a dermatologist.[10]

He gained his Bachelor's in International Relations from the United States and his Master's in the same subject from the Quaid-e-Azam University.[11][12]

He also passed the CSS exams and was working as a civil service officer in the police group before abandoning the job to concentrate on his passions, film-making and acting.[13]

He started his career in 2006 as a theatre actor and appeared in several plays such as Bombay Dreams, Phantom of the Opera, and Home is Where Your Clothes Are. He made his directorial debut with the feature film Mud House and the Golden Doll, which he describes as a simple story about simple people.[14] He considers his breakthrough to be the movie Waar (2013) : he was initially an assistant director to Bilal Lashari, before the later offered him a role in the movie, that he considers important for his future career.[11] He voiced Baba Bandook, the main antagonist, and Vadero Pajero in the Unicorn Black produced animated series, Burka Avenger.[15]

Being a supporter of the political party Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, of which he was elected the cultural secretary in January 2018 before quitting the function in April of the same year because he didn't feel "to represent Pakistan’s culture" through his movies,[16] it has led Abbasi to release controversial statements and accusation over twitter and BOL Network.

In 2018 he exposed journalist and former wife of Imran Khan, Reham Khan, by revealing the manuscript of the book beforehand. She also claimed to have been threatened directly by Humza Ali Abbasi via emails. When Abbasi denied the claim, Khan further stated that it was gimmick of Reham Khan's to malign him because of his closeness to Imran Khan.[17]

Abbasi is a Muslim.[18]

• Hamza Ali Abbasi on IMDb